Lonely little Isopod....

[lilmountaingrrl]

Well, I was doing quite a bit of reading about Isopods, and stumbled across the thread about obtaining them, etc. I broke down and purchased a couple hundred of them online yesterday from a fellow arachnoboard member, but Im horribly impatient when it comes to waiting for things.

I ended up going out in my yard to look for some (kind of hard to do since it's the middle of January) but found a few since it's been mild. I got them situated in their container, and just had to take some pics....

Here's a shot I got of one lone Isopod, all by itself.... soon I'll have a colony of many, though. I'm sure that will make for lots of great photo opportunities!

 

[Cirith Ungol]

Are you planning on keeping them as pets or as cleaners?

If you keep them as pets I don't think you're ever encounter any difficulties in keeping them if that what can be seen is your setup.

But if you want them as cleaners you might encounter a problem if you happen to have picked up the wrong type of pillbug. The thing is that there are some pbs which have very specific food requirements, like rotting wood or (what i believe to be) a certain type of fungus. Such pbs for example wouldn't fare well at all in a T tank since they don't like to eat leftovers and they'd simply starve.

I just thought I'd mention that.

Nice pic though

 

[jbrd]

Such pbs for example wouldn't fare well at all in a T tank since they don't like to eat leftovers and they'd simply starve.

Are the ones in her pic good for cleaners?

 

[Cirith Ungol]

Are the ones in her pic good for cleaners?

Impossible for me to tell. There is one thing you/she could try - putting some of those into a box with very little substrate and a dead insect and see what happens. If they start crawling allover the insect I suppose they're good.

 

[David_F]

The thing is that there are some pbs which have very specific food requirements, like rotting wood or (what i believe to be) a certain type of fungus. Such pbs for example wouldn't fare well at all in a T tank since they don't like to eat leftovers and they'd simply starve.

Are you thinking of pill millipedes (way different from pill bugs)? I figure there are also pill bugs that have specialized diets but the one in the pic (and it is a nice pic ) just looks like a regular ol' A. vulgare. Can't be positive without looking really close up but that's what it looks like to me. Should be no problem at all using it as a cleaner. Plus, since it was taken from the wild there should be no question as to what it was eating. Just toss a bit of leaf litter into the spider (or whatever) enclosure every once in a while and no problem. But if they're not to be used as cleaners...you don't have to worry about it.

Enjoy the pill bugs lilmountaingrrl. They are fun bugs.

 

[OldHag]

The ones in her picture do indeed eat ANYTHING.. Dead worms, mice, crickets etc. They also eat, cucumber, oakleaves, fruit, veggies, eachother, small neighbor kids, cats, dogs and numerous other vegetive fodder.

 

[NiGHTS]

They love to eat just about any type of lettuce...just make sure you rinse it off really well if it isn't from a garden or organic. Also, if you can get some dried leaves (especially oak), add a layer of leaf litter to the top of the substrate - the isopods will eat it, and it is helpful for hiding places.

The problem with wild caught common grey isopods is that they may not breed in captivity. I've had good luck getting them to multiply by keeping higher numbers of them together (100+ seems to get them breeding). The layer or leaves also seems to help with breeding as well. I'm not sure if it's because the animals have places to hide and are thus less stressed, or if it's something in the leaves that encourages the breeding...it just seems to help.

If you haven't seen them already, there are some very neat orange isopods that you can get pretty readily. I'd recommend getting some from Graham at StrangeCargoInvertebrates. Here's his post: http://www.arachnoboards.com/ab/showthread.php?t=59142

 

[Bloodletting]

I am in PA and it is amazing how many you can find right now (jan). We usually don't start collecting them til March. The weather has been mild and they are easily found in rotting logs, under rocks, leaves, etc...

 

[kahoy]

???

pill millipedes? isnt that mills stinks??? might not be nice for any arach?:?