Northern scorpion near Sacramento, California

I found this northern scorpion by looking under a log at a campsite in Northern California.

Although there are scorpions in Canada (Milk River Valley, Alberta), the only ones I have ever found were in the States.  One in Arizona (American giant scorpion), and the other is the one I photographed above.  I found both of them under surface structures (log above and a rock for the first one), which is where you will find most scorpions during the day.  The strange thing is that scorpions do not typically come out during the day; they are nocturnal predators and leave their burrows or hiding places only in the dark.  Hollywood often portrays the Scorpiones as desert-dwelling creatures that wander during the heat of midday, looking for some hapless passerby to clumsily fall into their path.  

Northern scorpions have stingers that are capable of delivering a painful hit to humans, but little more than what one would get from a bee.  Their weapon is for incapacitating food (invertebrates) or for defence.  If you were to put one of them in a open-aired container without cover in the sun, they would die quickly.  They maintain internal temperature and moisture by avoiding the sun and the heat of the day.

It turns out that northern scorpions are the only scorpion species that live in Canada.  They can be found in the far-southern reaches of Saskatchewan, Alberta, and BC.  In BC, where I live, they can be found in the south Okanagan around Osoyoos.  In North America, they have the widest range of all the various species.  

I showed one parent the one I captured and she immediately rounded up all her children to move them away from the "dangerous area."  Funny thing - they were never in any danger, even if they upended a log and stuck their hands down to investigate what they discovered.  I did, and I was fine.

Thanks for reading.

Eric Svendsen     www.ericspix.com