# is there a lifespan difference between male and female scorpions?



## VictorHernandez (Sep 3, 2012)

I want to buy male sub-adult P. Imperator, H. Arizonensis, and S. Mesaensis scorpions. But do male scorpions live significantly shorter lifespans like male tarantulas do? Thanks


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## 2nscorpx (Sep 3, 2012)

The answer to this question can be found quite easily in literature...I don't believe there is a significant difference.


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## Danimal (Sep 3, 2012)

The short answer is no, given all things relative, the will live the same amount of time. I would however, consider females if you are looking at those specific species, as MOST of the time, all three of those are wild caught, and if adults, you could have a good chance of getting a gravid one.


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## VictorHernandez (Sep 15, 2012)

thanks. I got a male emp sub-adult, and will get a female dune and hairy scorpion.


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## VictorHernandez (Oct 6, 2012)

Question regarding male and female scorpions again:
Is there a real noticeable size difference in Pandinus and Parabuthus scorpion males and females?
I have a small male (thin, probably a little less that ~6 inches), and was wondering how much more he would grow. I bought him from Ken the Bug Guy for $10 advertised as a small Emperor, and I e-mailed to check the availability for "large" ones, and they told me that they were small because they were juveniles. They later started selling "large" Emperors and "babies". I just went with a small male.


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## Olsin (Oct 7, 2012)

VictorHernandez said:


> thanks. I got a male emp sub-adult, and will get a female dune and hairy scorpion.


My thoughts here are that it would probably have been better to have got a female emp and male arizonensis with the logic being that if gravid you will have an infinitely better chance of getting viable young from an emp than from H.arizonensis



VictorHernandez said:


> Is there a real noticeable size difference in Pandinus and Parabuthus scorpion males and females?


All things being relative i'd say, yes .. Females from most species are slightly larger and bulkier. With regards to your juvenile male emp he will grow a bit more. Juveniles are always smaller than adults regardless of specie

Reactions: Like 1


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## VictorHernandez (Oct 7, 2012)

Olsin said:


> My thoughts here are that it would probably have been better to have got a female emp and male arizonensis with the logic being that if gravid you will have an infinitely better chance of getting viable young from an emp than from H.arizonensis


Oh yeah I know right




Olsin said:


> All things being relative i'd say, yes .. Females from most species are slightly larger and bulkier. With regards to your juvenile male emp he will grow a bit more. Juveniles are always smaller than adults regardless of specie


How much is the difference on average?


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## snippy (Oct 8, 2012)

That highly depends on the species. But in quite a few Parabuthus species the difference is rather big. 
As an indicator which species show bigger differences between sexes when adult, you can take the differences in instars, in which they (usually) are adult. I have posted a link to a list somewhere in here. Take a look. I would suspect that there is some correlation between overall size and number of instars, towards the size differences. So especially smaller species which do less molts, show bigger relative differences in size comparing male and female. But I have not tested that, its just a hypothesis. At least in case of the Parabuthus spp. I have, it seems to hold true (for example the size differences is bigger in case of the smaller P. pallidus, than it is in case of P. villosus)

Edit: I see that older threads get removed. I would highly suggest that important threads get archived or to make at least a subsection for useful threads. No wonder the same questions are asked over and over again (not relating to you, of course)

So here is the link again: List of instars scorpions mature in

Regards
Finn

Reactions: Like 2


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## VictorHernandez (Oct 8, 2012)

Alright, Thank you. Interesting hypothesis.


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## Olsin (Oct 8, 2012)

VictorHernandez said:


> Interesting hypothesis.


Hypothesis! .. Do you doubt the sources?


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## 2nscorpx (Oct 8, 2012)

Finn said it was a hypothesis. I agree, it makes sense. The list of instars at which the scorpions mature looks quite credible; _this_ is consistent, yes?


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## snippy (Oct 8, 2012)

At least the sources of the data are very credible, yes. However, there are always deviations. So what data there is does not need to be the full story.

Regards
Finn


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## 2nscorpx (Oct 8, 2012)

So it's still consistent enough to use as a general idea of the species' number of molts...


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## snippy (Oct 8, 2012)

Yeah, sure 

Regards
Finn


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