Giant Red Velvet Mite

Description

The giant red velvet mite, Dinothrombium magnificum, emerges after hard rains in the desert and they adorn the landscape here and there like little Christmas ornaments. In any case, these arachnids are very unique looking and shockingly hardy!

Apparently their lifespan is 2 to 3 years or more if you count the larvae stages! Here is a fantastic article by the late, great Justin Schmidt: Big, Bad, and Red

We treat these as scavengers in our pet bug tanks. We provide them a mostly sandy substrate and keep it fairly moist. They will burrow down if they feel it is too dry at the surface. We feed them dead insects. In nature they may be predators of termites and their remains, and perhaps grasshopper eggs. I sort of guess the ones we kept for 8 months last year were scavenging on dead insects only, if they even ate. Some sources indicate that they may only eat for a few hours once per year, feeding on termite reproductive that have dropped their wings.

A steal at $6 each. Some have white spots as pictured. Some are straight red. No guarantee on colors but if you purchase multiple specimens, we’ll send both color forms if they are available. These are reported to be a single species. Size is around 6 to 10 mm body length.

 

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