Feb 22
Being elusive
seen from Malaysia
seen from T1
seen from T1
seen from United Kingdom
seen from Netherlands
seen from T1
seen from Italy
seen from T1
seen from Iraq
seen from T1
seen from United Kingdom
seen from Finland
seen from Malaysia
seen from Italy
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from Italy
seen from Canada
seen from Kenya
seen from South Africa
Being elusive
UFO crash site setup for my P. scaber whiteouts and the five or so random O. asellus they live with.
Madam, one of your babies is looking a little... Different...
A little detail about what I'm on about with "flared scutes" and possibly "weak carapace";
On the left is a typical wild type Porcellio scaber, according to the BMIG they are "a large (to 17 mm body length) woodlouse with a rough, heavily tuberculate body with a continuous/smooth outline".
In the right is one of grandpa whiteout's f1 offspring, they are lacking tubercles and have a jagged outline. Their carapace is also more translucent, which could be a result of partial expression of no pigment, a sign of weakness/thinness, or both.
The first scute is especially flared, changing the typically streamline shape that is normal for Porcellio scaber. What I've read is that this can cause molt issues as the jagged, sticking out scutes make it hard for the woodlouse to physically get out from the molt.
I just posted on reddit r/isopods about these guys' lack of vigor and possibility of inheriting badly flared scutes/ weak carapace from their grandpa, so I'm looking into picking out a male to put to some healthier, more lively females and go back a step to having f1 hets (whiteout x wild type). To see if it can be selected out, but it's possible that without pigment for strength, these pods are doomed to be weakly built.
However;
It also looks like f3 is on the way (in first pic, the yellow tint of brood pouch is visible through the back of the pods with babies on board). I'm moving the rest of these guys (-1 boy) into a smaller container together with some other species (Miss. Cream's O. asellus babies), to test and see if their activity level would be boosted by the activity of other more lively pods around them.
The fact that they bred means they are not completely lacking vigor ! But they're still not zipping around being lively like you would expect from P. scaber - and I don't want them to have molt problems or stunted growth from weak carapace- so I'm hoping that can be worked out over time.
They're getting bigger 🌨
Pretty snowbug ☃️
Baby whiteout