Please help.. Millipede dying

[apocalypse910]

Somehow one of my giant african millipedes escaped. I found him today, not sure how long he was out for but he is in very bad shape. I thought he was dead at first, but i noticed a few legs moving. I gave him a bit of apple sauce and water .. I notice a bit more movement in the legs, but not much. Is there any hope, and is there anything i can do? All help is greatly appreciated.. Thanks

 

[Kasha]

Oh no! I wish I had some advice, but I haven't had an escapee myself. Aside from the obvious like keep him warm, in a dark quiet place with his favorite food and some water. Could he have fallen in his great escape? Or do you have other pets or children who could have injured him? How long was he MIA?

 

[apocalypse910]

Unfortunately i have no idea how long he was gone. I try to check on my pedes regularilary however i try not to disturb them when i do. I just assumed that the pede i could not see was hiding. The enclosure was on the floor, so he didn't fall and i have no other loose pets that could have hurt him. I'm thinking that he got really dehydrated why he was out. I feel horrible that I didn't realize he was missing sooner.

He is still alive this morning, however I can't tell if he is any better. He still can't move his body at all so I've been feeding him and giving him water with a cotton swab for the last hour.

Thanks for the input i'm moving the enclosure to a warmer spot, and keeping the food and water nearby.

 

[Kasha]

hmmm....you are probably right. I read somewhere on the forums once that someone went like month without feeding their milli, so I would have to agree its probably a lack of water that is making him weak. Please keep me posted. Best of luck.

 

[NiGHTS]

All I can recommend is getting the millipede into an enclosure with high humidity. Provide him with a water bowl too, as he's probably dessicated. If possible, I would also isolate him (just in case he dies, you don't have to worry about mites/flies/etc going after the corpse and messing with the rest of your pedes). I would also stop swabbing him - if you get water into the breathing holes, you can drown him.

Unfortunately, in my experience, pedes that are in this situation rarely recover. However, I did have one pede who was acting like this (I thought he was a goner for sure), but it just turned out that he was preparing to molt. So just hang in there and see what happens. If he doesn't move much, take a smell. If he's dead, you will be able to smell the rotting. Just make sure not to dispose of him unless you can smell bad things.

 

[fantasticp]

If he's dead, you will be able to smell the rotting. Just make sure not to dispose of him unless you can smell bad things.

Always good advice. You can never really tell if a millipede is dead or faking until it either smells or falls apart. I have had some pretty gross looking millipedes get up and walk away or molt when I was 99% positivethey were dead.