Rhopalurus Junceus Keeping


Rhopalurus junceus is a medium sized scorpion that is native to Cuba. These 3.5-4.5 inch Bark Scorpions are a beautiful reddish/orange color. It is safe to say these are one of the most desired specimens to add to any collection. Unfortunately, they have been rare in collections with the exception of a few hobbyists in Europe. Late in 2005 and early 2006 I was able to acquire 5 mid sized juveniles thru 3 different transactions. I acquired these specimens with the hopes of breeding and getting a nice captive population started here in the USA. They seem relatively easy to breed and the husbandry is near identicle to other tropical Bark Scorpion species such as Centruroides spp and Tityus spp.

Housing adults should be done the very same as with Centruroides gracilis. For this I use plastic Sterlite or Rubbermade shoe boxes that can be purchased at practically any Dollar Store. It is important to drill several small holes around the sides of the box to provide some ventilation. For substrate, about 3 inches of slightly moist peat moss can be used. When the peat moss starts to get a little dry, I pour water directly on the substrate until about half of it is moist again. It is important not to get the substrate too moist. Also important is to add several pieces of wood, cork bark etc for hides and for them to be able to get off the moist substrate. Unlike several Tityus spp which seem to prefer to rest directly on moist substrate, R junceus seems to prefer resting between the stacks of wood. One of the more common mistakes a novice keeper will make is trying to house scorpions such as this in Kritter Keepers. The "open screen top" on a Kritter Keeper will allow the substrate to dry out very fast and not keep the humidity high enough. They seem to do well with temperatures at around 80F. While they may live at temps in the lower 70sF, they will grow and be much healthier when kept in the low 80sF. Only adults should be kept in groups as juveniles will often cannibalize a cage mate during molting. Adults will eat 1-3 medium crickets a week. Like males of many species, Rhopalurus junceus males seldom feed.

Breeding is typical and rather straight forward. After I had my first pair to mature in August of 2006, I put them together in their own plastic shoe box. After about 30 minutes the male and female were courting. Oddly enough, I did not find a spermataphore until the next morning. It was obvious that they did not finish mating until I turned out the lights for the night. Determining the sex of the adults is easy to do. Like most scorpions, the males are much thinner and delicate looking than the more robust females. The chela (claws) of the males is more bulbous with the fingers being slightly curved. The male cannot close the fingers completely due to the curve. The females however have much thinner and straighter chela that can completely close their fingers together. I have also noted that the males are a lighter more orangeish color when compared to the darker red females. I know of no other way to determine the sex of this species and unfortunately the hobbyist will have to wait until adulthood in order to accurately sex them.

In January of 2007 my wait was over. My female gave birth to 21 babies. Interestingly, it took two days for all the babies to be born. The only other time I have seen this happen was with a Heterometrus laoticus in 2005. While this number is low when compared to the reports of some European breeder's reports this is a start. About a week after giving birth I gently coaxed the female into a deli cup with moist peat. I do this with all my Bark Scorpion species as this makes capturing the babies much easier than if they were in the adult enclosure. After about 10 days the young molted into 2nd instars. Less than a week later the young started to disperse from the Mother's back. I then returned the female back to the adult enclosure. To house the young, I set up 50 Dram vials that can be purchased from Thornton Plastics. I filled roughly 1/3 with moist peat moss. In order for the young to molt properly it is important to provide a climb. In this case I leaned peaces of tree bark inside each vial. The young need to be kept separately until adult. This insures there will be no cannibalism and with the low numbers in the hobby each individual counts. The 2nd instar young are a decent size and feed voraciously on small crickets and small lobster roach nymphs. I feed them 2-3 times a week until they "plump up". The specimens I recieved were mid sized juveniles so I am not sure how many molts it takes for one to mature. Judging by the time it took for mine to mature I can safely assume that it takes over a year and probably closer to a year and a half.

Although Rhopalurus junceus is a very rare scorpion in the hobby now, with this birth gives much hope that more and more hobbyists will be able to acquire this beautiful species in the not so distant future. At the time of this writing I have a different mated female that should be giving birth anytime and a fellow scorpion enthusiast has a mated pair as well. It should be noted that anyone getting this species in the future should try to breed them in order to keep a good number in the hobby as it is pretty safe to say that there will be no imports of this species anytime soon from Cuba. This is a really nice species worthy of any collection as they are impressive and beautiful to look at.
I would like to give a warm thanks to my friends Alex Tietz, Tom van der Ende and Vincent Wisse. Their advice has been helpful over the past few years and I have benefited greatly

SPecies Name : Lychas Scutilus ( Formally named Lychas Scutatus?)
Family : Buthidae
LOcality : Southast Asia - Singapore, Malaysia.
Habitat: Between fallen logs, inbetween cracks or gaps in barks, stays near termite nest.
venom: unknown
No. of speciment studied: 5 adult speciments, 1 juv , and 20++ CB youngs till 4th instar so far.
(In Kovirak F's Lychas papers collection data do have other location other then the two ive mentioned.hence my data r base on my own data or other hobbist who had collected the speciment)

Simple Discriptions by Kovirak F's Lychas papers -

Kovarik, F. 1997. Revision of the genera Lychas and Hemilychas, with descriptions of six new species (Scorpiones: Buthidae). Acta Soc. Zool. Bohem. 61: 311-371.

"Total length 60-86.5 mm males; 40-65 mm females. Male differs from female by much longer, very thin metasoma and long telson. Sixth cutting edges on moveable and fixed fingers of pedipalps each with 3-5 external granules and one or no internal granule.
PTC: males = 16-20; females = 15-19."
Distribution Range: Andaman Islands, China (Shanghai, introduced?), Indonesia (Java, Sumatra), Keeling (Cocos) Islands, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore and Thailand.
COloration with base color is yellow,to reddish brown.Tibia,in part of patella of the palps,telson and fifth and ocassionally 4th metasomal segment are dark brown.Mesosoma is spotted.Pectime count 15-20.

Temprement/Behaviour -
Not very pron to sting but rather chose to evacute. this species is VERY fast.in my experience faster the L.mucronatus... Female speciments tends to be more skittish while male tends to put up a small lil fight if needed.
AS a barkscorpion this spcies does not seems to use the verticle bark for moulting but rather they chose to moult on the ground. this has been proven by the first female juv speciment moulting to adult to the youngs that have since passed a few instar and 100 percent of them moulted on the floor and non on the bark.Ive also observed that they do some time dig a lil at the small corners of the tank, still tryig to find out why.
Cannabalisation among adults has not been observe but i did lost 2 speciments when i tried to have 5 2nd instar in communel setup only to have two being eaten by their siblings after they moulted to 3rd. they seem to be more verocious in the first two instar, once they hit 4th they don seem to be that aggresive hence the 3 remaining still together in communel.

Housing - (communelly and individually)
Food: they take mealworms, crix , roaches, hoppers. (these r those i have tried)
frequence of feeding: Once every 2 days for adults/juv and every other day for slings.
Temp: 26-30 degress day, 22-26 degrees night
humidity: 80-90% adult, +/-75% for slings below 3rd instar
Room: mutiple verticle hides.5 by 8 inches and 7 inches tall enclosures. with 1-1 1/2 inch of peat moss or soil. very moist for adult but only that with high ventilation for slings in lil 3 inch tall by 1 inch diameter viles r bottles does well for them.

some pics t view LLOLL