Archimandrita males biting at each other

hundefrau

hundefrau

Third Instar
Good evening!

Today what I was dreading actually happened - I woke up to my two adult males (one being my original male and the other being rather freshly molted) fighting with each other.

I know they do fight on occasion but it still looked so brutal! Since the new male seemed kinda shy and was burrying itself a lot, they never had that much contact with each other.

My question is if they can actually seriously hurt each other? If they'd go for the legs that'd suck... is it smarter to keep them in seperate groups/enclosures?

Thanks in advance!

- Pia

(P.s. I wasn't sure where to put this topic. But since this is a courtship-related question I posted in the breeding section)

 
How many females are in the  cage? If there's only a few females and just the 2 males I'd take out one of the males so they don't fight it would also increase your chances of breeding, I would keep the extra male in another cage just incase your original male died then you could put your other male in the cage with females for breeding purposes. I hope this helps!  :)

 
Thanks for your suggestion :) After they woke me up with their fighting, I put the newer male into another, smaller box to prevent any bigger injuries.

There are 5 adult females as of right now (more to mature soon). Should I leave him on his own in the other box? I do know roaches like company  :o

- Pia

 
I do separate the males once in a while if I have the feeling that fighting gets out of hand and one of the males get a hard life. There is a reason why my males have a shorter life span, they have significant more damage than the females. Ragged wings, lost legs or parts, shortened antennas etc. 
I have them now in a larger enclosure with multiple 'lookout places'. It requires a roach to come down to the bottom to get to another lookout place. That way more than one male can have the feeling to be king of the hill. But even then... I guess that in free nature, the looser will move to the next tree and that solves the problem. 

I also observed that some males adapt by getting a kind of low profile life. Then don't engage in fighting and remain hidden. Some of these managed to outlive the more aggressive guys by quite a long time. Kind of biding their time... 

So yes, if you feel that they fight too much, separating the males can be a good idea. 

 
Thank you for your reply, stanislas :)

I, too, have several lookout places. The old male uses them a lot, I hadn't seen the new male use them yet.

The younger male does indeed keep a low profile. Before last night, it remained hidden in the substrate at most times. I think they clashed when the younger male went to eat, since they were right in the food bowl when I separated them...

Maybe I'll try to reunite the group later again... I'll keep you updated :)

 
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