Heterometrus longimanus molting

Taken from my blog . . .

I was doing the rounds yesterday and when I went to check on my juvenile Heterometrus longimanus community, I managed to catch one little guy in the act of molting (something I've only witnessed once before in a much smaller scorpion).

When I found him at 8:20 PM:


One of his tankmates came out to check on him and see what I was up to (note the threat posture):


A blacklight pic for fun -- he decided to molt right beside another exuvium:


A weird shot of what the pedipalps look like during all this (8:42 PM):


10:48 PM and the pedipalps are free:


Finished up just after midnight:


That's his exuvium on the left, along with the one he molted next to:


For another 7 pictures of the sequence, please go >here<.

Brilliant pictures!
I love it when the siblings come out to protect the moulting scorpion from the "huge giant thing"

xxxxxxxxxxx

well Mike chould as well scared it from eating the molting tank mate.. you never know

Interesting. I've never seen a freshly molted scorp like this. Looks alien-like!

cooool...... they look really weired whilst molting. i hope i get to witness this sometime

Kejser wrote:

well Mike could as well scared it from eating the molting tank mate.. you never know

These guys have actually been better about not cannibalizing than my baby emps -- I've lost two in each case, but I started with five emps and ten hets. Although it was feeding time when I saw this, and one of the guys that came out was hungry. I offered him a baby dubia but then my camera crapped out on me when he stung it.

scorpion111 wrote:

cooool...... they look really weired whilst molting. i hope i get to witness this sometime

I'd always wanted to as well -- this is the first time I've seen it in something bigger than a 2I bark scorpion.