Chaerilus under UV light

[Nazgul]

Hi,

I got back my uv flashlight recently and took some ov pictures of my C. celebensis, C. rectimanus and I. maculatus today. The pictures are far from being good quality as I didn´t have enough time to shoot good and sharp pics but at least you can see both Chaerilus fluorescing under uv light. The buthid I. maculatus is fluorescing much brighter though.

1.) C. rectimanus
2.) C. celebensis
3.) & 4.) C. celebensis and I. maculatus in comparison

My C. celebensis have been collected by Alakdan originally, I don´t know where yours are originating from. I haven´t tried to confirm the ID of them being C. celebensis yet but at least they are looking very similar to yours, superficially.

 

[Ythier]

All my Chaerilus (celebensis and variegatus), young and adults, fluoresce very well...

 

[John Bokma]

It is also possible that they are emmitting light at a non-visible frequency, but I am skeptical of this. The nature of fluorescence dictates that the emmited spectrum be of lower energy (longer wavelength) than the exciting light. So a fluorescent compound exposed to UV light should fluoresce at a longer wavelength. There are, therefore, two possible ways in which it could emit light in the non-visible spectrum. The first would be a very small drop in the energy. UV goes in, longer wave UV comes out. This would, however, indicate a very small energy difference between excitation states. I can't remember my physics very well -- but this strikes me as unlikley/impossible. Perhaps someone who has done this more recently can comment?

Only on what I know about minerals: some turn purple/blue under UV, meaning close to the UV wavelength. Others can glow close to red, so close to IR. This means that the energy drop covers a wide range. However, unsure if this means that a scorpion can fluorescence in non-visible light. If it can, UV close to blue/purple sounds to me like the most likely candidate.

 

[John Bokma]

I experimented yesterday a bit with taking UV photos, see: http://johnbokma.com/mexit/2007/01/02/making-better-scorpion-under-uv-photos.html

post-processing them in software seems to work very well. As an example I attached a post-processed version of C. celebensis by Nazgul (all blue removed, and sharpened it) Since I don't have this species I am curious if this matches better the real color?

 

[skinheaddave]

John,

Very nice. Looks like I have some more playing around to do!

Cheers,
Dave

 

[Charlie_Scorp]

Hi John, I read your website article today; cool site and nice little article. The before and after is very interesting. Do you think a UV filter would have a very similar effect?

Charlie

 

[SimplengGarapal]

Hi,

I got back my uv flashlight recently and took some ov pictures of my C. celebensis, C. rectimanus and I. maculatus today. The pictures are far from being good quality as I didn´t have enough time to shoot good and sharp pics but at least you can see both Chaerilus fluorescing under uv light. The buthid I. maculatus is fluorescing much brighter though.

1.) C. rectimanus
2.) C. celebensis
3.) & 4.) C. celebensis and I. maculatus in comparison

My C. celebensis have been collected by Alakdan originally, I don´t know where yours are originating from. I haven´t tried to confirm the ID of them being C. celebensis yet but at least they are looking very similar to yours, superficially.

Hi,

It seems you have a very powerful UV light there. Would it be possible that the Chaerilus spp reacts differently on different intensities of UV light? I tried using a UV light with just 1 LED and my Chaerilus floresce very dimly compared to my other scorps.

Gian

 

[kahoy]

vixvy's UV has a different wavelength with that of Nazgul, my very fat emp doesnt glow too...

his sides doesnt glow, maybe he needs to fast, so i think i should give him only 2 crix a month... :}


nice maculatus Nazgul, is it a male sub-adult?

 

[Nazgul]

Hi,

John, actually the colours on the pics are the way they are flourescing in real by using my flashlight. Nevertheless, your overworked icture in green looks much nicer.

Gian, my flashlight has 12 LEDs but it seems to have a different wavelength than the ones other people have used to take pics of Chaerilus under UV, too.

It should be a subadult according to the number of molts but for some reason this male stopped eating several months ago and doesn´t grow since. Don´t know why cause besides that it seems to healthy.