C. gracilis finally giving birth

SoHum

Arachnopeon
Joined
Jan 7, 2015
Messages
47
...and hopefully I didn't screw anything up! This morning before I left for work, I threw crickets in to all my larger scorps (all ~8mm long, down to the dregs of a "medium" bag of crickets) because it's feeding day, and while my gracilis had looked about ready to pop for weeks now, her apatite hasn't ever wavered- in fact she's probably the quickest on the draw for food of any of them. Just now I was giving everybody a misting, and saw she was out...and also there's ~6-8 brand new baby kittens on her back, at least one of which is nearly white (meaning freshly born?).

She's wild caught, and looked to be gravid at the time, so who knows if this is her first brood or not, but I'm hoping that feeding her (I think I threw in two crickets?) didn't lead to accidental cannibalism of the newborns. :cry: Anyway, I feel terrible about it, this is my first brood and I'm really hoping I didn't ruin it for lack of paying attention. When I fed, she was upside down under her bark and went immediately into feeding stance when I threw the crickets in so I didn't think anything of it for a second.

Anyway, what's done is done. She's always been pretty active, I see her out and about every other day or so..how long until I can disturb her for pictures? I was also literally about to move her into a bigger tank, as the weather here is getting pretty nice and I'm in the process of releasing all the mordax I picked up over the winter that looked gravid, but I don't want to cause unnecessary stress.
 

gromgrom

Arachnoprince
Old Timer
Joined
Nov 30, 2009
Messages
1,743
Remove the crickets, she may consume the new brood because of the stress. Why did you feed her?
 

SoHum

Arachnopeon
Joined
Jan 7, 2015
Messages
47
I don't actually know for sure that she had started to give birth before I fed, I was in a hurry because I was trying to get out of the house to go to work. By the time I got home and went to mist them, she had already eaten the crickets, and there were some babies riding on her. I just saw her like the day before yesterday, and she definitely didn't have babies hanging about then, and because her apatite is still really good (she kills/starts eating anything I throw in there within 10 minutes) I didn't know she was close to giving birth yet- I had read that she would start refusing food when the time was near.
 

gromgrom

Arachnoprince
Old Timer
Joined
Nov 30, 2009
Messages
1,743
In either case, just leave her be, no more feeding until they're second instar and ready to leave her. Just keep it humid in there, misting occasionally. Good luck!
 

SoHum

Arachnopeon
Joined
Jan 7, 2015
Messages
47
Mom was out and about today, now with only 2 babies on her back. I saw her ~ a week ago, and there were 7. I lifted her log and didn't see any more, but the babies look a bit less like eggs with legs..I didn't want to stress her out so i didn't really look around very hard for exuvia, but is it possible the babies hit 2i, the shed skins are too small to see with a quick glance around, and cannibalized? Would 2i babies still be trying to catch a free ride around with mom? She still looks fat as hell, I don't even think it would be obvious if she had eaten the others herself. Temps get down to ~18*C at night and 23-28*C during the day.

Any suggestions? I haven't done anything to disturb her except mist a couple times since I made this thread, and I'd prefer they didn't all end up mysteriously missing. :(
 
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