# Scolopendra hainanum



## Galapoheros (Jun 6, 2013)

Just a molt pic, better than nothing.

Reactions: Like 9


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## satchellwk (Jun 6, 2013)

Scolopendra hainanum is the new name for what used to be called S. subspinipes "tiger leg," right? 
Awesome photo, by the way.


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## beetleman (Jun 6, 2013)

ive always loved this sp very sinister looking,i had some large females in the past...........evil and awesome! nice pic of yours.


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## Galapoheros (Jun 6, 2013)

Yeah they are OK, Jason and some other person sent me a few.  I wasn't that fired up about them at first but they have grown on me.  Also, with the recent classification as a sps, they might be hard to get later, so going to try and keep them going in the US.  This is a female and I have a couple of males.  They are more stealthy and strike more like a snake does.  If a pede could be described as "smart", I would call it smart.  Really long "fangs"(so everybody can understand lol)compared to other pedes, long and thin, I make it a point not to get bitten by these, I heard a bad story from somebody about a bite, sounded pretty bad.  The ones over aren't very big though, but a good size.  I'll take another pic later and post it here.

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## Nanotrev (Jun 7, 2013)

They certainly grew on me. I used to loathe them because in a previous post Galapoheros was spot on in that he claimed that they hate light in a very big way. The moment I pick up a hide I have to be ready to slap the lid on lest I want an escapee. They're lightning fast- and I'd be tempted to say that they're among the fastest of the Scolopendra if I were to go out on a limb and make a guess. However, they do reach a considerable size and I enjoy watching them hunt just like any other pede. The females also have those nice stripey legs! Overall they're pretty interesting. I'm just kicking back for now and waiting on a clutch from the female I have in my possession.


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## MarkmD (Jun 7, 2013)

Really cool nice pic.


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## korg (Jun 7, 2013)

This picture is really upping my interest in centipedes... I actually think that clearish blue is more interesting than the natural color. Great photo!


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## InvertAdict (Apr 24, 2017)

Cool picture! How big do they get? I think I found one for sale near me.


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## Stugy (Apr 24, 2017)

Lol this thread is almost 4 years old xD I'm hoping to get one of these too though.


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## Galapoheros (Apr 24, 2017)

Haha, you sound fired up.  The are different ways to hunt them, if I were in your area I would look for them at night while shining a flashlight on short cliffs, on public property of course.  You will find them in drainage areas, you probably read about it doing a search for info.  castaneiceps of course isn't in your area but because of the terrain that are normally found in, imo they are easier to find under rocks.


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## Stugy (Apr 24, 2017)

I think S.hainanum is from China...


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## Nich (Nov 11, 2017)

Since it’s been long enough, anyone here have an estimated max length on these? Initial rumors and sales pitches were claiming around 9”+ when they were introduced if I remmeber correctly.


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## LawnShrimp (Nov 11, 2017)

I have 3 adults with striped legs (which probably means they are all female) and 2 of them are currently incubating 3rd and 4th stage plings. The largest is about 6.5" inches, and the rest are a little smaller. 9" sounds too big to me, but an old specimen might reach that size.

This is one of my favorite species. Cold, calculating, and intelligent, more so than the other hyperactive Asian centipedes, but has faster reactions and worse venom than New World species. When threatened, my largest female doesn't bother to hide, run, or attack. She just moves her legs in place, like she's tapping her feet as if to say, "Don't even _think_ about it."

Reactions: Love 1


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## Nich (Nov 11, 2017)

LawnShrimp said:


> I have 3 adults with striped legs (which probably means they are all female) and 2 of them are currently incubating 3rd and 4th stage plings. The largest is about 6.5" inches, and the rest are a little smaller. 9" sounds too big to me, but an old specimen might reach that size.
> 
> This is one of my favorite species. Cold, calculating, and intelligent, more so than the other hyperactive Asian centipedes, but has faster reactions and worse venom than New World species. When threatened, my largest female doesn't bother to hide, run, or attack. She just moves her legs in place, like she's tapping her feet as if to say, "Don't even _think_ about it."




This info is great!
How many seasons have you had them? Ssp generally sexually reproductive at the 4-5” bl mark. 
I’m looking for long term sizes (4 years+ Of observed growth) rather than sexually mature specimen lengths as those are two very different things. I saw your post on the eggs, kudos to that! 

Are you implying that males have a different color pattern on the legs? I haven’t read if that before.


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## LawnShrimp (Nov 12, 2017)

Nich said:


> This info is great!
> How many seasons have you had them? Ssp generally sexually reproductive at the 4-5” bl mark.
> I’m looking for long term sizes (4 years+ Of observed growth) rather than sexually mature specimen lengths as those are two very different things. I saw your post on the eggs, kudos to that!
> Are you implying that males have a different color pattern on the legs? I haven’t read if that before.


Actually, these are my newest centipedes and I haven't had them for more than four months or observed a molt! The first female dropped eggs about three weeks after I got her and the other a week after that. The smaller one has a smaller clutch, about 25, and the other, larger mother has a huge ball of at least 40.
These are probably wild caught so their age is not known, but you are probably right that they will reach a larger size than they are currently.

In Orin McMonigle's centipede handbook, he claims that males of hainanum have solid orange legs and females have striped orange legs; he provided examples of each. This thread claims the exact opposite, however. All of mine are striped and two are female, so that proves that thread wrong about males being striped. Most pictures I have seen of this species appear to have either striped legs or patternless legs, but I do not doubt there are intermediate patterns, such as only the last few legs having stripes. I hope that this is a valid method for sexing this species; it would make them easier to breed, but I am somewhat doubtful of this theory as well.

I am very leery of bites, especially from this species, and I also do not want to stress them by knocking them out, so I'd rather not sex the undetermined. However, as I have 100+ plings on the way, I will keep a good number of each and see if some develop stripes and others do not.

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## Nich (Nov 12, 2017)

LawnShrimp said:


> Actually, these are my newest centipedes and I haven't had them for more than four months or observed a molt! The first female dropped eggs about three weeks after I got her and the other a week after that. The smaller one has a smaller clutch, about 25, and the other, larger mother has a huge ball of at least 40.
> These are probably wild caught so their age is not known, but you are probably right that they will reach a larger size than they are currently.
> 
> In Orin McMonigle's centipede handbook, he claims that males of hainanum have solid orange legs and females have striped orange legs; he provided examples of each. This thread claims the exact opposite, however. All of mine are striped and two are female, so that proves that thread wrong about males being striped. Most pictures I have seen of this species appear to have either striped legs or patternless legs, but I do not doubt there are intermediate patterns, such as only the last few legs having stripes. I hope that this is a valid method for sexing this species; it would make them easier to breed, but I am somewhat doubtful of this theory as well.
> ...



This is great stuff! I was eyeballing some pede books online, and have contemplated buying that one before...you’ve convinced me! I’ve seen a “non-striped” in person at a show (was labeled patternless) and can confirm the last three or so legs fading into being striped and terminals are well striped. Finally going to grab afew of those books


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## Salvador (Nov 12, 2017)

It's been a long headscratcher. The species description states over 20cm for some specimens, from what I recall. There are some photos I've seen of Facebook from Asian keepers, with rulers, showing enormous 25cm specimens. My biggest is about 17cm, had him 3 years from about 14cm, and hasn't grown much from that after a couple of moults.

As for the dimorphism, I'm open to it being true, but only when I've seen it...there's not much visual proof circulating, just statements it's the case. I have stripeless, half striped, and fully striped S.hainanum, with some some striped having yellow base colour for the legs, with other being pink. So they're pretty variable, even from the same clutch. Doesn't help that some sellers in the EU claim the stripeless are a rare variant and charge more for them either!

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## LeFanDesBugs (Nov 12, 2017)

8" is the correct max size. I saw pictures of them a while ago, and might find them back. If so I'll post them here, or a link.

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## Staehilomyces (Nov 13, 2017)

Salvador said:


> ...There are some photos I've seen of Facebook from Asian keepers, with rulers, showing enormous 25cm specimens...


Am I the only one who noticed that some Asian keepers seem to be able to get their pedes to achieve greater sizes than usually expected? One posted a pic of a 30cm S. dehaani a while back.


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## Galapoheros (Nov 14, 2017)

Staehilomyces said:


> Am I the only one who noticed that some Asian keepers seem to be able to get their pedes to achieve greater sizes than usually expected? One posted a pic of a 30cm S. dehaani a while back.


My hunch is that size is a random genetic thing going on, just as with mammals and with people for example.  You can't grow a miniature poodle to be a big poodle with nutrition, it's genetic.  I think it has to do with millions of years of evolution and dealing with gravity changes as it relates to physics over time along with prey that is available.  Taking a look at fossils, everything tended to be larger in size millions of years ago, leading to the speculation that gravity may not have been as strong as it is today(related to physics there), there could be more than one reason why that would have been so, the rotation speed of the earth, something to do with the molten core, earth size, and this is going to sound even weirder, ...there is the existence of dark matter expanding "everything" so was the planet smaller due to that?  So maybe these genes are buried deeper from the past and are expressed now and then just to check if the conditions are more beneficial to an organism being larger size.  So, then a unique large specimen pops up now and then, it's just genetic imo.

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## LeFanDesBugs (Nov 14, 2017)

The 30cm dehaani are no big deal. They are black flame leg variants from thailand which are reportedly even larger than the regular dehaani. In general they get to 28+cm in BL 
Also Galapoheros there were way higher levels of oxygen in the atmostphere which allowed for a tremendous amount of growth in inverts.


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## Galapoheros (Nov 14, 2017)

I think evolution adjusts to O2 content, I don't think it's a factor.  O2 can be toxic in concentrated amounts.  Pilots OD on O2 from supplementing and miss work the next day and those pilots stay the same size, the O2 thing doesn't make sense to me.


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## Staehilomyces (Nov 14, 2017)

Perhaps it's less of a growth thing then, and more to do with lifespan. When pedes are given a varied diet, they apparently live much longer. Thus, they have more time to grow. Could that be a possibility?


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## Galapoheros (Nov 14, 2017)

I think it's no different from humans.  You see the difference in size from you and your friends, from your dad and his friends, your mom and her girlfriends, a poodle and a German Shepard.  A poodle and a German Shepard are the same species, but different genetics within the same species.  I really do think it is this simple, some will grow larger than others within the same species.  Of course, it's all "imo", just going with my logic here.

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## Salvador (Nov 14, 2017)

@Galapaheros Hey, any chance you could reup some of your centipede pics on a different host sometime? Photobuckets change is a real pain, some of your old pictures are legendary.

Might be time for everyone here to start showing off how big some of their pedes are. Always read a lot about big ones, don't see much of them. Or this just an excuse to see more, of course


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## LawnShrimp (Nov 14, 2017)

Galapoheros said:


> I think it's no different from humans.  You see the difference in size from you and your friends, from your dad and his friends, your mom and her girlfriends, a poodle and a German Shepard.  A poodle and a German Shepard are the same species, but different genetics within the same species.  I really do think it is this simple, some will grow larger than others within the same species.  Of course, it's all "imo", just going with my logic here.


True, but humans and dogs are vertebrates with defined adulthood where they stop growing. A centipede is an invertebrate that never stops molting and growing after it matures. A centipede alive for 10 years is much larger than a five-year-old of the same species simply because of this constant growth. Think of insects as an example. Beetle breeders, especially in Japan, have cultivated a special died of rotten wood and mycelia for Lucanid beetles, which helps males attain a large size and grow more points on their mandibles than an undernourished beetle eating the wrong fungi. Feeding the incorrect diet to other insects and arthropods will result in them being stunted. A varied diet and fruit possibly affects this in centipedes. While it is true that genetics are definitely a factor, they are probably not as influential as age. With invertebrates like centipedes which often are wild-caught and hard to tell the age and are so poorly studied, it is difficult to tell what defines their size.

Either that, or they're just really good at Photoshop.

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