Sunday, March 13, 2022

My Dream Hissers: Princisia vanwaerebeki "Androhamana"!!!

Nicoluc Shipment Pt 1/6
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Just in time for my birthday, I've received a package that was part of a trade which a couple good friends helped me out with. ๐Ÿ˜ I got six new species/strains of roaches for the US hobby, and I'm gonna start off with the ones I'm the most excited about, my dream hissers, Princisia vanwaerebeki "Androhamana, Madagascar"! ๐Ÿ˜

Now mine are just small nymphs ATM, but rest assured these will grow to be quite large, vibrantly colored hissers! This strain was somewhat recently imported from Androhamana, Madagascar, and is only being cultured by a select few... Meaning they're 100% pure Princisia! ๐Ÿ˜ Even more exciting, unlike the "Big/Black" strain or "Tiger/Tricolor/Black & White" complex, this strain is pretty much identical to the holotype in terms of coloration and patterning (and indeed they were collected fairly close to where the holotype was).

Here's a picture of an adult male of this strain from my friend Nico, compared to the holotype male:

©Cafarnarium
©CSF
Basically identical, right? So we've essentially got "holotype form" Princisia in culture finally, after all these years! ๐Ÿ˜

I've got my 20 small nymphs housed in a well ventilated enclosure with a thin layer of coconut fiber as the substrate. I'm keeping a third of the enclosure humid, the rest dry. They've got bark, eggcrates, cardboard rolls and leaf litter for hides. I'm keeping them at around 80-85F°, and am feeding them dog food, fruits and veggies.

Here are some pictures of a few of my nymphs:






Very similar in coloration and morphology to my P.vanwaerebeki "Big/Black" nymphs (which also gives me hope that those are indeed pure). Here's hoping these will do well for me, and become well established in the US hobby! ๐Ÿ˜

Well, that's gonna do it for this post, but stay tuned, lots more awesome species to showcase in this little series! ๐Ÿ˜‰ Thanks for reading, hope you enjoyed, stay safe, and I'll see you all next time!

4 comments:

  1. Purestrain hissers of fully known provenance! My head is spinning...

    The nymphs and Nico's male look fantastic. Congrats! If the other entries in this series are as good as this, it's going to be... good!

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    1. Right? So rare that we actually get locality data for hissers, really only happens with newly imported strains (which are few and far between sadly).

      Yeah they're stunning, can't wait until I got a colony going! Thanks, definitely got some neat new stuff to show off, though hands down these Princisia are my favorite, being the hisser geek I am. ๐Ÿ˜„

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  2. Hey Tristan!

    Where did you get these cockroaches? In the USA or in Europe? I would love to have them in my collection!

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    1. Well I live in the US, but these individuals came from and were produced by Nicolas at the Cafarnarium in Belgium... Hence why there were actually two people involved in getting these to me. ๐Ÿ˜…

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