Questions about young Emps

Hi all!

I brought my first two scorpions home on Sunday. The two in question were a bit of an impulse buy, but I've been seriously wanting Emperors for over a half-year now. When we walked into my fave little pet shop my hubby pointed out that there were little baby scorpions on the counter and I was hooked! I had fallen in love with their gravid mother right after x-mas, but wasn't in a place where I could have brought her home. Someone else purchased her and when she gave birth they brought the babies in to be sold. Their mother was one of the most stunning creatures I had ever seen, and when I saw those captive-born babies I had to have them!

Tank set-up was done with peat moss, and the room they are being kept in is currently 80 degrees for the hermit crab molting isolation tanks. I started them off in a 10 gallon and have a 29 gallon that needs to be cleaned for when they are larger. Humidity is currently 89%. Is this an alright set-up, and am I missing anything?



I know they were born May 5th. Can anyone hazard a guess as to what instar they are, and when they're due to molt again? Unfortunately I wasn't able to find this out at the shop. Any idea when they'll be large enough to move into the 29G? The stand needs refinished and the tank polished, and there are a billion other things that need done before I can get around to that, so I'm hoping I have a few months. I haven't been able to find much about their growth rates.




With the feeding - all the shop has are small crickets. What's the best way to go about feeding these two. Should I try to hand-feed them with tongs (I fed one cricket last night like this to the thinner one when we got home), or just let the crickets loose in their tank? I don't think I'll be able to find both easily to be able to feed them by hand. What's a good feeding amount - it was recommended that I feed them one cricket every other day. Is this too much or not enough? Do I have to worry about the crickets harming the little ones since they are still tiny?

Thanks for the help! Thought I'd be okay doing this, but then I found out there's all these little things that I'm not confident about when it comes to babies. Just want to make sure I'm doing this right as I really like these two little things.

When they are born in May they are probably 2nd to 3rd instar... I have androctonus from may and they are 3rd instar. I believe Pandinus grow slower though I have to say they look big for 2nd instars.

Humidity, temperature, soil and shelters look very good. I think you might have happy scorps.

As for the feeding part, there is lots of information already on this forum. 2-4 crickets a week I believe is most commonly recommended.

I think they may have molted this week. They seem like they're larger and they have hair on their tails that I don't remember seeing. I dunno. Still getting the hang of this!

I let the crickets loose in their enclosure and they ate very well yesterday. I lost count of how many I put in, but I think they had 5 between them. I also need to look into how to properly keep crickets since there are several now running around the room, and I have no idea how or where they escaped from.

wodesorel wrote:

since there are several now running around the room, and I have no idea how or where they escaped from.

lol thats happened to me a few times as well.

I'm really not sure if they're eating too much. I think they're looking great, but they are each eating at least one cricket every night, and some nights they'll take two. (I try to leave a couple running around at all times since when there are no crickets both of the scorps go out hunting.) Since they are young I'm hesitant to restrict their diet, but is it something I need to be doing?

Most recent photo - I bought them a mealworm each on Thursday night, but this one took both and was running around for 15 minutes doing the "happy food dance" with a worm in each claw.

Dont worrie about overfeeding. No such thing in invert world.
If they need that much food, they have a reason for it and thats growing!

Its good to keep them round when growing up! Nice work btw

Actually, alot of inverts can die from overfeeding. Take praying mantis for example. I once fed mine so much that they both died within an hour of eachothers.
I was a newbie then but at least i learned not to throw in a whole tub of crickets at a time.

EDIT: I have also read alot on a norwegian forum about praying mantis and some scorpions dying from overfeeding.

I'm sure any animal can overfeed, especially ones that are geared towards eating themselves silly in the wild if they don't know when the next meal will be. That's why I'm concerned! They do seem to pace themselves and during they day they shrink down a bit and then in the evenings when they've eaten they puff up again. There's a big difference between pre- and post- meal in their size so I'm assuming that's a good thing?

You heard these things. Try them out for yourself. You will see it doesnt happen. They ignore it when they are sated. Simple and a hard to beat myth.

I dont know about mantis species, but I do know about scorpions. So I might have formulated it wrong.

No such thing as overfeeding in scorpion world. They get fat, they get sluggish and they hide... They dont eat untill they burst. Ever.
If you dont agree, that is fine and I like people with their own opinion.. I just say what I experience with them in real life.

I might even want to add to this that gravid females eat A LOT, to make up for the energy loss in developping embryo. Because of the embryo the female scorpion will expand immensely too. This combined with eating makes for a VERY FAT scorpion. Even these dont burst because they know exactly what their bodies can handle. They stop feeding at a given time too.

I tested it, here is the link and a picture of a fat one, still alive and kicking today (prolly even gravid)
clickme

By this I'm not saying you should feed them untill they can barely walk anymore. It prolly is better to have a fit scorpion.

That's certainly one less thing to worry about then! Thank you pluto.

So then perhaps I should be asking if young emps can be an unhealthy weight? Will the extra nutrition make them molt more often, and is that a good/bad thing?

It will not make them moult more often, but it will make them moult faster, provided the temperature and humidity is high too.

Thank you for all the help!

Quick update: they finally molted, seven days apart from each other, which surprised me. I think they're at 3i now, but that's just from comparing photos of the stages I was able to find on the internet. They're eating like pigs (dozen tiny crickets a week), and have built their first burrow!

I'm feeling a lot more confident about caring for them now, and I'm really looking forward to getting their 30 gallon set up this fall. I'm also hoping to sex them soon, as I'm really hoping for two females.

The lady at the pet store still has all of their siblings. I was thinking of maybe bringing home one or two more, but I don't want to crowd the tank. Would three in a 30 be good, even if I don't know their gender?

30 gallons is plenty of room for three emperors.