Solving "THE GREAT ESCAPE"

[42LegAPede]

This is a followup thread to my other one about how my Desert Hairy Scorpion escaping and falling 10 feet... Not a pleasant experience but he is recovering with great success.

So here is the story; I went to PetSmart to get a 10 gallon lid because I got 4 Halloween Hissers in the mail the day after, but alas, they had none. So I was forced to use the scorpion's lid for the Cockroaches. Because I put in a hide (which was kind of clunky) he climbed atop and climbed out of his enclosure.

I have him in the standard 10 gallon tank with 10 pounds of excavator clay and 40 pounds of play sand (compacted and 40 mL of water added) with 2 Black Death Feigning Beetles as a cleanup crew.

For some reason he has not been hiding in his caves, he just scrunches up in a corner of the enclosure. His past burrows seem to be collapsing and one time he seemed to be trapped in a corner of the enclosure. I helped him out and that's when it started.

Am I suppose to add more water to his enclosure? Did I not compact it enough? Why do you think this is happening?

P.s. I gave him a post-it like piece of paper to hide under so he isn't scared.

P.P.s I just bought a miniature plant pot for him.

P.P.P.s I can't get pictures now, but I will upload them if anyone asks to give a better answer.

 

[Ranitomeya]

You should compact it after water is added so that the particles are able to stick together when you press down. If you add water after compaction, you're loosening things up by washing the smaller clay particles off of the larger sand particles. You might also need to add more water so that the substrate is more damp before compaction. If it's too dry, it won't be cohesive enough.

 

[42LegAPede]

I will try this when I can

 

[shining]

You may also want to add more clay to the mix. I had problems with collapsing burrow's and designs when there wasn't enough.

Your scorpion my be finding your water adding a nuisance and be trying to escape the extra humidity.

 

[Najakeeper]

I would remove the scorpion to a temporary enclosure until the substrate is fully dry. Adding that much water to a desert adapted animal's environment is a bad idea.