We have exciting news to share!! Lily has successfully completed her molt! She had been showing signs for weeks that she was preparing to molt, and she finally underwent the process yesterday! The first picture of Lily on her back is the beginning of the process. She laid on her back and slowly pushed herself through the carapace (head) of her old exoskeleton. She basically pushed her old exoskeleton off, and slowly emerged with her new exoskeleton. Molting takes several hours and is exhausting for little Lily! Once she freed herself from her old exoskeleton, she continued to lie on her back for a while longer until she was strong enough to flip herself back over, right-side up. The last three pictures are of Lily and her molted exoskeleton. We are so happy she successfully molted - it means she is healthy and growing! We will have to wait at least a week before we can start to gently handle her; it takes a while for her new exoskeleton to harden. She is so fragile right now that we cant even feed her a cricket because a small insect could harm her! Hooray for Lily!
Posted on: Thu, 31 Jul 2014 15:53:00 +0000
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