Porcellio bolivari

Hisserdude

Hisserdude

Megaloblatta
Forum Supporter
Received 6 of these in a trade with Alan Grosse, (who's got an awesome new website), man are they beautiful! :D  Hopefully they'll do well for me, I know they aren't the easiest of the Spanish isopods for sure!

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Please keep us posted on your husbandry experiences / observations with this species.  I am very interested in keeping P.  bolivari but I've been hesitant in taking the plunge with this species because of other USA keeper's lack of success with them.  It appears that "good air circulation" with moderate humidity is essential for keeping this species alive.

Edulio Isopods seems to have the regimen for successfully keeping and breeding this species figured out.  Alan Grosse in the USA also seems to have figured out the requirements for propagating for this species!  Good luck my friend!!


 
dactylus said:
Please keep us posted on your husbandry experiences / observations with this species.  I am very interested in keeping P.  bolivari but I've been hesitant in taking the plunge with this species because of other USA keeper's lack of success with them.  It appears that "good air circulation" with moderate humidity is essential for keeping this species alive.

Edulio Isopods seems to have the regimen for successfully keeping and breeding this species figured out.  Alan Grosse in the USA also seems to have figured out the requirements for propagating for this species!  Good luck my friend!!
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Will do! Yup, I made sure to ask Alan Grosse how he keeps his, I've given them plenty of ventilation, and have most of the enclosure dry with one moist corner, (which is supposedly the best way to keep these Spanish isopods). They also have plenty of hides. If this setup doesn't work, then I don't know what will! 

 
Definitely on my want list for the Spring of 2018!!  Once it warms up.   ;)

It has been -15 F (actual temp) here in MN for the past few nights...   Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr...

 
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Well, I just checked on mine, and found two of my three females dead, including the really gravid one.... WORST way to start the new year, EVER.  :(

 
Hisserdude said:
Well, I just checked on mine, and found two of my three females dead, including the really gravid one.... WORST way to start the new year, EVER.  :(
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That really, really sucks!  Sorry to hear that.  Do you have any idea what might have happened?

 
dactylus said:
That really, really sucks!  Sorry to hear that.  Do you have any idea what might have happened?
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The males must have stressed the females out too much, which is EXACTLY what happened with my P.silvestrii earlier this year. I had planned to separate the females once they became gravid because of this, but they seemed to be doing so well, so I left them alone. Basically, it's my own dang fault this happened, should have seen it coming. :( Hopefully my last female is in good health, I'll only be keeping one male in her enclosure now for sure.

 
Thanks for the reply!  Your information is good to know!!  I definitely want this species but I've been a little gun shy because of the price and the instances of tragedies mentioned by experienced isopod keepers!

 
dactylus said:
Thanks for the reply!  Your information is good to know!!  I definitely want this species but I've been a little gun shy because of the price and the instances of tragedies mentioned by experienced isopod keepers!
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No problem, hopefully others will learn from my mistakes. ISOLATE single pairs or gravid females when starting a colony of Spanish isopods, when the colony gets bigger it may be less of a problem, but when starting out males seem to really bother females.

 
Well, my last female is dying, probably only has a few hours left, and I'm really not sure why. :( I put a male back in with her, then after a few days I saw that she was gravid, so I removed him.

Now, about a week later, I just found her in between a leaf and the enclosure wall, moving very sluggishly, half of her legs aren't working, and unfortunately it looks like she's still carrying her eggs, and they are too underdeveloped to hatch. 

The ONLY thing that's changed in the past couple days is that I put her enclosure under two others, and it used to be on top. So maybe covering the lid ventilation did her in, even though the enclosure has cross ventilation too. If that's the case, then I'm gonna be SO furious at myself, because that means I've single handedly killed all of my females due to stupid mistakes... 

Very sad right now, these are my favorite isopods ever, was really hoping I'd do a better job at keeping them.

 
pannaking22 said:
Sorry to hear that man :( Sounds like they really are a picky species. Even though it sucks it still provides some good info everyone can use in the future with this species.
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Yeah, the females are SO picky, but my males are all doing amazing still... I'll probably be getting more females from Alan this spring, will be sure not to keep them with males for too long, and will be sure to keep them very well ventilated.

 
Damn, I'm sorry to hear about the turn of events with your last female bolivari.  I would hope that restricting the total ventilation of her enclosure by covering the vent holes on the lid for just a few days would not lead to the demise of that female.  

As I mentioned before I am also interested in keeping this species.  P. bolivari does appear to be a picky species to keep alive.  Adequate ventilation & humidity, the size of the enclosure and providing numerous hides/shelters seem to be very important factors in keeping and breeding P.  bolivari and several of the other Spanish isopod species.

If you haven't already looked at the "Albums" section of Edulio Isopods Facebook page you should check it out.  

https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100010559525104&sk=photos&collection_token=100010559525104%3A2305272732%3A69&set=a.457198737975440.1073741854.100010559525104&type=3

This info is from that site: 

Our "small" cages: 40X24X!6 Cm. with a wire mesh of 16X10 Cm. on the center of the top.
We use them for small species and for selective breeding purposes.

Our "big" cages: 73X40X16 Cm. with a wire mesh of 26X20 Cm. on a side of the top.
We use them for our main colonies.

Based on what I'm seeing on the Edulio site I will have to set up much larger enclosures for several of the Spanish species than what I had originally planned on.  

 
A LOT of people have poor luck getting these to survive, in most cases people lose their whole groups though. My males are doing fantastic, so my overall setup for them, (humidity, ventilation, amount of hides, etc) is OK, I just messed up with my females. :(

I'm not even sure a lack of ventilation was why my last female died though, because as a test, I put one of my males' enclosures right where hers was, (it has the same amount of cross ventilation and everything), and he's doing fine... Maybe gravid females need more ventilation than males do? Or maybe it was some other cause, I'm not sure.

In any case, I've put the males back into the main enclosure, (along with some P.ornatus "South" females), and added a lot more ventilation. Next time, I'm gonna put my P.bolivari in a enclosure twice as large, and only keep a single male with the females, harem style. I may even remove him once I see females becoming gravid, just in case.

 
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