Centipedes: The Ultimate Nopes

this episode was brought to you by audible nothing point makes you say nope nope nope like a centipede there's a reason these scary-looking arthropods are used in movies to add tension the word unpleasant comes to mind hi I'm Danielle and you're watching Animal Logic there are over 3000 described species of centipede creeping around all over the world preferring warm and temperate climates in fact unless you're one of the 4,000 or so people who live in Antarctica there's probably a centipede in your house right now it may even be watching this episode with you learning hunting strategies from their larger wilder cousins while centipedes may cause a guttural vile reaction in you the vast majority are harmless their bodies consist of a head with a pair of antennae and a pair of legs that are built into their stinging structures and venom glands they have an odd number of body segments with a pair of legs on each segment and an elongated pair of legs on the last body segment [Music] because they always have an odd number of body segments there are no centipedes with an even 100 legs I guess sent to dual peds wasn't catchy enough due to the wide variety of species different species grow in different ways some species are born with the total number of legs they'll ever have while others gain legs through molting they range in size from about one centimeter to about thirty centimeters long though the majority top out at 10 centimeters long centipedes are also one of the longest living classes of invertebrates but some species able to live up to 10 years there are five orders of centipede the order you may be most familiar with is scooter Dara Morpha these are house centipedes these creepy-crawlies are super fast and like to live in dark damp environments they've been measured running at forty centimeters a second they have a distinct shape as each pair of their legs are longer than the pair in front of them in some cases their last pair of legs can be twice as long as their first pair this is a result of their molting process they get longer legs as they progress through their various stages of incomplete metamorphosis gaining up to 15 body segments as they mature their vision isn't very good their compound eyes are made up of a large number of simple eyes called asal eye these simple eyes can only distinguish between light and dark it would be like if instead of your eyes being a regular camera you have thousands of cameras each taking simple black-and-white single pixel sized photos which you would stitch together to make a full image kind of like an 8-bit vision in black-and-white as an illustrator I can say that image is rather horrific the second order of centipedes is litho biomorphic these are known as rock or stone centipedes due to their choice of locale like how centipedes they can have up to 15 body segments which they gained through incomplete metamorphosis most rock centipedes don't have eyes and instead rely on chemo reception to get around the rarest order of centipede is crater au stigma morpha say that five times fast and this order only has two species in their first molt they go from 12 to 15 segments but in every subsequent molt they don't gain any new segments these centipedes ward off predators and parasites by secreting disgusting smelling chemicals because we needed another reason to stay away do you feel a more fun or soil centipedes is the most diverse order and they also have the most legs piemonte areum Gabriella's for example has a hundred and seventy nine body segments for a total of three hundred and fifty eight legs the most badass order of centipedes however is skull pendra Morpha this order contains the giant centipede most of these centipedes have 21 or 23 segments and are famous for that big ol stinger or force appeals centipedes use venom to paralyze prey and the bigger centipedes hunt small vertebrates like mice birds and snakes there are opportunistic hunters and we'll take whatever chance they get to catch their meal and their meal of choice a mouse a giant centipede can make a very quick meal of a baby mouse it just needs to get past the mother if the centipede can catch it by surprise the mouse is no match for its venom if not the centipede doesn't have quite as easy of a time those centipedes that are lucky enough to survive a bout with a mature mouse will have no trouble at all devouring the babies giant centipede bites are extremely painful they inject their prey with venom which contains muscle contractile agents to cause paralysis histamines to cause inflammation and cardio depressants to lower blood pressure all of this combines to a bite deadly to prey and painful to humans giant centipedes are massive measuring up to 30 centimeters long they would take up most of your forearm skull pendra subsp in apes' commonly known by many names including the orange legged centipede the red-headed centipede and friend can reach over 30 centimetres long and they too have a very painful bite there have been reports of people getting skin irritation just by having one of these guys walk on them Scolopendra Haros or the giant desert centipede is a possum addict and it backs it up these multicolored Horrors reportedly have one of the most painful bites in the world despite all their creepy ferocity centipedes are actually really good parents first of all they don't actually copulate so their offspring would never risk walking in on them males leave a spermatophore for the female to take and impregnate herself with host centipedes and stone centipedes bury their eggs in soil or similar damp spaces to keep them safe from predators but the massive Scolopendra morphs and soil centipedes are very involved parents the females will stay near the eggs cleaning them off by licking them to keep them free from fungus without parental care the eggs would die quickly consumed by fungus once they hatch it can take several years for the centipedes to reach sexual maturity and now I'm Danielle Defoe and I'm about to get bitten by a giant centipede I'm just kidding of course not but crazy come on getting so up close and personal with centipedes just made me imagine how incredible it would have been to see animals like mammoths and saber-toothed cats who are now extinct I really wish they could be brought back to life and some scientists believe it might someday be possible I recently started listening to an amazing audio book called how to clone a mammoth by dr. Beth Shapiro in it she talks about de-extinction the process of using genes of extinct animals to resurrect species on a personal level I would love to see saber-toothed cats be brought back to life just maybe not close to where I live I highly recommend this book I think you'd really like it if you're interested in genomics or have ever dreamed of seeing live mammoths and mastodons with your own eyes you can even listen to it for free on audible if you sign up for a free 30-day trial all you have to do is go to audible.com slash animal logic I use audible all the time making animal logic as well as illustrating and doing research means I'm constantly on the go but audible lets me listen to audiobooks anytime anywhere while I'm working commuting and even when I'm exercising I'm learning about more things than ever before and it's not all science they have a gigantic library including pretty much every fiction book you can think of so there's always something that you can listen to no matter what your interests are audible members now get more than ever before members choose three titles every month one audiobook and two audible originals that you can't get anywhere else if you want to support animal logic and start listening to your favorite books sign up for a 30 day trial and you'll get your first audiobook plus two audible originals for free just visit audible.com lush animal logic or text animal logic two five zero zero five zero zero to get started so what animal should I talk about next please let me know in the comments and be sure to subscribe for new episodes of animal logic every other week thanks for watching [Music]

Channel: Animalogic

Views: 545,167

Rating: 4.8734713 out of 5

Keywords: animals, animal, logic, education, show, animalogic, crazy, ugly, weird, gross, beautiful, interesting, facts, animalsfacts, about, information, info, school, research, learn, learning, fun, easy, smart, centipede, nope, giant, bite, sting, brave, wilderness, giant centipedes, house centipedes, legs, bitten by, venom, mouse, eat, hunt, centipede eats mouse, centipede eating a mouse, centipede on arm, getting bitten by a centipede

Id: KHCY9RceDFc

Length: 10min 11sec (611 seconds)

Published: Fri Jun 28 2019

Reddit Comments

[u/Mr_Teaofthetime]

I don't tend to get too bothered by insects and such but earwigs and centipedes do make me feel a bit on edge.