# Meet Abbi the Emperor Scorpion



## LittleMick (Jan 1, 2010)

And some more pics of Abbi, the Emperor/Imperial scorpion (Pandinus Imperator). She is actually my second Emperor, unfortunately the first one did not make it past 2 weeks, I thought it was due to the type of enclosure she was in, I was really gutted, I know peeps don't really offer as much sorrow for inverts for some reason but believe me I nearly shed a tear I cna tell you. Anyway, I got hold of what I thought to be a better enclosure and kept that running for a month then introduced Abbi to her new home. I kept it small for now just to make sure everything is ok, she will be getting a bigger one soon.









And here she is. This shows how big she is, that is the probe from teh Exo Terra Hygrometer/Thermometer combi meter.









































I pooed my pants the other week, I check the enclosure out every day to monitor how many crix are left from feeding, lift the hides to see where she is (paranoia :blush and she was no where to be seen :gasp:. Well I knew she couldn't get out as the enclosure has a lid on it, but it still doesn't stoop you looking round, lol. Anyway, not too fear, she had dug her first burrow, I was well chuffed, shows she is acting normally and naturally :notworthy:









Normally I feed her cricket, but today I thought I would try a mealie, I dropped it at the entrance to her burrow and talk about snatchy, lol. She dragged it back inside, then popped back out with it in her pincer.

















And some close ups as usual.


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## Reptile_Kyle (Apr 24, 2010)

*Invert*

looking well,

I have never owen an invert but would love to get into them!
Was close to buying a flat rock today, but i knew nothing about them so i decided to do abit of research before i bought it lol

No harm in abit of research:2thumb:


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## SkinheadOi85 (Sep 28, 2008)

Pretty lil scorp! Love the one where she is holding up the mealie its like

LOOK WHAT I FOUND


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## Reptile_Kyle (Apr 24, 2010)

*Invert*

i didnt think you could feed spiders to t's?


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## LittleMick (Jan 1, 2010)

Reptile_Kyle said:


> No harm in abit of research:2thumb:


Hell yeah, I try to do a minimum of 1 months research before I buy the equipment, and can be as much as 4-6 months if it is something that it TOTALLY different to anything I have got. It took 6 months for me to decide to get Gerbils, but less than a month to research my Hammies. I find with mammal, or specifically rodents, the requirements are more or les the same and its more the diet and their main activity that needs researching, so my gerbils are burrowers, and they live in a tall gerbilarium, and although hammies burrow as well they like climbing so I provided them with grawtones on ropes and some grapevine to climb on.



SkinheadOi85 said:


> Pretty lil scorp! Love the one where she is holding up the mealie its like
> 
> LOOK WHAT I FOUND


I have another feeding story that is somewhat amusing but I guess sad as well. During one of my maintanence sesions I went to change Abbi's water only to find a crick in the water bowl on it's back. I was like "oh poor little sod", so I went to flick it out and toward Abbi's burrow as I thought it was dead and it started flappin' about like no bodies business. So I flicked it out of the water bowl and it righted itself and done a runner into Abbi's burrow only to become lunch :gasp:


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## PRS (Dec 31, 2007)

Reptile_Kyle said:


> i didnt think you could feed spiders to t's?


It's a mealworm. Not a spider.

By the way some pretty good shots, sorry to hear one passed on.. It's horrible when you loose them I know what it's like 

I have a group of 6 emperors(Pandinus imperator) sub adults and they are a great species imo. Although all of mine are fiesty, most are generally chilled out..


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## TheMetaphysicalNinja (Aug 18, 2009)

Reptile_Kyle said:


> i didnt think you could feed spiders to t's?


What?? 

Nice photos, must have a darn good camrea lol. Mine wont focus if I got that close to mine. Not that they'd stand still long enough to let me... Yours is about the same sort of size as my two too xD I do the whole *check-its-still-there* thing too... especially as they BOTH escaped not too long ago. was not pleased lol. It's really worrying when their not where you expect em to be eh?
Didn't happen to get it from scorpion-boy did you? :2thumb:


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## xerophere (Apr 13, 2010)

Very nice pictures :no1:


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## Webleybulldog455 (May 11, 2010)

Stunning scorp and great clear pics :2thumb:


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## LittleMick (Jan 1, 2010)

Thanks for the replies.



PRS said:


> I have a group of 6 emperors(Pandinus imperator) sub adults and they are a great species imo. Although all of mine are fiesty, most are generally chilled out..


When you say group, they all live together? Are they mixed sexes? And did you have them all at the same time or did you introduce some at a later stage? And how did it go if you did? 



TheMetaphysicalNinja said:


> What??
> 
> Nice photos, must have a darn good camrea lol.


It does the job, lol. I have a couple, one is a Pentax Optio M10 compact for just quick snaps then I have a Sony A100 DSLR with a 18-50mm lens, I thought I would have a bash at some amateur photography so I thought I best invest in some proper equipment. I also got a heavy duty tripod and a panoramic camera head. I don't get out as much as I should to get into it enough, lol. Plus if I want to get decent shots of animals out in the wild I need a telephoto lens which I haven't got.


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## PRS (Dec 31, 2007)

Pandinus imperator(Emperor scorpions) Are one of the best communal species, although sometimes fights brake out..

I asked for 1.5(one male, 5 females) but they were guaranteed. All introduced at the same time.

Had them together for about 20 days, no casualites :2thumb:

Just give them a few hides, plenty of space. Although I generally find mine all cuddled up together


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## LittleMick (Jan 1, 2010)

PRS said:


> Just give them a few hides, plenty of space. Although I generally find mine all cuddled up together


What size enclosure have you got yours in?


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## PRS (Dec 31, 2007)

LittleMick said:


> What size enclosure have you got yours in?


Mine aren't adult but they are kept in a 3ft long by 2 ft wide by 1 ft high, and have plenty of space.

They are like sub adults atm, got a bit of growing to do.


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## LittleMick (Jan 1, 2010)

I was going to say wow! that is a big enclosure bt I forgot you have a group, sounds good. Have you got any posts or pics anywhere of so I can have nosey? Would love to see it.

Have you had any molt in your care yet? If so had any issues? One thing I have been worried about is molting, as I'm sure you're aware if arachnids have issues molting they can lose limbs and there have been reports that they can die if they can't molt. So I was wondering if you can do anything to assist in the molt like you would a snake or lizard.

EDITED LATER BY ME - For a minute there I thought I had hijacked someones thread, then I realised it was my thread, lmao. I need to get more tea.


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## PRS (Dec 31, 2007)

LittleMick said:


> I was going to say wow! that is a big enclosure bt I forgot you have a group, sounds good. Have you got any posts or pics anywhere of so I can have nosey? Would love to see it.
> 
> Have you had any molt in your care yet? If so had any issues? One thing I have been worried about is molting, as I'm sure you're aware if arachnids have issues molting they can lose limbs and there have been reports that they can die if they can't molt. So I was wondering if you can do anything to assist in the molt like you would a snake or lizard.


You cant really assist em, well you could try but possibly cause more so damage as they are in a weaker state.

None have moulted so far, generally I've heard of group mates actually protecting those in moult but I'll see I have no pics atm but I'll take some now for you if you like


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## PRS (Dec 31, 2007)

Just a quick pic, didn't wanna disturb em too much. Only took one, shows 5 of em the other is away from the group underneath the small hide in the pic.

I have a huge piece of bark generally in there, lifted it up to take the pic..

I'll take some proper ones later on and of the setup


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## LittleMick (Jan 1, 2010)

So basically you can only make the enclosure humid enough for them to slide out of it then I guess. How have you got all your heating set up? And what temps? I have a mat on the back wall, unstatted, it was necessary to run without a stat to make sure the front parts of the enclosure got to the right temps.

That would be great to see some pics of yours, may be inspire me when it comes to upgrade Abbi's home. The first image in the thread is of the second enclosure which seems to be doing the job. The first one I got was one of those Komodo Spider/Scorpion Commplete setups, and the reptile stores out there are selling these for tropical setups, I say NOOOOOO, these are totally inadequate, or at least I think so. Or at least being sold with the equipment you get. I'm not sure why my first Emperor died, whether it was temp fluctuation, humidity or whether she was simply ill, or too stressed. But I had to mist twice a day, the temps were all over the place. I could only get a temp of 28c on the wall the heat mat was on, 24c in the middle then right down to 22c at the far end, so I am putting it down to the heating which is also backed up by the fact that she wasn't eating. I was so gutted. And the advice I was getting was don't worry yet, she is probably just stressed out from the move, but she didn't even make 2 weeks.

But the new enclosure seems brill, although there is hardly any ventilation it does keep the heat and humidity in there perfect, I mist twice a week. I must admit it probbably does get a little too warm, in which case I either remove the polystyrene covering the heat mat or open the lid a little (only when I am there) just to let ome air out. The heat mat is not on a stat as it is the lowest wattage mat, but when I upgrade I will be putting the mat on a stat, I might even consider heating with a ceramic heat lamp. I was debating whether to get one of those Exo Terra terrariums, I just like the idea of having everything in one, lol. But then I like enclosures where I can pick and choose how I set it all up.

Abbi had her first cleanout yesterday, I had to gently and slowly scoop away near her burrow, it took forever as she had burrowed from the halfway mark all the way to one end where she was hiding, lol. Then when it came to getting her out I had to gently scrape the surrounding soil around her to make her come out, suffice it to say she was not impressed I was destroying her hard work and started attacking the spoon I was using. Right little Missy.


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## LittleMick (Jan 1, 2010)

Damn you post quick, lol. Nice shot, they look great. You can even tell they are coming up to adults, the telson is orange instead of white :2thumb:. What sort of sizes are they? Abbi is roughly 4" from head to tail. They reckon an Emperor won't grow much more than 5" in captivity, not sure how true that is.


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## ~MMD (Jun 24, 2010)

She is butifull 
and as already said very nice pictures


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## PRS (Dec 31, 2007)

LittleMick said:


> So basically you can only make the enclosure humid enough for them to slide out of it then I guess. How have you got all your heating set up? And what temps? I have a mat on the back wall, unstatted, it was necessary to run without a stat to make sure the front parts of the enclosure got to the right temps.
> 
> 
> That would be great to see some pics of yours, may be inspire me when it comes to upgrade Abbi's home. The first image in the thread is of the second enclosure which seems to be doing the job. The first one I got was one of those Komodo Spider/Scorpion Commplete setups, and the reptile stores out there are selling these for tropical setups, I say NOOOOOO, these are totally inadequate, or at least I think so. Or at least being sold with the equipment you get. I'm not sure why my first Emperor died, whether it was temp fluctuation, humidity or whether she was simply ill, or too stressed. But I had to mist twice a day, the temps were all over the place. I could only get a temp of 28c on the wall the heat mat was on, 24c in the middle then right down to 22c at the far end, so I am putting it down to the heating which is also backed up by the fact that she wasn't eating. I was so gutted. And the advice I was getting was don't worry yet, she is probably just stressed out from the move, but she didn't even make 2 weeks.
> ...


Temps, I'm using a heat mat as well not on a stat. Most inverts do ok with varied temps generally, it would never be a fixed temp all the time in the wild anyhow.



LittleMick said:


> Damn you post quick, lol. Nice shot, they look great. You can even tell they are coming up to adults, the telson is orange instead of white :2thumb:. What sort of sizes are they? Abbi is roughly 4" from head to tail. They reckon an Emperor won't grow much more than 5" in captivity, not sure how true that is.


Mine aren't huge, most 3.5 or so maybe 4 inch, I have a male here who's about 5-6 inch but he's kept by himself.

There's two forms of Pandinus imperator apparently, the commonly available one kept in captivity and another I was reading an article and the size difference is quite alot.

I've seen some 6-7 inch P.imperators in captivity, but I saw some pinned up dead specimens of the apparently different form reaching 9-10 inch.

Unsure why they aren't available, probably generally places people wouldn't catch them I suppose I'm sure some have probably came back over here though.


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## LittleMick (Jan 1, 2010)

Are you sure they are on about Imperators though and not an Asian Forest Scorpions that look more or less teh same? They reckon the Guiness Book Of Records is an Asian Forest at 9".


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## scorpion-boy (Dec 14, 2009)

TheMetaphysicalNinja said:


> Didn't happen to get it from scorpion-boy did you? :2thumb:


 that how big theyve grown to now? thats good, especially to say the little beggers got trapped on the roach trap too, youll have to post some pics 

2 types of P.imperators??? an emp is an emp there are no sub species - there are seperate pandinus species - for example imperator, cavimanus,militaris,etc 

dont be taken in by those taxidermy display scorps - most are labelled - black scorpion, giant scorpion, even saw one labelled death scorpion - some are pandinus imperators but the majority i have seen are heterometrus spinifer (asian forest scorpion) as said above they are very similar in appearence to an emperor but their claws are must sleeker and smoother


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## PRS (Dec 31, 2007)

scorpion-boy said:


> that how big theyve grown to now? thats good, especially to say the little beggers got trapped on the roach trap too, youll have to post some pics
> 
> 2 types of P.imperators??? an emp is an emp there are no sub species - there are seperate pandinus species - for example imperator, cavimanus,militaris,etc
> 
> dont be taken in by those taxidermy display scorps - most are labelled - black scorpion, giant scorpion, even saw one labelled death scorpion - some are pandinus imperators but the majority i have seen are heterometrus spinifer (asian forest scorpion) as said above they are very similar in appearence to an emperor but their claws are must sleeker and smoother


Thats what I thought, and I wasen't sure. I've seen threads on it in the past, with photo evidence. I'll try to find the link and post it at some point.. Was on Tarantula store I think.


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## PRS (Dec 31, 2007)

The Tarantula Store -> 10 inch of pure Scorp!=

^^^

Thats the thread, as said I'm unsure what the specimen you see there is. Looks Pandinus though.

Saw it ages back, just found it. Like said unsure what species it is, fairly large though.


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## scorpion-boy (Dec 14, 2009)

yeah that looks like an imperator - depends how you measure them - i have a couple really big ones


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## LittleMick (Jan 1, 2010)

Yep looks like an Imperator, but as SB said it depends on how you measure, I think most people measure from the front of the carapace to the end of the tail laid out flat, so looking at that one it's only 7 1/2", so a large female I reckon. That's my guess anyhoo.


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