make a beautiful roly poly habitat
Didn’t I say we’re whimsymaxxing?
PARENTING WIN
🐛
PARENTING WIN 🐛
elevate your kid’s obsession to classy decor
Shoppable materials list here.
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I don’t really like bugs
but I’m really focused on following my daughter’s interests and investing in her childhood rites of passage. There is glitter all over my house, a tank full of shrimp, stickers all over her door, tents, pillows, dolls everywhere!
The roly polies started out innocently enough, she was very curious about them and then very emotionally attached to them, and when it was clear that the phase was lasting longer than a month, I started to feel icky about the ethics of keeping these crustaceans in a pickle jar.
So I set out to build them an ideal home, complete with activities!
I had to have this dollhouse playground obviously!
True to my neurotype, I went down a wild rabbit hole of isopod ownership and found roly polies that are fancier than my wildest dreams.
Was gonna get the $1,000 one, but they were sold out.
After about a month, some miracles started happening.
One, we got a taker on the playground. I cannot tell you how happy this made me.
And two, dozens (hundreds?) of baby polies were born.
Allegedly, crustaceans only breed in ideal conditions, so I took this as a prideful win.
INSTRUCTIONS
🪲
INSTRUCTIONS 🪲
Materials here.
There aren’t really instructions for this one as much as considerations and things I learned.
I used coir because I was feeling fancy and wanted dopamine from doing it “just right.” The dirt in our yard is also very hard with clay and riddled with earwigs which freak me out. But whatever dirt your roly polies are in is perfect for them, and you can definitely use that! Beware of potting soil, though, which may contain pesticides.
I used live moss because I wanted it to be pretty, but it’s definitely optional!
I do recommend getting this particular type of spray bottle, because it makes it easy to mist them without overwhelming them with big globs of water, but again, any spray bottle will do. The internet says you have to keep one side dry and one side wet, but I’ve found as long as they have dry spots to retreat to they’re fine. And if you use the moss, that’s their moistest place.
Make sure you include “hiding spots” for them. I used some of the bark I found them under.
When I first made this, I had my beautiful pothos hanging out of the lid which was lovely but BEWARE one of them turned it into an escape ladder…they will climb!
I did put this guy back outside. I figured he had been so bold and brave that he cared about freedom more than the others…his name is Billy. Bye, Billy!
If you make one, please share it with me.
I’d love to see what you create!
