Scorpion





This scorpion is another of the creatures that I photographed from the visit with one of the collections managers in entomology at the Utah Museum of Natural History. http://www.umnh.utah.edu/ Christy Bills is accumulating a number of species including the wolf spider in the entry last month.

This particular little guy was, as most scorpions appear to be, foul tempered and not terribly interested in being photographed. In fact, if you look carefully, you will see a droplet of venom on its tail where it tried to sting me repeatedly for putting the camera lens in its face. The venom from this species would not really have done much to me in terms of toxicity, but I will tell you from experience that it would be a likely painful experience.

Scorpions are also relatively easy to find at night in the environments where common. If you use a black light (don't look into the UV light) and shine the black light onto the ground while walking, you will find that scorpions tend to fluoresce making them easy to find and capture.

Posted: Thu - April 24, 2008 at 03:25 PM          

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