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Everyone is saying they're harmless, but we read house centipedes cam leave painful bites. I've never been bitten, that I know of, but when plagued with centipedes, I'd sometimes wake up with one of two types of mysterious bug bites: itchy, and painful. I know from prior experience that most North American spider bites are only ever itchy, so I always put the painful ones down to house centipedes. I can't prove it, though. Here are the facts I do know about house centipedes, from empiricle evidence:
- They like damp. You'll find them in damp spots, drains, around toilets, around damp areas in basements, etc. Not exclusively, but predominantly.
- They wage a secret war with spiders. Sometimes the spider wins, but usually the centipede does unless it gets trapped by a web.
- Alive, they move like the wind. Shockingly, alarmingly fast.
- When smacked, they explode into air and legs. So many legs, and not much else.
- Despite reports that they control other bugs, they are useless against real nuisance bugs like soldier and stink bugs. And for fly control, spiders do a better job. The only real thing we ever saw centipedes hunting were spiders.
- Small glue traps work really well at controlling them. I caution against large glue traps, as they might catch small rodentia, and if you want to know true horror, find a YouTube video of a mouse caught in a glue trap.
I'm team spider.
This pretty well captures things! Insects that eat other insects are worth rooting for, but like you, Iβm on team spider.
Spiders are no insects technically. But whatever...
Are either centipedes or spiders insects? I thought insects only had 6 legs
They are arthropods, just like lobsters and insects, but no, they are not insects. Spiders are arachnids.
Centepides actually only have 6 legs. You can see the six real legs if you look closely at a picture. The other "legs" work like legs, but are not actually legs.
Dumb question but I thought centipedes had like... 95 legs or something.
The one in the op doesn't have that many. Why are people thinking it's a centipede?
Because centipedes vary a lot between species. The house centipede only has up to 15 pairs (30 legs): https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scutigera_coleoptrata
They can actually range from roughly 30-350 legs! Fun fact
As far as I'm aware, if it's got upwards of 350 legs, those are called millipedes, not centipedes.
Also, I've never in my life seen either a centipede or a millipede with legs anywhere near that long, so my mind is still stuck on WTF is that damn thing?
Any which way you go, I'd say kill it with fire! Even though it's already dead, I wouldn't wanna take any chances if it happens to have eggs in it or possibly a parasite or anything...
The difference between centipedes and millipedes actually has to do with how many pairs of legs they have per body segment. Centipedes have one pair per segment, millipedes have two pairs per segment. The centipede with 354 legs is indeed a centipede (: the millipede with the most legs actually tops out around 750 legs! Pill *millipedes seem to be the smallest millipede with only 14-42 legs!
Also, if you google pics of centipedes, there is indeed a species with terrifyingly long legs just like this picture, the house centipede.
*pill bugs != pill millipedes, pill bugs are crustaceans apparently, cool!
No, a pill bug is not a type of millipede, they're actually crustaceans, and not closely related.
Pill bugs used to be one of the few exclusively terrestrial crustaceans, but now almost all insects are classified as crustaceans, so, i'd have to double check the phylogenies.
Ah, apparently pill bugs and pill millipedes are different! Thank you for the correction.
Huh, interesting. Well today I learned a little more about creepy-crawlies than I expected. Also, a pill bug is considered a type of millipede? Well hell, I never would have guessed that.
I was actually very surprised to learn about the pill bug as well, if Iβd known they were millipedes as a kid I would not have found them so cute and fun lol
No, a pill bug is not a type of millipede, they're actually crustaceans, and not closely related.
Pill bugs used to be one of the few exclusively terrestrial crustaceans, but now almost all insects are classified as crustaceans, so, i'd have to double check the phylogenies.
Oh? Okay then, well either way I've learned something new today. Interesting, not like it's going to change the price of weed in Colorado for my daily life, but thanks for sharing. π
So while I'm sure there are thousands of different kinds of milli- amd centipedes, in general:
- Millipedes have shorter legs
- Millipedes are slow. Like, slow enough to see them move unlike centipedes, creepy bastards
- Millipedes are vegetarians, and while crushing them can be bad news, they don't bite
- Millipedes look kinda like long pill-bugs, whereas centipedes look like hell had a nightmare and it was given flesh and form
I'd say a small asteroid impact will take care of it. Something about the size of the tanushka event seems appropriate. Just be sure to pre-warn all of the neighbours within a 500 mile radius.
Small? We need larger, something like 10.5 elephants in size!
I guess ninetyfivepede doesn't really roll off the tongue.
That's why you always find dead garden millipedes curled up in a spiral. The odd number of legs makes them walk in circles until they die from it. "True" story.
I was bitten by one in my sleep as a kid, my foot swelled and it was pretty painful.
Youβre team spider unless you live in Australia and like all animals in Australia the spiders are no exception.Spiders kill, spiders eat burbs, spiders fly. Yup they fly, itβs nightmare material.
Iβve also been bitten by a centipede in bed while sleeping and woken up in so much pain I threw up(#australiathings). How did I know it was a centipede? It was still in the bed. They are not nice. But Iβm still all for them eating the spiders.
I've been bitten in the ass by centipede... twice. Took a few weeks until the bite mark disappear.
Your bullet points sound like an RTS (real time strategy) game's description of a unit. I would prefer neither around me, let them wage war (or set up home) elsewhere preferably.
Wouldn't it be inhumane to catch centipedes with glue traps if it is with rodents?
Alive, they move like the wind. Shockingly, alarmingly fast.
This is true. It was both shocking and alarming how fast it moved when I first spotted one in my room after moving to the east coast.