Pineapple Spiky Isopod — Fact Sheet

Cristarmadillidium muricatum · Pineapple Spiky Isopod

📋 At a glance

🏠 Enclosure

• Placement: Indoor, shaded and thermally stable.
• Starter colony: 25 x 18 x 15 cm or larger; at least 0.045 m² floor area.
• Type: Tight box with fine mesh over generous cross-ventilation; tiny mancae make escape risk high.
• Substrate: 5-7 cm of fine unfertilized topsoil, powdered decomposed leaves and very soft rotten hardwood.
• Containment: Quarantine stock for 60-90 days; count gently and work over a catch tub.
• Avoid: Coir alone, fertilizer, pesticide-exposed leaves, conifer wood and heavy rocks that can crush animals.

🪨 Enclosure furniture

• Create one compact, full-depth moist refuge and keep most of the surface much drier with strong airflow.
• Add moss to the refuge, whole and crumbled leaves, and several thin cork pieces across the gradient.
• Mix limestone grit or crushed cuttlebone through part of the edible substrate.
• Use fine food particles for tiny animals, while retaining larger leaf pieces as cover.
• Clean springtails may manage fine mold; introduce only a verified culture.

💡 Lighting

• UVB: Not required or recommended.
• Source: Soft indirect room light; strong lighting rapidly dries the small refuge.
• Photoperiod: 10-12 hours daily.
• Shade: Preserve deep shade beneath leaves and cork.
• Avoid: Direct sun and hot display lamps.

🌡️ Temperature

• Basking spot: 21-24 °C profile value; do not create a focused basking site

• Warm zone: 18-24 °C

• Cool zone: 18-21 °C

• Night: 16-20 °C

• Avoid prolonged temperatures above 25 °C; the small moisture reserve changes quickly.

• Measure both ends at substrate level with probes.

• If heating is essential, thermostat one outside wall; never heat the base.

💧 Humidity & water

• Working range: 55-75%; 75-90% within the shedding refuge.
• Keep the moss corner moist through the full substrate depth; the other surface stays comparatively dry but the lower layer must not become dusty.
• Add small measured amounts of water only to the refuge.
• No open water dish or soaking area is required.
• Constant condensation, spreading mold or sour odor = too wet; animals compressed into the deepest wet point = gradient too dry.

🍂 Diet

Feed freely:

• Finely broken deciduous leaves and crumbly white-rotted hardwood, always available.

In moderation:

• A tiny portion of squash, carrot or complete isopod food twice weekly.
• A pinhead-sized protein portion about once weekly, only if fully consumed.

Avoid:

• Large wet portions, leftover protein, moldy food and chemically exposed plant material.

Supplements:

• Fine calcium powder, limestone or cuttlebone available continuously; no routine vitamin powder.

🩺 Health — warning signs

• Colony seems absent → inspect beneath leaves gently; then verify deep moisture and 18-24 °C before dismantling the box.
• Mold overwhelms food → reduce portions to specks, remove waste and improve dry-side airflow.
• Failed molts → stabilize the compact moist refuge and permanent calcium source.
• No mancae for months → stop repeated disturbance and confirm stable adult stock, food and moisture.
• Several animals gather at the wettest point → rehydrate the refuge and intermediate lower layer gradually.
• “Spiky” stock lacks traceable Spanish origin → keep isolated and do not distribute as C. muricatum.