Tips on scorpion places in central/south California

[Ythier]

Hi,
I'm going to do some travels between Monterey, San Benito, Merced, Madera, Kings, Tulare and Fresno counties: any one knows of any places where I could watch (not catch) some scorpions?
Same thing in the area between Joshua Trees, Palm Springs and Riverside?
Many thanks for your help.
Eric

 

[cacoseraph]

i don't know of any place in riverside specifically but there is a lot of good territory out there

i know places in cities around riverside


perhaps you should stop by the scabies website and let us know when you will be down and maybe some of us can go hiking/hunting with you
http://scabies.myfreeforum.org/forum36.php
you can post in there w/o having to join our forum. it is our Foreign Consulate

 

[~Abyss~]

Def. Would be fun to hike with you and we already have a few places down here for scorpions.

 

[Selenops]

Ythier,

I know a place on the Riverside/Rubidoux border in West Riverside. Along the shores, on the western shore of the Santa Ana river, between Mission Boulevard bridge and the 60 Freeway. Mt Rubidoux sits across the Santa Ana (or Mission Blvd bridge).

There is a 2" species of scorpion underneath these large stones that line the sloping shores of the Santa Ana.

Unfortunately this spot sits right next to a lower income neighbor, me and my friends in our youth used to cross the bridge and turn over these huge stones and catch em. Probably too close to civilization for your tastes.

I am not sure if this is legal but a blacklight at night you should find TONS of them.

If you were looking for S. polymorpha, I'd suggest any hill or mountain in Riverside and the surrounding counties.

 

[Ythier]

Many thanks for your help guys!
Eric

 

[cacoseraph]

hey, i am sure the other scabies wouldn't mind (plus only i have entered locations) but if you join the scabies site i will give you the permissions you need to view our "Locale Color" forum where i have entereted 14 sites around Southern California, complete with coords and directions on how to get there...

plus you can look at the "Biota Crossreference" to look up species (or down to whatever level of taxo we have ascertained) and see what locales we have found them at.

eventually i would like to have a publicly accessible thread (without coords and directions) for each locale that scabies knows about, complete with a full biota cross reference

Biota Xref: http://scabies.myfreeforum.org/about282.html (anyone can see it... but you have to join and become an "explorer" to follow the links to the location details)



also, if you wanted to make an afternoon and night of it i can drive us between the Wastelands (http://www.arachnoboards.com/ab/showthread.php?t=76498) and the wilds (http://www.arachnoboards.com/ab/showthread.php?t=90975) and maybe Azusa Canyons (http://www.arachnoboards.com/ab/showthread.php?t=94090). the wastelands are east most, the wilds are 10 miles W and Azusa is 20-30 miles further W.

could easily do all three in a day. wastelands you are guaranteed to see at least one scorp. the other two places are somewhat more difficult to find scorps at but are BEAUTIFUL! if we blacklight i am almost postive we could see Anuroctonus sp. at the wilds. asuza is the prettiest, potentially, of the three but the hardest to find bugs of interest at

 

[Thiscordia]

I know I'm the most Inactive SCABIES member :wall: but it would be cool to organize a hike & hunt while Eric its around.

 

[Ythier]

Many thanks Cacoseraph, I will join your website.
Thanks

 

[Zach Valois]

There is alot of scorpion fauna out there. I would just go scout out some interesting habitat during the day, and then go out blacklighting. You probably won't know what your seeing, unless you are familiar with North American species. No time to key, but photos should get you a tentative ID on most of the specimens once the trip is done. To genus level at the least.
And everyone else who is around out there. If you do collect please consider sending scorpions to the REVSYS research team (vaejovidae.com). Great things are happening in the world of scorpion systematics right now! And collectors are part of the process.