Any tipps for an Parabuthus villosus enclosure?

[Alveus]

Hi
Next month i'm getting a 2/3i Parabuthus villosus. So i am starting to set up an Enclosure for it.
My goal is to set up a natural as possible Habitat as possible.

My Plans for now:

Enclosure size: 40x40 x34

Substrate: 8cm mix from Excarvatorclay and a bit forrestsoil and/or sand.
2cm toplayer of desert sand with some lose stones/ gravels ect.
One or two big rocks for the scorp to burrow a hide underneath. Secured against colapsing for shure.

Backwall: i'm not sure if i want to go with a rockbackwall or (i don't know to describe it in english)an edge where the desert soil broke of. Something like this:


Currently im more in to a rock wall.
Like my Pterinochillus murinus enclosure:





With a Rockbackwall i will losa a little bit more roaming area (not as much as in the murinus enclosure,). But for sure 3-5cm on each side (more in the edges to smooth them out).
But the Scorpion can dig under the rockwall, if it wants to.

Deco:
A Smal dead bush, wich grows out of the corner in thr backwall

Plants: not sure yet. Must be some smal desert plants origin in namibia.
Open for suggestions!

Tec: two led spots. One of them gets realy hot. If it provides not enough heat, i'l have to improvise. I don't got enough space above the encloser for a heat lamp. Evt a heatmap behinde/ on the side of the enclosure, but that would be suboptimal with a backwall made out of styrofoam and cement....


Questions:

When i build a natural looking rock backwall i'll lose a bit of space. The roaming area will shrink from 40x40cm to 30x30 +/-. Is that still enough? The backwall will not go down all the way. So the digging area will stay 40x40.

Do they enjoy to climbe a lot?
If yes, can it survive drop from max 20cm hight on a rock/ branch?

Any special habits?
Like: do they enjoy to lay on flat rocks during the day? Or do they like to stick their but in to the water from time to time like tarantulas?
Do the change their hides often like Tityus stigmurus, or do they use only their main hide like those lazy ass holes in the ground called Heterometrus?

Greetings, Alveus

Ps: Sorry for my bad grammer. I'm not used to write like this in english. This is the first time i'm doing it.

 

[Veno Manus]

IMO, i don't ever give my scorpions the option the climb the walls. Give to many opertunity to fall and cause damage. Just somthing I personally don't do some other would agree. But it's just a risk and the investment in the creature dosent outweigh the risk. Maybe a shallow background that dosent go all the way to the top but that's just my opinion. But otherwise sounds like a pretty sweet build.

 

[Alveus]

Hello and thank you for your answer.

Yeah, the posablity of a fatal fall is my biggest concern at the moment.
The problem is that i have a strikt concept for this Enclosureshelve: no visible glaswalls


Here, a image, so you know, why i'm a little stuborn with the Background.

But when a 20cm drop is to much of a risk i could build the wall like this:



That would reduce the max fall height to 10cm.
Still to much risk? What do you think?

Greetings, Alveus

 

[Veno Manus]

You could maybe split the background 50/50 and go to a pet store or online and grab a background art to slap on the back side of the glass to "hide" the glass look?

 

[Veno Manus]

Those enclosures look super sick BTW.

Hello and thank you for your answer.

Yeah, the posablity of a fatal fall is my biggest concern at the moment.
The problem is that i have a strikt concept for this Enclosureshelve: no visible glaswalls
View attachment 489175

Here, a image, so you know, why i'm a little stuborn with the Background.

But when a 20cm drop is to much of a risk i could build the wall like this:

View attachment 489176

That would reduce the max fall height to 10cm.
Still to much risk? What do you think?

Greetings, Alveus

 

[Alveus]

So do you think spliting the backwall with a "balkony", is still to much risk?
In my minde, when it drops from the top, it drops on the Balkony. Worst case it slips further down to the ground another 10cm. But the balkony slowed down the velocity.

Those enclosures look super sick BTW.

Thank you! Im working on it for a long time. An its a pain in the ass with the glas. I'm not good at cuting glase yet...

 

[adam james]

So do you think spliting the backwall with a "balkony", is still to much risk?
In my minde, when it drops from the top, it drops on the Balkony. Worst case it slips further down to the ground another 10cm. But the balkony slowed down the velocity.





Thank you! Im working on it for a long time. An its a pain in the ass with the glas. I'm not good at cuting glase yet...

Very nice looking enclosures, great looking designs (you are talented!).
I would tend to agree about the fall hazard, especially if its to land on something hard from the max height. I however will say that I am not sure if I am just being overly paranoid as I have no direct experience with scorpions falling.
is there any way to grade it down enough that there is less 'cliff' angle? I suppose you would lose even more floor space though. maybe grade the floor toward it a bit as well? Just guessing though. Either way I am sure you will find a design that works. Good luck!

 

[Alveus]

Hello

Very nice looking enclosures, great looking designs (you are talented!).

Thank you. My goal is to copy natural habitats as close as possible. Especially arid habitats.
For example my Pterinochillus murinus encloser, i posted above. I tried to copy
exactly what i saw in a Video* where they searched those spider in the wilde. *
And the spider defently loves to build its web in the crevice. The crevice is as deep as my Hand (eu size 11).

I'll take your concerns serious and will try to take them into account when i'build the enclosures, without destroying my concept. I got some ideas for that. I'll post the result here, before i put the scorp in. Hopefully i manage to finish it this task next week.

Greetings.

* source of the image is linked

 

[Brewser]

Fantastic Interior Design, Inspiring.
Keep it up.
Thanks for sharing,

 

[Alveus]

Sooo



The first step is done. Next step is he modeling layer.

As you can see, on the left and in the back there is a "balkony" (i don't know if "rocky outcrop" is the right term)
On the left i'll put a pile of stones right same hight as the wood.

That will be a max fall hight of 13cm on soft sand and max 8cm on rocks. But the surface will be so rough... must be a really dumb scorp to drop there.

 

[Alveus]

This is what it looks like now.onky the paint work has to bi done, than it can be filled.

The surface is really rough. So even the clumsiest scorpion should not fall. And ther are also the balkonies.
I'm not sure about the wood yet. I'll have to wait until i filled it with substrate and look how it fits.

What do you guys think?

 

[parabuthusVillosus]

Hi, I have already had Parabuthus villosus fall from a 4 metre high gallery onto a wooden floor in Instar 2 and they all survived. As long as the animals are still so small, I wouldn't worry. But please don't take this as a recommendation to throw the animals around
BTW: instar 2 animals are still really small. You will have to look for him often.
However, I also avoid walk-on back walls with scorpions as it increases the risk of being stung.
P. villosus is very fond of showing off and loves flat slate slabs that heat up under spots. They normally use one main hiding place. I love this species: very active, can be kept together in adult pairs and are easy to breed. Greetings from Germany to Switzerland

 

[Alveus]

Hallo und Grüezi

But please don't take this as a recommendation to throw the animals around

Haha. That was never in my minde.
The breeder also ensured me, that a drom from 20cm wouldn't kill even adult. But i don't think that it would possible fall in this set up.

BTW: instar 2 animals are still really small. You will have to look for him often.

Yeah, im not shure if i will put it in from the beginning. I probably build a little glas cage, wich i put in the enclosure. An when it's big enough ill but a stick in this cage so it can climbe out by it selfe and remove the cage later, when its settelt down.

However, I also avoid walk-on back walls with scorpions as it increases the risk of being stung

That is less of a concerne for me. I'm trying to be as less intrusive as possible. And i have good training due to my Tityus stigmurus enclosure:

There are about 10 adults and countless juveniles. I would never ever stick my finger in this enclosure. I do everything with long tweezers.

in the Parabuthus enclosure won't be a lot of hiding spots and there is only one hiding spot in the backwall wich is fully observeable.

The idea is this:


Yellow: the place i'll put the spot, beside the actual light.

Red: warmest flat area

Grey: Stones

Orange: 2- 3cm desertsand. Underneath the sand i'll but an excarvator/soil mixture, so it can dig.

Green: possible hiding spots.
The one on top is just a little cave. It can't really hide in there but shuould give it a little bit of security when its basking and getting disturbed.

Then a premade hide under the stone.

And a premade hide under the backwall.

It can chose between those two and dig its hole.

There are no oder possibilitis to hide in the backwall. Even for a small scorpion.
Those deeplocking crevices are more an opticalillusion.

P. villosus is very fond of showing off and loves flat slate slabs that heat up under spots. They normally use one main hiding place. I love this species: very active, can be kept together in adult pairs and are easy to breed.

This is exactly why i choosed this scorpion. And i really looking forward to ceep one.
And the tipp with the flat flat slaps is good. I think i will build the rock hide with flat stones.

Thank you!

Und Grüsse zurrück!

 

[Joey Spijkers]

Sieht sehr schön aus!
Looks very good!

 

[parabuthusVillosus]

Looks great! I have bred this species many times and they grow best at 32-34 degrees. Below 30 degrees the growth was much slower and above 35 degrees it sometimes gets critically warm. And always a little more humid than with the adults.