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Sexual dimorphism It's pretty easy to see if the scorpion is a male or a female. The easiest way is when there are two scorpions male and female. When placed next to each other the difference in bodyshape and length is obvious. Of course this is not the best way of sexing. The best way of sexing is by looking at the genital opperculum and the pectines. Male:
As seen in the above image, the genital opperculum is oval shaped, the pectines are relatively long and slender. Also note the pectines are close to each other. When looking at the female the difference is very obvious. Female:
In the above picture you can see that the genital opperculum is more "heart-shaped" instead of oval. The pectines itself are smaller and relatively wide. As you can see the pectines are more separated then with the males. This sexual dimorphism is already seen at instar 4 animals, before instar 4 it is pretty hard to see the difference with the naked eye. Molting In order to grow, scorpions have to molt. Molting is a very energy consuming event. Mostly the scorpion will molt in a safe and secure place, usually a burrow or similar protected places. When there are other scorpions around it might happen the molting scorpion gets eaten. When looking at a communal scorpion like Pandinus imperator there is also the chance the scorpion gets protection from the community. You can see this in the pictures below. When I tried to get a bit closer for better pictures I actually had te deal with the scorpion on the left protecting its mate.
The molting sequence starts with the opening of the carapace, the scorpion then needs to slide and move itself out of the old skin. The complete molting process lasted about 15 minutes in the above animal. As you can see, after molting they are grey colored, the exoskeleton is very soft and the telson white in color. It takes more then one week to harden up enough to gain protection from the exoskeleton. One of the most interesting things about molting is when an UV-light source is used. Then you can see the scorpion is not glowing in UV-light as normal scorpions do, this happens only when the scorpion has harden up. See below picture.
If you take a good look at the scorpion on the right you can see that it is molting. The scorpion on the left acting as guard. The soft exoskeleton of an instar 4, a few hours after molting:
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