Quick answer: yes, there are pink isopods. I sell five, all captive-bred, and four of them are tropical Cubaris. The pinkest is the Cherry Blossom, a pastel-pink colour line, and the Pink Panda King is a pale, blush-toned form of an easy species. Rose Quartz is a peach-pink collector's animal, the Papaya is an orange-pink form of Cubaris murina that suits a beginner, and the Salmon is a salmon-orange species from Martinique. None of them is bubblegum pink: on a woodlouse, pink means pale, warm and soft.
Pink Isopods at a Glance
| Isopod | How pink | Adult size | Our care panel |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cherry Blossom | Pastel pink all over | About 15 mm | Medium; 22-25°C; 70-80% |
| Pink Panda King | White to cream with a faint pink blush | 10-15 mm | Easy; 21-27°C; 70-80% |
| Rose Quartz | Peach-pink with grey markings | None on record | Medium; 21-26°C; 75-85% |
| Papaya | Soft orange-pink | 10-12 mm | Easy; 21-27°C; 60-80% |
| Salmon | Salmon-orange | 12-15 mm | Easy; 22-26°C; 60-80% |
The last column comes from the care panel on each listing: difficulty rating, then ideal temperature and humidity.
Cherry Blossom: The Pinkest of Them
If you want an isopod that is pink in the plain sense of the word, this is the one. The Cherry Blossom is pastel pink all over, with paler edges to each segment and a faint grey line down the middle of the back.
It is sold as a selected colour line, not a wild species. Two suppliers say it was isolated in Japan from Cubaris sp. 'Red Pak Chong' stock, which is traced to north-eastern Thailand; others tell it differently, and nothing has been published. Some list it as Sakura, while others treat Sakura as a separate, related line. Keepers report adults of about 15 mm.
It is not a first isopod. Our care panel rates it Medium and asks for 22 to 25°C and 70 to 80% humidity, held steady. Give it a few small vents, never a sealed tub. It is slow as well, so buy it for the colour and the long project, not for a quick colony. Our Cherry Blossom care guide covers the detail.
Pink Panda King: The Pale, Easy One
The Pink Panda King is a colour form of the Panda King, the black-and-white Cubaris that is the usual way into the genus, and it is also sold as the Pink Panda. Expect a pale animal. Ours are white to cream with a faint pink blush. The Panda King banding is there, but the contrast is gentle, so if you are picturing a pink body, look at the Cherry Blossom instead. Young animals are paler still, and the colour firms up over successive moults.
What it has over the Cherry Blossom is ease. Our care panel rates it Easy, at 21 to 27°C and 70 to 80% humidity, with adults of 10 to 15 mm, and like the standard Panda King it breeds steadily once a group has settled. It is fine as a first Cubaris, even as a first isopod. Keep it apart from the standard Panda King and the other colour forms if you want the pink to hold, because mixed morphs give mixed young.
Rose Quartz: Peach-Pink and Little Known
Rose Quartz is the subtle one: a warm peach-pink with grey markings down the middle of the back, closer to apricot than to rose in some lights. The colour shows best on a settled, well-fed colony.
It is also the least documented animal in this guide. It has no scientific description, no published adult size and no recorded collecting site, and I have not found it on another seller's list or in a hobby reference. What I can give you is how I keep it: 21 to 26°C and 75 to 85% humidity, deep substrate with calcium worked through, and patience, because it builds in small, regular broods. Our care panel rates it Medium.
Papaya: The Beginner's Pink
The Papaya isopod is a colour form of Cubaris murina, sold as Marina Papaya or Murina Papaya. It is a soft orange-pink, a little translucent, the colour of the fruit.
Cubaris murina is found right across the tropics, and an animal that has settled in so many places is a forgiving one. Our care panel rates the Papaya Easy: 21 to 27°C and 60 to 80% humidity, with adults of 10 to 12 mm. Give it good ventilation. It breeds dependably once established, and the species has laboratory breeding figures behind it: kept at about 27°C, females averaged 25 young a brood.
Salmon: The Orange End of Pink
The Salmon isopod is not a Cubaris at all, though it was sold as one for years. In November 2025 it was described as Caribodillo martinicensis, a new genus and species so far known only from Martinique in the Caribbean. The paper that described it calls the colour uniform orange to brown, often with a grey head and antennae, and that is the fair way to picture it: more orange than pink. In our colony photographs the young are paler than the adults.
Our care panel rates it Easy at 22 to 26°C and 60 to 80% humidity, with adults of 12 to 15 mm, and the paper that described it credits its spread through collections to easy care and a high reproductive rate. The same paper calls it a clinger: it holds on to bark and stone and rolls up only when knocked loose, so give it flat bark and a few stones to grip.
Pink Lambo: Pink Spots on a Black Isopod
The Pink Lambo has pink in its name, and the name misleads a little. It is sold as an Ardentiella, one of the climbing isopods the hobby used to call Merulanella, and it is a glossy black animal with bright pink spots, so the pink is in the markings, not the body. I do not have it listed at the moment, but our Pink Lambo care guide covers it.
What Makes an Isopod Pink?
The woodlice that have been studied make their own colour. The main pigments in the body are ommochromes, which the animal builds itself and does not take from its food. In Armadillidium nasatum, where this has been looked at, dark animals carry two of these pigments and red animals only one. In one albino strain of Armadillidium vulgare studied in detail, the albinism appeared recessive and went with a block in that same pigment pathway.
For the pink Cubaris, nobody has published breeding crosses or pigment work on the Cherry Blossom, the Pink Panda King or the Papaya. So when a seller calls one of them an albino, read it as hobby shorthand. What can be said is that each is a pale line of a darker animal. The Panda King is black and white, the wild-type Cubaris murina is grey-brown, and the Red Pak Chong behind the Cherry Blossom is a blue-grey animal with orange-red on the rear and often the face.
Three practical points follow. First, food will not make them pinker on any evidence I know of, so feed carrot and pumpkin as food, not as colour food. Second, keep each line in its own tub, because morphs of one species interbreed. Third, keepers notice that a freshly moulted isopod looks paler until its new shell hardens.
Keeping the Pink Ones
None of these animals needs special treatment for being pink. The Cherry Blossom, Pink Panda King and Rose Quartz are still-air Cubaris: warm and humid, with low to moderate ventilation, never none. The Papaya and the Salmon take more airflow.
- Heat: every animal in the table wants 21°C or more, and an English home averages about 19°C through the heating season. Plan on a heat mat or heat cable on a thermostat, fixed to the side of the tub and never underneath.
- Substrate: deep, and built on flake soil, white-rotted hardwood and organic topsoil. Leave coir out: it holds water but feeds nothing to an animal that eats its substrate.
- Cover and food: a thick layer of leaf litter with bark on top, a little vegetable and a pinch of protein once a week, and leftovers cleared before they mould.
- Calcium: cuttlebone or crushed limestone, always in the tub.
- Moisture: moist, not wet. The Papaya and the Salmon also get a drier far end, so the colony can choose where to sit.
Our complete Cubaris care guide goes through each of these in full.
Which Pink Isopod Should You Choose?
For a first Cubaris, choose the Pink Panda King or the Papaya: both are rated Easy and both breed dependably, and the Pink Panda King is fine even as a first isopod. For the pinkest animal, choose the Cherry Blossom once you have kept a humid tub steady for a season. For a collector's line that I have not seen offered anywhere else, Rose Quartz. And for an easy colony with a species name and a known home behind it, the Salmon.
Frequently Asked Questions
Are there pink isopods?
Yes. The Cherry Blossom is a true pastel pink, and the Pink Panda King, Rose Quartz, Papaya and Salmon run from a pale blush through peach to salmon-orange.
Are pink isopods hard to keep?
It depends on the animal, not the colour. Our care panels rate the Pink Panda King, the Papaya and the Salmon as Easy, and the Cherry Blossom and Rose Quartz as Medium. All of them need warmth of 21°C or more and steady humidity.
How big do pink isopods get?
Small. Our care panels give adults of 10 to 15 mm for the Cherry Blossom, Pink Panda King, Papaya and Salmon, and no adult size has been published for Rose Quartz.
What is a Cubaris 'Pink Rose'?
A trade name that a few UK sellers use for a soft pink Cubaris; one describes it as a form of the Panda King. I do not sell an animal under that name, and I cannot tell you how it relates to our Rose Quartz. If that seller is right, the nearest animal on our shelves is the Pink Panda King.
Does food change an isopod's colour?
Not in woodlice, that I can find. I have seen no feeding trial showing carrot, pumpkin or any other food turning a woodlouse pinker or more orange, and in the woodlice that have been studied the pigment is one the animal builds, not one it eats.
Is a pink or orange woodlouse ill?
Colour alone does not say so. The best-documented disease colour in woodlice is blue to purple, caused by an iridovirus, and I have found no disease recorded as turning one pink or orange. Red forms occur naturally in wild populations.
What is the pink woodlouse in my garden?
Most likely the rosy woodlouse, Androniscus dentiger, a wild species about 5 to 6 mm long that the British Myriapod and Isopod Group describes as usually bright orange or salmon pink. It is common across much of lowland Britain and Ireland, in damp spots under stones and rubble in gardens and churchyards. It is not one I sell.
Where can I buy pink isopods?
Here. The listing linked in each animal's section above shows which packs are in stock. All five are captive-bred, packed in a ventilated tub with damp sphagnum inside a double-walled box and posted Monday to Thursday, and our live arrival guarantee covers every livestock order.
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