Advice needed on selling Slings

Hello. Thanks to breeding, I was able to have a lot of great experiences with scorpions thus far. However, I'm beginning to worry that I'm going to have way too many. I have been planning on selling them, but what I was offered wasn't very high.

My jacksoni, I have 2 adults, 3 4th instar, and 23 third instar.

My Mordax is now gravid, and I can see embryos.

My Emperor is about to Pop.


zzzzzzzzz I already have 30 scorpions, and 50-60 will be a bit much.

I talked to a scorpion/tarantula dealer who I befriended, and they offered me 5$ each for the 3rd instar slings, and I would assume that they would buy the emperor slings at 2-3 dollars possibly. Mordax, I will work with them most likely.

Have you ever not been able to sell your slings? Are the above prices fair? If you weren't a dealer trying to make money, would you separate the sexes of the more common species?

When I needed to sell mordax babies because of bills one year, all 10 I had sold within a couple days.

When I had 80 and was offering up half for sale the following fall, nothing sold.

Sometimes it's the economy, sometimes it's the luck of the draw, sometimes it's what's "in" at the moment.

Thank you for the help. For an update, I did a guy interesting in New York.. And gave him a great deal in my opinion, which ended up just being another dollar per 3-4 instar and 10$ for adults.

The thing is, that female just gave birth AGAIN! It has been 2 months? Another huge brood, and I haven't lost any due to molting yet in either batch. My roaches cannot keep up with the feeding demands. They don't breed fast enough! haha.

The price for B. jacksoni should be dropping to about nothing before long. From what I understand in talking with dealers, they can buy them for nothing.. or their stock breeds easily, and they are still selling for 15-35 dollars per B. jacksoni. Then again "pest species" of scorpions down south still sell for 15$ which is shocking.

I'm unloading anything that breeds this quickly, and now focusing on harder to find/more expensive scorpions with slower/more diminished fecundity.

The same scorp gave birth to another large brood 2 months later?

Man, I feel left out. I bought five slings to hopefully start up a breeding project, only two made it to adulthood, and the male died two weeks after the female matured.

binksyboy3 wrote:

The same scorp gave birth to another large brood 2 months later?

That's been documented in this species.

Wow! You learn something new everyday.

I know the OP found resolution. But I wanted to add some things for those that follow or next time the OP has more broods.

For a lps, the prices you mentioned are reasonable. Remember, they have access to large distributors/importers that you don't, unless you have a wholesale license.


In the year I've been selling scorpions, I have noticed something that may help you out in the long term. I have seen over time, as I post in forums, and put up pictures, care sheets, and the like, that I have a lot more interest when I have sales.

People appreciate help, pics, vids, info, et al. They come to know, like, and trust you. They know you know what you are doing. They know they will get healthy and well taken care of scorpions.

Really and truly, this will help a lot. I don't even have to put my sales lists on the boards now. I have a list I can email and most of them will be sold almost immediately.....

Another thing I wanted to add,.... I would not personally only have the rarest of the rare.
If all you have is super hot/rare species, you will have a limited customer base. If you are selling 2i's, and your cheapest species is $30 a pop, you won't have a huge audience.
Plus, I think you will find people getting 10 B. jacksoni, sometimes picking up a P. transvaalicus or two sometimes too. But I guess that's up to you, and your time allowances etc. Maybe it would be fine. But If I ever get a chance to breed a lot again, you better believe I want to have a diverse selection of venom/rarity's in my room!

~r

Would you ship them