Panchlora sp. "White" News & a Much Needed Lanxoblatta Update!!!

I recently rehoused my Panchlora sp. "White" culture back to a gallon enclosure, as the nymphs getting to be half grown now, and I didn't want to overcrowd them. The day after rehousing, I was happy to find some tiny newborn nymphs in the enclosure as well! 😁 I haven't gotten an accurate count yet, and won't bother to in fear of stressing them out, but there are at least half a dozen+.

However, my young adult female is showing black coloration where her internal ootheca is/was. I'm not sure if she's the one who gave birth or not, or what is up with the black insides, but I'm willing to bet this doesn't bode well for her... 🙁

Anyway, here are some pictures of an adult male and the new enclosure:

The adults and even the nymphs really like hiding in this "roach hut" I constructed for them out of corkboard. The newborn nymphs of this species seem to have long thin legs, and prefer seeking pre-existing cavities in which to hide, rather than construct burrows themselves like the larger nymphs do.

Anyway, my colony's numbers seem to be on the rise, so hopefully the next couple generations will prove to be very prolific!

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Now, last month another litter of Lanxoblatta rudis nymphs was born, despite me moving them to a colder area of the room to prevent any reproduction until I had some more hides for them. Sadly, a decent portion of those nymphs have died off, and it seems like all suitable resting areas in the enclosure have been claimed.

Finally though, a light at the end of the tunnel! I made a trade with Leo Dutkewych, (owner of Leo's Invertebrate Blog and a long time supporter of this one), and received a box full of Birch bark, which should work very nicely for this species! 😃

Here are a few pictures of their enclosure, pimped out with some of the Birch bark:

I will be placing their cage next to my heat cable again, so reproduction may commence at a quickened pace! Hopefully I'll be swimming in nymphs soon! In the meantime, me and another buddy will be working on coming up with a more permanent hide option for this species, (as they will chew through the bark and render it useless after a few months).

Well, that does it for this post, thanks for reading, I hope everyone enjoyed, will see you all next time! 😉

Arenivaga bolliana Rehouse, Horrible Porcellio News & More

Happy New Year's everyone! 😀

Well, I finally rehoused my Arenivaga bolliana colony last week! I now have them housed in a gallon container with lots of ventilation, for the substrate I am using coconut fiber, which I am keeping dry, except for the very back, which I am keeping rather moist. They have lots of dead leaves on top of the substrate for food, as well as a food bowl with chick feed in it.

Here is a picture of their new enclosure:

Hopefully they'll enjoy their new habitat, and breed well in it! 😃

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Also, forgot to write this in a previous post, but I found another newborn litter of babies in my Corydidarum pygmaea enclosure on December the 26th. This generation is breeding way faster than their predecessors, high ventilation = lots of babies and a short gestation period! 😁 Also, some of my females are boring into that rotten log I put in there, which is really cool!

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Sadly, the New Year got off to a really bad start for my Porcellio bolivari, today I checked on their enclosure, only to find that TWO of my three females were dead, one of which was very gravid!!! 😩 It's my own dang fault too, I'm pretty sure the males (who are all fine), stressed out my females with mating attempts, which is exactly what happened to my Porcellio silvestrii at the beginning of this year.

I actually had planned to isolate the females as soon as I saw them getting gravid, but then I saw how well they were doing, and decided against disturbing them. I figured worst case scenario, one female would die at first, at which point I could separate the remaining two. But nope, because of my hesitation, now I'm left with just one small female, who I really hope is in good health. 😟

I've removed all of the males from the main enclosure, and will introduce one of them once I know she's OK. I did the same thing with my last female P.silvestrii, and now I have a couple dozen of them, so HOPEFULLY I can save my colony, we'll see... What a stupid mistake I've made!

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Speaking of Spanish isopod woes, it seems I won't be breeding my Porcellio ornatus "South", as I sexed them last week, and they are all females. 😢 One died a month ago, but they were all mature at that time, so since none of my females are currently gravid, I'm gonna assume that one was a female as well. Maybe I'll get a male from a trade or something later on, but for now, it does not look like I'll be breeding this species.

Oh well, that does it for this post, hope everyone enjoyed, will see you all next time!

Lanxoblatta & Corydidarum Updates! (Picture Heavy!)

I moved my Lanxoblatta rudis to a larger enclosure recently, but most of it is empty, I need to buy some more bark for them soon. Right now they should be comfortable the way things are though, and indeed there has been some molting activity! 😁

My female nymph molted, into what I assume is the subadult stage, as she is quite large now! My male nymph also molted, into an adult! My original adult pair are still doing well, and I even got some pictures of my female a few days ago!

Here are some pictures of them:

Adult pair, female on the left, male on the right

Adult female

Adult male

Subadult female

Subadult male

Freshly molted adult male

Their new enclosure (I surrounded their bark hide area with cardboard, to make them feel a little more comfortable)

Hopefully I'll be able to find some suitable bark for them soon, will let you all know when I do!

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It looks like one of my newer Corydidarum pygmaea females gave birth a few days ago, which I was definitely not expecting! Their male brethren are still alive, usually the females don't give birth until several months after all the males are dead, (at least all the males that matured at the same time they did, that is). Super surprised and happy to see this newest litter of Corydidarum nymphs, glad this species is doing well for me! 😊

Here are a couple pictures of the newborns and their mother:

Aren't they just the cutest little things? 😄 Even the adults are cute!

Anyways, that's gonna do it for this post, I hope everyone enjoyed, will see you all next time! 😉

Armadillidium, Anallacta & Panchlora, Oh My!

Pretty sure I made the same pun on a different post title as well, but whatever! 😜

My Armadillidium maculatum "Dalmatian" colony is doing quite well, and I've been doing my best to selectively breed for the most white coloration possible, while still retaining a good amount of grey spots too! I'm pretty sure I've done that now, here are a couple pictures I took of one particularly good looking individual:

Nice, right? I'll take the silence as yes! 😆 Hopefully these will become more widespread in the hobby soon, it's a beautiful strain of an already very attractive species, that every isopod enthusiast should have!

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My Anallacta methanoides are maturing like mad, and I have quite a few females now! I should be getting plenty of oothecae soon! 😁

Here are a couple pictures of a mating pair:

Can't wait until I get some oothecae from them!

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At least one of my Panchlora sp. "Costa Rica Yellow" females has given birth, there are more than a dozen tiny nymphs crawling around the enclosure now! 😊 I am quite relieved, as I was beginning to doubt if they would ever give birth, after their substrate was infected with a nasty fungus a month or two ago. Things are definitely looking up though, which is great! No pictures of the little nymphs unfortunately, they are just too small right now.

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I finally moved all of my Panchlora sp. "White" to a medium sized enclosure, with plenty of bark, dead leaves, and New Zealand sphagnum moss for hides. There are three areas where I place food in the cage, so the adults are always sure to find some, let's hope they like it! Unfortunately the enclosure did get inoculated with Sinella curviseta accidentally, so now I have to keep my eye on them and make sure their numbers don't get out of control...

Also, while moving my old female and her nymphs to this new enclosure, I discovered that she actually gave birth to a good sized litter, a dozen or more nymphs! I thought she only produced half that much, so this was quite a pleasant surprise! 😄

Here are some pictures of the enclosure:

The adults seem to spend most of their time on the sides of the enclosure, which is a bit concerning to me, but apparently not unusual for Panchlora. They don't seem stressed, trying to escape or anything, they just like resting on the sides of the enclosure. I might redo the enclosure later and prop some bark slabs up vertically, maybe they just don't like resting on a horizontal surface?

Anyway, that is gonna be it for this post, I hope everyone enjoyed, will see you all soon! 😉

Pasimachus L3 Larva & My Current Pyrophorus Larvae Setup

My Pasimachus sp. "Arizona" larva has molted to L3, and is still eating like a champ, fingers crossed it will pupate soon! 😄

I had moved it to a larger jar once it molted to L3, since I thought it would want more room to burrow around, but unfortunately it seems like it took the whole burrowing thing too far, and never found the food I offered it. Once I noticed it hadn't fed on anything for at least a week, I moved it back to it's little deli cup, and it resumed it's normal feeding activity.

So note to self, (and all you Carabidae keepers), don't house Pasimachus larvae in spacious containers with deep substrate, as they don't seem to have the ability to find food easily in such conditions.

Anyway, here are some pictures I snapped of it the other day, I want to be sure to photograph every phase of it's development that I can, including the pupal stage!

Will keep you all updated as to it's development!

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So, I have been isolating any Pyrophorus noctilucus larvae from my main enclosure that come close to the surface of the substrate, since they are all starting to grow a bit now! I have twenty-three deli cups devoted to them at the moment, each of them filled with a centimeter or so of moist rotten wood. Twenty of the deli cups now have larvae in them, and it looks like there are still quite a few larvae in the main enclosure... So it looks like my adults have been really busy LOL!!!

I'll be keeping the larvae in these deli cups for several months, until they grow too big for them, and will be feeding them chick feed in addition to the rotten wood, until they are big enough to tackle some small Tenebrionid larvae. My cf. Cynaeus angustus and Tribolium sp. are probably gonna come in real handy for feeding these little guys!

Here is a picture of my current setup for the young Pyrophorus larvae:

As you can see, I've put all of the deli cups in one shoebox, so I can move them around more easily, as taking down each deli cup one by one off of the shelf they are stored on would be quite a pain!

Well, that's gonna do it for today, I hope everyone enjoyed, will see you all next time! 😉

The "Catching Up" Update (Very Long Post!)

Sorry it's been a while since I last posted, I've been a bit down lately, as some of you may know, I am in the process of moving, and that has put a complete halt on any new invertebrate acquisitions for me. I had to turn down an offer on a roach species I've been waiting to become available for several months now, and have had missed out on a couple of other neat sales as well. 😞 All of that, plus a couple of other things in my life have put me in a bit of a bad mood lately, so I haven't felt like blogging at all, despite the fact that there have been several new developments in my collection. This post is meant to help you all catch up on most of the stuff that's happened since my last post! 🙂

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First of all, you know that female Arenivaga sp. "Algodones Dunes" that I thought was mature? Well, turns out she was a subadult, she molted a few days ago, and boy did her coloration change a LOT! She is now a dark red, kind of the same color that my Arenivaga cf. genitalis and Arenivaga sp. "Dell City" females usually are, but with almost no light markings, and dark, almost black edges to her thoracic pads and the bottom of her pronotum. Overall I find the coloration very attractive, I wish I had a male for her now more than ever!! 😩

Here are some pictures of her:

I don't know why, but it was really hard to get clear, crisp pictures of her, I really need to get a better camera one day!

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Most of my Balta notulata have started maturing, these ones grew a lot faster than their parents! I'm gonna have a ton more soon, I ended up with a good amount of offspring from just one adult female, and now I have at least a dozen adult females, and more on the way! 😁 I wasn't able to get any good pictures of the adults, just wanted to let you all know how they are doing, and that my culture has really bounced back in full force!

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My Deropeltis sp. "Jinka" are almost all mature now, including four of the males! The males of this species look amazing, so cool and sleek looking, and aren't very skittish either, so handling them is easy! The first male to mature, (the one pictured), has slightly ruffled wings, two of the other males came out with perfect wings, and the other molted in a bad spot, so he ended up with really messed up wings unfortunately.

Here are some pictures of the first male to mature:

Can't wait until the females start producing oothecae, hopefully these will breed well for me!

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All of my Drymaplaneta semivitta are mature now! (save for one small, stunted nymph). However, I haven't been able to get the females to lay ANY oothecae at all! I've never had an egg laying cockroach just refuse to lay any ooths, so I'm really not sure what to do. 😕

Their enclosure has been changed up a little to help aid egg laying, I put a thin layer of coconut fiber at the bottom of the enclosure, and I replaced their water bowl with a moist corner of the enclosure, with some bark pieces there in case the females needed to lay their oothecae on bark for some reason. I also added even more ventilation to the enclosure, and placed it on top of a heat cable, but I'm probably going to remove the cable, since it doesn't seem to be helping at all, and my room is already very warm.

I also have varied their diet a lot, in addition to chick feed, I'm offering them cat food and fruits, so far it doesn't look like that's helped anything. A couple days ago, I removed one of the adult females and placed her in my Deropeltis sp. "Jinka" enclosure, to see if the higher air humidity in there would help induce egg laying, we'll see how that goes. I'm deathly afraid of raising the humidity in the actual Drymaplaneta enclosure, since that could end up wiping them all out.

Will keep you guys updated on them, hopefully I can get them to lay some oothecae before they get too old!

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My Gyna lurida are doing very nicely, I have a lot of adults right now, and lots of tiny babies too! 😊 The other day I tossed a banana piece in their enclosure, and they went nuts for it! Normally it's a hassle taking the lid off of their container to do maintenance, but this time they all just gravitated to the banana instead of trying to climb out!

Here are a couple of pictures of them eating the banana:

I love these guys, they may seem rather plain looking, but there is just something about the coloration of the adults that I adore!

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One of my Panchlora sp. "White" females matured a while ago, which is great! 😄 Unfortunately it doesn't seem like my other two female nymphs will mature in time for the males to mate with them, so the fate of my colony all comes down to this one female! Luckily she seems healthy, and I saw her rotating her ootheca the other day, (I kept looking at their enclosure to make sure she wasn't aborting it), so hopefully babies aren't too far off in the future. Let's hope she produces more offspring than the original adults I got!

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Lastly, I have moved my Polyphaga saussurei adults (and the few nymphs in their enclosure) into a larger bin, which I'm hoping will stop any future nymphs from dying off prematurely. They certainly seem to be eating more of the chick feed I am offering them, which is great, that one subadult nymph I have still hasn't matured though, I think she's a goner.

Here are a couple pictures of their new setup:

By the way, the two test groups of nymphs that I am using to tell which supplemental food is better, cat food or chick feed, are both doing very well, they are growing at the same rates, no die offs so far, etc., so I think it's safe to say that the switch to chick feed is NOT the cause of the young nymph die off I have been experiencing. If rehousing my main culture does not help things out at all, I don't really know what else to do.

Well, that about sums up most of what has happened in my collection since I last posted, there are a couple of other things I haven't brought up, but I'll save those for the next post, since this one is already very long! BTW, I made all the "topic divider" lines in bold for this post, do you guys like it better like this, or do you prefer the old way better? Let me know! I'm also going to start writing scientific names in italic for now on, since I'm pretty sure that is the "proper" way to write down scientific names.

Anyway, that's it for today folks, I hope everyone enjoyed this post, will see you all soon, stay tuned for the next post! 😉