Just want to know if I am doing things right. (updated 18/04/2010)

I thought I'd give you guys an idea of my everyday care for my two emporer's, Mog-Phauru and Gilgaol.

SETUP:
My set up is a 10 gallon tank, with two hides one on each side, there was at one time a third hide but Mog And Gil
seem to spend alot of time in each others company. I personally like to beleive that it's because their a happy couple.
I've tried to sex them as best I can, Mog has heart shaped Pentitles or whatever their called underneath him/her with finer 'feathers' is what they remind me off.. Like wings.. Anways, Gil's are much broader and wider spread. Mog is also the bigger of the pair, which also leads me to beleive him/her is female.. From what I understand the male is ussally the smaller in arachinds. The water dish is betwen the two of them.. Right now I am using Coco husk, I was using cocofiber before but had to change the substrate a while ago.. If you've read some posts by me before you might remember my freak out over baby crickets.. I don't really like the husk but can't find fiber anywhere..(Edit: I have now changed it to coco-fiber.) I've forgone the false bottom and just pour a glass of room temp water in when it looks a bit dry. Their water dish is in the middle of the two hides, it is big enough for one of them to fit in at a time.(I'd add pictures but I don't have a camera.. I really want one so I can show my babys off. Also I have ordered a heating mat which will be placed at the back wall of the tank. Edit: I have the heating mat now, I have it placed in the left corner behind one of the hides, if they want it warmthey can go into a burrow on the left. Cool, on the right.)

FEEDING:
I feed them big crickets, I put about 4 in their a week and leave them untill their gone.. Strange as it seems I am more afraid of the crickets then the scorpions themselves.. I've had them for about a month and a half, and they've fed cleared out the tank 3x. Also they've ate a couple meal worms each, when I was unable to procure crickets.
I also noticed that they were not eating the crickets, who seemed to stay ontop of the false plant.. Which I removed so they couldn't and withn the next day their was 1 of 3 crickets left and the last one was gone withn a couple days.. Then I went a week without feeding them, my crickets had died and I didn't have enough money to get to the petstore and get crickets.. They we're pretty active throughout that time period.. So I think their fine, I hear they can go quiet a while without food. I just put in my ussall 4 crickets in.. Hope to see a few gone in the morning.

BEHAVIOUR:
Okay, these guys are like day and night.
Gilgaol can be reqognized for his attuitde, you disturb him and he is instanly on the defensive, tail at the poised, pincers ready. He has even taken a swip at the tongs once when I was replacing the water dish. Gilgaol will come out every now and then, do his rounds of trying to skitter up the corner of the tank, maybe walk through the water dish once ot twice, then back to his hide. He will always go to the hide where Mog is.
Mog-Phauru on the other hand is very docile, most times when I try to lead prey towards her she will flick it away.
She tends to stay in the hide more then Gilgaol. She will come out pretty much only once a week, twice at most, and walk around. She will not always try to skitter up the side like Gilgaol, but she will sometimes. She will get defensive, but it takes a bit more then Gil, basicly breathing on her.. Yes, I've done it once or twice cause I have been deathly afraid she's dead. Mog will also sometimes seek out the other smaller hide for a day or two. Mog has a brown telson, Gil has a brown one.

18/04/2010
Update: Little bit of a scuffle today as I put them in the tank with the new substrate, mog went back in first and found a nitch, which I hope will become a burrow. I went away for about a half hour and put Gilgaol in. He explored a bit, looked at the other nitches, Right and in the middle, and then went to Mog's nitch, Mog didn't really like that and tried to kick him out.. He presisted and then she just semed to give up, he got inside moved a bit of subsrate around and laid down beside her.

Give me some input, tell me what I am doing right or wrong. Also if you'd like mor einfo on something.. I'd like to think I have been paying them quiet a bit of attention, even if it is just to a hole most of the time.

lol my female stays in her burrow a lot too, i recently had to dig her up in order to add some more coco fiber and make sure she was ok. but as i have learned on this forum they are know as pet holes which is pretty obvious.

your diet for them sounds pretty good, mine will only eat two crickets at a time about once a week (i need to feed her tomorrow) but when she is out of her burrow she is very active clicking her claws against the tank wall an such.

in all i think you are doing great, and keep up the good work, also try to find coco fiber i think its better than the husk...

I also think the fiber is much better then the husk, I have been scouring the pet stores.. I think I may resort to asking for them to order some for me..

yeah thats a good idea, whereabouts are you? i every shop near me has coco fiber, its kinda strange that the ones near you dont have any unless its a shop that doesnt usually have arachnids or anything like that...

Nanaimo B.C. and no, the shops around here ussally don't.. THese guys were a specail find for me at one of them.

oh ok then that explains it lol. you could probably find it online, or the shop may be gracious enough to order you some as you said, either way good luck!

if its a private owned shop, they can order it...
just make sure they know it comes from the company Zoo-med....

if its a chain type (petco, petsmart, pet supermarket, etc, etc) they should carry it because you can also use coco fiber for other burrowing arachnids and a few burrowing reptiles...

if you want to go the cheaper and simpler route...

http://www.drsfostersmith.com

go to reptile supplies and look in the substrate section...
this is a website i go to for a few supplies whenever my friend at the pet store irritates me...
i also use this site for all my freshwater fish needs (i have 3 major freshwater tanks to run and they have ALOT of stuff i use for them)

not too mention when i get a leopard gecko anytime here in the near future...ill go to them for all my needs also

This may sound kinda werid.. But I'd like to rasie my own crickets and meal worms..

I just got a pic of Gilgaol feeding, luckily one of the people who were over had a camera.. I hope to have it emailed back to me soon. I will then post it.

crickets are simple from what ive heard...

i think meal worms are a little more difficult because they eventually turn into little black beetles....i could be wrong and just confused between them and another feeder...

Yes, mealworms tearn into a black bettle, which there probably is a use for..

Mog came out of the hide as well tonight! Recovering well from her little bit of cold weather last night. She went back in though, she's alot fatter then Gil, so her not feeding doesn't really bug me..

lol yeah...id hold off on feeding her for a little while...

Well, not alot alot but she is bigger, I don't think she is over fed. She isn't bulging, anyways. Any secrets on making crickets be quiet?

make them quiet??
ive never heard a sound from my tank, and i feed both my emperors 3 each...
well nevermind i take that back...last time i fed them on the 13th, the guy at the pet store gave me 8 crickets so they got 4 each...but i still never heard a sound out of them...

Well, for some reason these crickets are always going off with their little cricket sound.. It's not the ones in the tank so much as the ones kept in pantry..

i guess they just do what comes natural when theyre in a container in a dark area?

i really have no idea...i didnt even ever think about it until you said something about them chirping...

Unless you get "Silent crickets" usually there will be plenty that chirp. You can identify the noisy ones by looking for the one with wings that almost look like they are repeatedly pulsing.

If you touch the container, they will stop.....but unfortunately only for a short period of time.

What I do is if I notice that one is chirping, I will try and feed the ones with the wings first and then the other crickets later. That way, it becomes nice and quiet and I still have as many crickets as I would have done had I fed other crickets instead of the chirping ones.

you send the "loud" ones to there doom first

the lycan mikey wrote:

you send the "loud" ones to there doom first

Yep! Also for some strange reason, they seem to be the only ones that ever bite me!

lol they bite you?
i usually try to grab them by their back legs and abdomen (i think thats what there butt is called)

kadama wrote:

This may sound kinda werid.. But I'd like to rasie my own crickets and meal worms..

not wierd at all saves money over time for use as feeders i just started mine. there are some caresheets and everything for them in the forum just look around for them

kadama wrote:

Mog came out of the hide as well tonight! Recovering well from her little bit of cold weather last night. She went back in though, she's alot fatter then Gil, so her not feeding doesn't really bug me..

lolz bug... get it?

The pun was not intended!

the lycan mikey wrote:

lol they bite you?
i usually try to grab them by their back legs and abdomen (i think thats what there butt is called)

Yeh, its whenever one manages to wriggle out of my grasp and jump away, I just quickly catch it in my hand before it can go under the bed or something and thats when they bite me. lol Once I have them positioned like you do, then its fine