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Be
thankful you’re
not a scorpion! Your mother may have eaten you already! This,
and many other unique traits, make scorpions one of our most
"efficient" desert survivors, needing less food and
water than any other active organism. You may know them for their
devistating sting from their tail, but did you know that their "stinger",
or telson, is not their tail at all? Or how about that very few
of Mojave Desert scorpions are venomous enough to kill a person?
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you've already learned something, keep reading to learn all sorts
of interesting facts about these tough little desert survivors! |
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- Scorpions
are one of the OLDest land animals, having been on land for
more than 300,000,000 years!!!
- They have changed very little in an estimated 350 to 400
million years since they first became terrestrial!
- Their
thick waxy cuticle helps them hold water in their bodies and
the harsh environment out.
- Scorpion metabolisms are SO slow that an adult can
live over 2 years between meals! (I just ate breakfast an hour
ago and I'm hungry!)
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- Scorpions
are arachnids like ticks, spiders, mites, whipscorpions, sunspiders,
tail-less whipscorpions, daddy-long-legs and a few other eight-legged
critters!
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- Like
many other arachnids scorpions have elaborate appendages
called "pedipalps". These "pinchers" are actually parts
of their mouth!
- Scorpions
are also famous for their venom which they inject their
prey and agressors by a swift jab from their telson, the
pointed bulb at the end of their bodies.
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- Scorpions
do not have tails, their "tail" is
actually an elongation of their abdomen!
- Scorpions
will glow fluorescent green under a black light!
- We
do not know why they glow, we do know that it is likely
due to an aromatic compound in their exoskeleton.
- One
theory suggests they glow slightly in
star light to attract moths and other insects for their
next meal.
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- It
is thought that scorpions are
descendent from large arthropods called Eurypterids.
- These
giant scorpion-like animals were fully aquatic and
reached lengths of over 2 meters (about 6 feet)!
But most were about 20 cms or so.
- Eurypterids
lived during the Cambrian and Permian eras (510 to
248 million years ago!).
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- Scorpions
are so numerous in the desert that, in many places, there can
be as much as 70 kgs of scorpion in a single hectare!!!
- That
means if you were to gather up all the scorpions, there
would be enough to equal the weight of an adult human
in a space the size of about 2 football fields!
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Size:
While scorpions world wide can be fairly large, the biggest
Emperor scorpions of Africa and Asia can fill an adult's hand
and the long-tailed African scorpions reach lengths
of over 8 inches making them the longest scorpions we know of.
North American scorpions range from
Color:
Though color varies between species, Mojave Desert scorpions
are generally well camouflaged and blend into their surroundings.
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Scorpions
are Arthropods like insects and crustaceans. They have hard exoskeletons
that protect them from the external environment. Scorpions
are also in the group (Class) Arachnida, which consists of eight-legged
land Arthropods. Arachnids are mostly carnivorous |
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Scorpions
have adapted to a wide range of environments, including plains
and savannahs, deciduous forests, mountainous pine forests, rain
forests and caves. They live on every continent on Earth, with
the exception of Antarctica. They have been found at higher than
12,000 feet elevation in the
Andes Mountains in South America and in the Himalayas of Asia and
the European Alps. In snowy areas, they hibernate during the
colder months. In hot arid areas they may estivate
(pass the summer in a dormant or torpid state).
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About
90 species are found in the U.S., only 4 of which live east of
the Mississippi River!!! Scorpions are most common in southern
Arizona and in parts of Texas and central Oklahoma, we have several
species living here in Southern Nevada a few of which are non-native. |
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| Anything
that moves, really. Well, as long as it's not too big.
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| The
pedipalps are used in scorpion courtship behavior. The male performs
a kind of dance with the female, grabbing her pedipalps with his
own and dragging her across the ground until he locates a preferred
place to deposit his spermatophore, which is then drawn up into
the female's genital pore, near the front on the underside of her
abdomen. Some species' courtships include a sexual sting of the
female by the male. |
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Scorpion gestation periods vary from several months to a year and
a half, depending on the species. Each brood will consist of about
24-35 young. They are viviparious - the young develop as embryos in
the female's ovariuterus. The young scorpions are born two at at time,
climbing onto their mother's back to be carried there until their first
molt in about two weeks, when they will be large and strong enough
to take care of themselves.
Scorpions do not metamorphasize as they grow, changing only in size
and sometimes to a deeper color with each molt. Typically five or six
molts over two to six years are required for the scorpion to reach
maturity. The molting is accomplished by a split in the outer covering
through which the scorpion must crawl in order to grow. Scorpion lifespans range from three to five years, though some species
are thought to live 10-15 years. Some kinds of scorpions show more
sophisticated social behaviors, like colonial burrowing, and living
in familial groups that may share burrows and food. |
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Born
and raised in South Africa, John Lighton received various degrees
from the University of Cape Town before he left
for the U.S. to study Physiology under George Bartholomew
at UCLA in 1984. He has since become a U.S. citizen and served as
an adjunct assistant professor at UCLA, guest professor at the
University of Zurich, assistant professor at the
University of Utah, and has held various research positions at the
the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. John continues to enjoy an adjuct
postion at UNLV and is currently heading Sable Systems, a scientist
run biological instrumentation company. He maintains an internationally
recognized research program in arthropod physiology and has published
over 60 scientific papers since 1985. |
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Rob
Fulton grew up in Orange County Ca., where his interests in biology
began by catching and "experimenting" with backyard insects...
much to the disgust of his mother! Family outings usually revolved
around camping and boating (power and sail). He received his
BS in Biology from the University of California, Irvine with
a concentration in terrestrial ecology, and then went on to get
his Master's at Cal State Fullerton, focusing on pollination
ecology, with a thesis on bat pollination in Agave.
During graduate school, he and other students spent many weekends
and summer days renovating the former Zzyzx Mineral Springs resort
into a field station for the Cal State system. After much renovation
and hard work, the Desert Studies Center was born. After a few
years teaching community college, he took the opportunity to
move to Zzyzx as the first resident manager of the Center, and
is now in his 20th year there. His management duties consume
most of his time, but he still finds time to teach educational
extension courses for various universities (including UNLV),
and engage in some research on his own or in collaboration with
the U.S. Geological Survey working on long-term vegetation
changes and fire recovery.
Beyond
work, his interests are music (plays a mediocre bass guitar),
kayaking, backpacking, fishing, and whatever his wife wants him
to do. He also sometimes gets away to his own "private desert
condo" for some quiet relaxation. |
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| Desert
USA - for informatin on over 60 desert organisms! |
| The
Desert Studies Center @ Zzyzx - Check out
this desert oasis of knowledge! |
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