Vaejovidae.christimanus??? Or....

[The Toecutter]

Greetings, I picked up this scorpion from a guy who has a huge T collection but was getting rid of the few scorps that he had. Now I don't know the back story of the critter but perusing my copy of Scorpions of the World, I narrowed it down to 1 I'm 98% positive it is, or..97% positive it's this other. So I want to toss this out to everyone, and see if I'm 100% right, or don't know my bum from a hole in the ground

What do you surmise?

 

[brandontmyers]

It's now Thorellius christimanus. I do not believe it is T. christimanus. What is the size on it? A lot of Vaejovids look very similar to this so it may be difficult to know for sure without location data.

 

[The Toecutter]

He's about 5.5cm from chelicera to the end of his aculeus. I'm ballparkin' it cause I'm not home right now.

Thanks for the info on the christimanus..

 

[brandontmyers]

Thorellius can get pretty big. I believe they can get up to around 9cm. Best bet is to take a look at the article at the link below. It gives a key to some of the other families associated with Vaejovidae.

http://research.amnh.org/users/lorenzo/PDF/Gonzalez.2013.pdf

 

[The Toecutter]

Thanks for the link, added to my downloads on scorps. The Thorellius show are more green in hue, right shape, etc. My guy is almost purple in certain light, very reddish brown with yellowish legs.

I was really thinking more like Pseudouroctonus reddelli???

 

[brandontmyers]

Metasoma (tail) looks too thick to be Pseudouroctonus. If you could get a picture of the chela (claws) that may help a bit.

 

[The Toecutter]

The third thumbnail shows the pedipalp's look identical. Yes the Pseudourctonus fifth metosoma segment looks slightly thinner....but this could be due to pictures of differing ages of beasties? Maybe? Because in all other respects this is the closest animal that matches my guy.

 

[2nscorpx]

So there is no information about the locality? I agree with Brandon - I don't think it's P. reddelli. To be honest, I do think it could be Thorellius. It's very beautiful, whatever species it is (it is certainly a Vaejovid).

Is that the enclosure in which the scorpion is currently housed? That coconut substrate is not very good for scorpions (not dangerous, just not really suitable). You may want to use a mix of playsand and soil, or just dry soil (coco-fibre works just fine) - it's not all that fancy, but it is natural.

Brandon, thanks too for including that paper.

 

[The Toecutter]

No, on any backstory to this one unfortunately. I agree with Brandon as well....I've looked through all my books, cruised a million pics online, and the closest thing was the P.reddilli, and as Brandon pointed out the metasoma ain't a match....

The pic was just a spare holding enclosure for the pics while his real enclosure was cleaned..proper sand/rock.

He is beautiful...and in better shape now since I've had him. But am at a loss as to who he really is.