Variable Pill Woodlouse — Fact Sheet

Armadillidium versicolor · Variable Pill Woodlouse

📋 At a glance

🏠 Enclosure

• Placement: Indoor, out of direct sun; a cool room is preferable to routine heating.
• Starter colony: 30 x 20 x 15 cm or larger; at least 0.06 m² floor area.
• Type: Tight, fine-vented plastic or glass enclosure with cross-vents over the drier half.
• Substrate: 6-8 cm of pesticide-free topsoil, decomposed deciduous leaves and soft white-rotted hardwood.
• Containment: Open over a catch tub; quarantine additions for at least 60 days with separate tools.
• Avoid: Coir-only bedding, fertilized soil, treated leaves, resinous conifer wood and a sealed, uniformly wet box.

🪨 Enclosure furniture

• Create a moist third, a lightly moist middle and a ventilated drier end.
• Spread edible leaf litter over the whole surface; keep moss in the moist refuge.
• Lay bark across the gradient so the colony can change moisture without leaving cover.
• Add a little limestone grit plus a permanent cuttlebone, limestone or baked-eggshell calcium source.
• Increase leaf cover and floor space when several layers of animals crowd beneath hides.

💡 Lighting

• UVB: Not required or recommended.
• Source: Soft indirect room or plant light; no hot display lamp.
• Photoperiod: 10-12 hours daily.
• Shade: Maintain deep cover beneath leaves and bark.
• Avoid: Direct sun through a window; small containers overheat rapidly.

🌡️ Temperature

• Basking spot: 20-23 °C profile value; do not create a focused basking site

• Warm zone: 17-23 °C

• Cool zone: 16-20 °C

• Night: 14-19 °C

• Keep sustained heat below 25 °C; reproduction may slow during a cool winter period.

• Measure at substrate level at both ends with probe thermometers.

• If heating is unavoidable, thermostat one outside wall; never heat beneath the moist refuge.

💧 Humidity & water

• Working range: 60-80%; 75-90% only within the shedding refuge.
• Keep the lower substrate in one-third of the enclosure moist, never saturated; allow the ventilated surface to dry between waterings.
• Pour a measured amount into the moss corner when the layer below begins to lighten.
• No open water dish or soaking area is required.
• Whole-lid condensation or a sour smell = increase airflow/reduce water; clustering only in the wet corner = restore deeper moisture.

🍂 Diet

Feed freely:

• Decayed deciduous leaves and soft rotten hardwood, always available.

In moderation:

• Carrot, squash or sweet potato 2-3 times weekly; remove before mold spreads.
• A tiny pinch of fish food or dried invertebrate protein about once weekly.

Avoid:

• Resinous wood, roadside or chemically treated leaves, moldy food and heavy protein feeding.

Supplements:

• Cuttlebone, limestone or baked crushed eggshell available continuously; no routine vitamin powder.

🩺 Health — warning signs

• Incomplete or fatal molts → check deep-refuge moisture, ventilation and calcium together.
• Sudden summer deaths → measure substrate temperature and cool the room; spraying an overheated box is insufficient.
• Mites, fungus gnats or sour odor → remove rich food, clear fouled patches and improve dry-side airflow.
• All animals packed into the moist third → the rest of the substrate is too dry.
• No visible mancae for months → verify mature stock and stable conditions before increasing food or heat.
• Colour/pattern drift → stop mixing cultures and verify identity and locality records.