Isopods

I currently house 11 species of isopods:

• A. klugii “Dubrovnik”
• A. maculatum “Chocolate”
• Cubaris sp. “Panda King”
• Cubaris sp. “White Shark”
• Cubaris sp. “White Ducky”
• O. asellus “Skirted”
• P. echinatus “Spiky”
• P. laevis “White”
• P. pruinosus “Powder Orange”
• P. scaber “Orange Dalmatian”
• Sinodillo sp. “Vietnam”

If you told me a year ago that I’d have even a single roly poly in my house I’d tell you you’re insane. I’m not a “bug guy”. Best I can do usually is smoosh the spiders that scare my family members. But, my buddy over at xethrus.org hooked me. He gave me a colony of P. echinatus in a terrarium he designed and made, and I gotta say: they’re extremely peaceful. They just kinda mosey around and eat leaves. Spikies aren’t the cutest of the bunch, but as my first species they hold a special place in my heart.

The hobby as a whole is a confluence of a bunch of my interests:

• Xethrus and I make the terrariums using my laser cutter.
• There’s a whole mess of automation you can do with a microcontroller, some sensors, and some relays.
• I finally have plants! We’ve had dogs and cats for a long time at my house but I haven’t had a plant since I forgot about (and killed) a cactus back in high school. I love having nature around me as I spend most of my time looking at a computer screen.

These days my favorite isopod colony is the White Ducky colony. They don’t come out all the time (they like darkness) but when they do, (a) they have adorable lil faces and (b) they don’t run away when you spot them. Instead, they just kinda say “oh, you’re here” and slowly wiggle away under the nearest leaf.

Much to my wife’s chagrin I’ll likely be getting more of these.