# Centipede vs Tarantula video



## szappan (May 24, 2006)

Hey everyone, just letting you know posted another video on Youtube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2f5gBFMMmGc

I didn't film this one so hopefully I won't take as much heat for it or spark a big debate — just passing along some interesting footage.
Although it's professionally shot, I still think it's a pretty obvious that it's a set-up.

Anyways, as always, all the best:
szappan

PS: I will hopefully have a HQ version ready for download by tomorrow for those interested.


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## Gigas (May 24, 2006)

a im assuming subspinipse versus a albopilosum????? ya right


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## Randolph XX() (May 24, 2006)

it's pretty obvious theu are not from the same habitat, "robusta" vs albopilosum, clearly a set up and misinformation


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## Gigas (May 24, 2006)

thanks for the corrention Randolph , as you say, the centepede emerges from a flower pot hide lol


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## RVS (May 24, 2006)

That's horrible.


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## stonemantis (May 24, 2006)

This form of entertainment is sickening IMO. When will these kind of videos stop. (sigh) I'll be good this time and safely (I hope) say, "The predatory instincts of the Centipede are quite fascinating. With that being said, I still think it wasn't a fair fight."


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## Hedorah99 (May 24, 2006)

:? I really wonder how many animals have been killed by documentarians? :?


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## Tony (May 24, 2006)

Hedorah99 said:
			
		

> :? I really wonder how many animals have been killed by documentarians? :?


That video with the spider killing the fer-de-lance was staged..Ask Rick...
How horrible is it compared to a T ravaging a cricket or mouse? :? 
Or a female eating a male?

Where IS the line?


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## cacoseraph (May 24, 2006)

tony said:
			
		

> That video with the spider killing the fer-de-lance was staged..Ask Rick...
> How horrible is it compared to a T ravaging a cricket or mouse? :?
> Or a female eating a male?
> 
> Where IS the line?


dear gods!... i agree =P

i still wouldn't mix up *my* bugs like that, but it is hard for me to objectively say it is wrong, when i slaughter a hundred roaches etc a week MUCH to my amusement

hmm, the loose leaf litter must have screwed up the taras tremble sense... it got jumped BADLY!


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## Gigas (May 24, 2006)

Thats cos roaches are stooopid


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## RVS (May 24, 2006)

Well, my problem isn't that it's a centipede eating a tarantula. In my opinon, a centipede eating a tarantula is really no different than one of my tarantulas eating a cricket, or one of my centipedes eating a mouse, however my real problem is that this is staged for entertainment purposes and presented as a nature documentary.


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## jarrell (May 24, 2006)

tony said:
			
		

> That video with the spider killing the fer-de-lance was staged..Ask Rick...
> How horrible is it compared to a T ravaging a cricket or mouse? :?
> Or a female eating a male?
> 
> Where IS the line?


great point I forget about that some times:clap:

It looks like Discovery channel stages things now, or did they always do that?


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## Scorp guy (May 24, 2006)

guys! leave him alone ok? he has sent me some of the emails from idiots saying things like, they are gonna kill him and his family. im sure he gets all the rudeness he needs already, he does not need the bs everyone on here is/will give him. i talked to him, hes a nice guy, and he certainly isnt trying to start trouble, so i think we ALL need to back off from him.


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## Scorp guy (May 24, 2006)

er um.....are you guys mad at him or the video? if its the video, i apoligize to everyone.


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## ilovebugs (May 24, 2006)

cacoseraph said:
			
		

> hmm, the loose leaf litter must have screwed up the taras tremble sense... it got jumped BADLY!


yea, I noticed that. poor guy didn't stand a chance.

I watched a few of your vids on there. the S. Polymorpha bite is funny. 

I'm scared to pic up my scolopendromorph like that hehe


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## CopperInMyVeins (May 24, 2006)

Does anyone else here remember that show "Wild America" with marty stouffer?  There was a huge controversy over a lot of predator/prey interaction in those shows being staged too, but his intent was still to educate.  I guess in some cases it's just too improbable to be able to show a certain behavior being discussed in a natural setting.  Still an interesting video, but I'd rather these shows just let us know when something is being done in a controlled environment.


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## Steven (May 25, 2006)

szappan said:
			
		

> PS: I will hopefully have a HQ version ready for download by tomorrow for those interested.


i'm interested  

really nice footage of that Scolopendrid !
(to bad there's a T at the end    )


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## Ganoderma (May 25, 2006)

what nature show isn't staged?  it could take months in non-interfered environment to get the footage some of these shows have.  i don't care what eats what as long as it wasn't hurt intentionally or put through some kind of cruel game etc (ie rattlesnake roundup).

i like t's, but nothing is untouchable on the food chain.


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## danread (May 25, 2006)

Wow, that's some really nice footage of the pede, i especially like the shots from underneith, with the pede walking over the camera's POV.

As for the tarantula being eaten, it's not something i peronally would do, but any of us would have a hard time not being a hypocrite if we were to say it's wrong. As others have pointed out already, whats the difference between a tarantula, a roach, a cricket, or a locust......?

Cheers,


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## Randolph XX() (May 25, 2006)

well, the differences to me is- the organism takes longer to grow up and can live pretty long compare to the other invertebrates listed above
it's a waste of natural resources from my view
when u can feed a roach that only needs three months to mature, why feed a 4 year old T?
just my two cents


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## danread (May 25, 2006)

Randolph XX() said:
			
		

> well, the differences to me is- the organism takes longer to grow up and can live pretty long compare to the other invertebrates listed above
> it's a waste of natural resources from my view
> when u can feed a roach that only needs three months to mature, why feed a 4 year old T?
> just my two cents



Thats a pretty weak argument if you ask me. I'm not saying i condone feeding tarantulas to pedes, if only for the reason that it upsets a lot of people, but i can see no valid moral argument for not doing it.


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## Ganoderma (May 25, 2006)

from that point of veiw, good point.  from an animals point of view, it was very filling.

it may be sad for an old, rare, endangered animal/plant to get eaten, but it happens.  albiet unnatural in this case.

i theink the key word mentioned was "where is the line".  until people get involved, there is no line.


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## Vys (May 25, 2006)

Randolph XX() said:
			
		

> well, the differences to me is- the organism takes longer to grow up and can live pretty long compare to the other invertebrates listed above
> it's a waste of natural resources from my view
> when u can feed a roach that only needs three months to mature, why feed a 4 year old T?
> just my two cents


I agree.
The line is soft , subjective, and hard to define when you get too close to it; yet it must be drawn. (Think 'ethical constraints'), not un-adapted-to-the-world-viciously-unpractical-consistency). A tarantula might not be much smarter than a roach, but it is a more complex organism, and it can potentially live for much longer, making it more 'valuable' in my eyes.

(Plus, if they were going to stage something like that, would they please use a large, pre-emptively aggressive asian tarantula, instead of a wretched cuddly curlyhair? That disgusting worm (I don't much like centipedes  ) against an adult female C. 'huahini' perhaps? 
But never mind, I think it was wrong to stage this in the first place, so I just wish things like this'd cease.)


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## danread (May 25, 2006)

Vys said:
			
		

> I agree.
> The line is soft , subjective, and hard to define when you get too close to it; yet it must be drawn. A tarantula might not be much smarter than a roach, but it is a more complex organism, and it can potentially live for much longer, making it more 'valuable' in my eyes.
> 
> (Plus, if they were going to stage something like that, would they please use a large, pre-emptively aggressive asian tarantula, instead of a wretched cuddly curlyhair? That disgusting worm (I don't much like centipedes  ) against an adult female C. 'huahini' perhaps? But nevermind, I think it was wrong to stage this in the first place, so I just wish it'd cease.


On what are you basing your assumption that a tarantula is a "more complex organism" that say a roach? I would say they are very similar in terms of complexity.

Also, i'd still put my money on the pede against any tarantula, even an adult female C. 'huahini'


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## Vys (May 25, 2006)

danread said:
			
		

> On what are you basing your assumption that a tarantula is a "more complex organism" that say a roach? I would say they are very similar in terms of complexity.


'Features'?  I don't know so much about biology, but how would 'complexity' typically be objectively measured, if it ever is? DNA 'length'? Physical size? Which organells the cells have?



			
				danread said:
			
		

> Also, i'd still put my money on the pede against any tarantula, even an adult female C. 'huahini'



 There was this video on yourtube showing some sort of giant centipede being fed a mouse;
slowest creature I ever saw


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## Ganoderma (May 25, 2006)

have you kept a pede?  i've only kept a few but they are anything but slow. 

i think the pedes maneuverability would plan and simple beat any t.  plus they have better armor, if that would do anything to stop a powerful tarantula fang.

centipedes are like static electricity sometimes.  first you see them move then you are rehearsing the 4 letter dictionary cause it is now stuck to your hand.


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## szappan (May 25, 2006)

Well it appears as though I've unintentionally started another debate... but hey!  I guess that's what forums are for!  an exchange of ideas and knowledge... and I really do enjoy reading the differing points of view, good points on both sides   

I've posted two HQ versions to Sendspace, hope this is OK for everyone.

centipede_vs_tarantula.mp4 (18.9MB)
http://www.sendspace.com/file/lqcpjw

centipede_vs_tarantula.avi (149.2MB)
http://www.sendspace.com/file/utldah

All the best,
szappan

PS: oh, and Scorp_Lver – thank you so much for jumping to my defence like that, but unlike the Youtube messages there was nothing directed at me personally... that said, I really do appreciate it you comment.


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## Vys (May 25, 2006)

Ganoderma said:
			
		

> have you kept a pede?  i've only kept a few but they are anything but slow.
> 
> i think the pedes maneuverability would plan and simple beat any t.  plus they have better armor, if that would do anything to stop a powerful tarantula fang.
> 
> centipedes are like static electricity sometimes.  first you see them move then you are rehearsing the 4 letter dictionary cause it is now stuck to your hand.


No, I obviously have not. The three or so videos I've seen of them hunting mice though(like such: http://youtube.com/watch?v=3APJA0EedSE - incidentally made by the thread starter) haven't shown me any _particularly_ lightning-quick lunges; which has sort of surprised me since I've never seen a tarantula grab lunch so slowly, and since everyone keeping these things have attested to their speed. Feel free to show me video evidence of the contrary though  
As for what would beat what..a B . albopilosum is like a slightly bad-tempered care-bear, but still a care-bear :/


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## kerensky (May 25, 2006)

hmmm ... coincidentally my friend got bored of his WC _Phlogiellus inermis_ and decided to drop it into my _S. mutilans_ tank today.

my centipede tagged the tarantula's cephalothorax from the front but coiled up, which essentially left a good portion of it's 9th-11th segment in front of the spider's fangs. 

what actually caught my eye, when i separated the duo after the brief incident, was that the pede coiled around and "groomed" its wounds for a good minute and after that it wasn't "bleeding" anymore.

it promptly scuttled off to finish off the spider after that.

anybody observed wounded centipedes before?


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## Beardo (May 25, 2006)

That video is pretty interesting....some may not like it, and while I don't agree with the false pretenses it was presented under, the speed and prowess of a large centipede is something to behold. I for one had no idea it would have such an easy time dispatching a tarantula like that (yes, it was staged, I know but the result still ended in a well-fed pede).....at least it was a Curly-Hair (just kidding!). Centipedes are bad <EDIT>, thats for darn sure.


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## duente (May 25, 2006)

this clip is from discovery channel's documentary on tarantulas.i downloaded it a few weeks ago,it's not bad..i could upload it to sendspace or something like that if it's ok with forum rules,please let me know


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## diKe (May 25, 2006)

duente said:
			
		

> this clip is from discovery channel's documentary on tarantulas.i downloaded it a few weeks ago,it's not bad..i could upload it to sendspace or something like that if it's ok with forum rules,please let me know


Yes, and in the original video it looks more like a real Scolopendra gigantea... maybe the quality of this video is worser and because of this it looks more like Scolopendra gigantea "robusta".


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## cacoseraph (May 25, 2006)

szappan said:
			
		

> I've posted two HQ versions to Sendspace, hope this is OK for everyone.
> 
> centipede_vs_tarantula.mp4 (18.9MB)
> http://www.sendspace.com/file/lqcpjw
> ...


heh, i have subjected everyone who has come into my office to the high res version full screened on my computer.  i love the different reactions.

thanks szappan!


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## 236260 (May 25, 2006)

Randolph XX said:
			
		

> it's a waste of natural resources from my view
> when u can feed a roach that only needs three months to mature, why feed a 4 year old T?






			
				danread said:
			
		

> Thats a pretty weak argument if you ask me. I'm not saying i condone feeding tarantulas to pedes, if only for the reason that it upsets a lot of people, but i can see no valid moral argument for not doing it.


I think Randolph's point is less a moral one and has more to do with replaceability. It's parallel to the difference between felling a lodgepole pine versus a redwood. I have had a similar ethical dillemna as it relates to the fact that a four inch clam is likely to be over 100 years old.


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## CedrikG (May 25, 2006)

as a theraphosid fan , of course its sad to see ... I wont say its good or wrong.


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## CopperInMyVeins (May 25, 2006)

Vys said:
			
		

> I agree.
> The line is soft , subjective, and hard to define when you get too close to it; yet it must be drawn. (Think 'ethical constraints'), not un-adapted-to-the-world-viciously-unpractical-consistency). A tarantula might not be much smarter than a roach, but it is a more complex organism, and it can potentially live for much longer, making it more 'valuable' in my eyes.
> 
> (Plus, if they were going to stage something like that, would they please use a large, pre-emptively aggressive asian tarantula, instead of a wretched cuddly curlyhair? That disgusting worm (I don't much like centipedes  ) against an adult female C. 'huahini' perhaps?
> But never mind, I think it was wrong to stage this in the first place, so I just wish things like this'd cease.)


    Your argument reminds me of when I was younger, and my friend went on vacation, his only pet was a goldfish, which he was pretty attached to, so I took care of it for him, had it at my house in the same room I kept all my lizards in, and I took care of it as I would any other pet.  The thing is, if it wasn't his goldfish, it would have been just another feeder fish to my Tegu, and I had actualy fed it goldfish in the past.  

    My point is, which animal is a good pet, and which is just a feeder animal for your pets is in the eye of the beholder.  Some people feed fish, lizards, rodents, even birds to invertebrate pets, and in all those cases, someone could argue that vertebrates are "higher" or "more complex" just as you did with the tarantula and roach.  it all comes down to personal choice though, I'm sure there are some people out there who would rather keep a colony of Blaberus than a tarantula.  

    I think tarantulas are great too, I would never use one as a feeder animal, but they're trying to demonstrate that the centipede will prey on tarantulas, so it makes sense that they'd use one.  It also makes sense that they'd use a new world one, since S. gigantea is a new world centipede.  It's already staged, no need to mix up continents too.


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## Randolph XX() (May 25, 2006)

236260 said:
			
		

> I think Randolph's point is less a moaral one and has more to do with replaceability. It's parallel to the difference between felling a lodgepole pine versus a redwood. I have had a similar ethical dillemna as it relates to the fact that a four inch clam is likely to be over 100 years old.


thanx for concluding my statement of my not-so-brilliant English
another point i wanna add is
i know mutilans farm in China feed their stocks pre-made food, which is mealworms and other kinds of domestic feeders insects mixed with fish food, chicken feed and put them all in the juicer!
it is just like fishing bait and last longer with lill trouble to maintain in this kind of maner!


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## Morthoseth (Jun 1, 2006)

I think the video is really cool...


P.S. and centipedes are fastttttttttt!!!


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## Buggin (Jun 3, 2006)

Centipede 1
Tarantula  0


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## Tarantula (Jun 3, 2006)

tony said:
			
		

> That video with the spider killing the fer-de-lance was staged..Ask Rick...
> How horrible is it compared to a T ravaging a cricket or mouse? :?
> Or a female eating a male?
> 
> Where IS the line?


Well that one is so bad shot so Its very obvious that its fake...


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## Vys (Jun 3, 2006)

CopperInMyVeins said:
			
		

> My point is, which animal is a good pet, and which is just a feeder animal for your pets is in the eye of the beholder.  Some people feed fish, lizards, rodents, even birds to invertebrate pets, and in all those cases, someone could argue that vertebrates are "higher" or "more complex" just as you did with the tarantula and roach.  it all comes down to personal choice though, I'm sure there are some people out there who would rather keep a colony of Blaberus than a tarantula.


Ultimately, it is indeed in the 'eye of the beholder', and personal choice, as it is we who perform the action. The choice is dependant upon the line in the head, which is dependant upon how we view the world. There are still objective factors such as brain-size, potential longevity, presense of vocal chorts, and, perhaps a measure of 'biological complexity'. Granted, these are often thrown to the wind when it comes to evaluating a 'potentially fun feeder', but people that do that are either stupid, or are aware that they are walking one one end of a line.


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## C_Strike (Jun 3, 2006)

Ok, i wouldnt wanna give this as a suggestion to do so, *plz dont on my account  

So im not saying it would be, but i have doubts the pede would win if it ran into a T blondi burrow.:? 
I saw a video of some venomous snake that entered a blondis burrow, the blondi won that. but if you put it with the pede into a new enclosure or something it wont stand a chance, in my experience with all my tarantulas at least, tarantulas take a little while to adapt to a new environment and often just curl up somewhere in the tank, and dont move far, or start webbing for a while, where as my pede was actively searching its enclosure for a while, testin all the hides.
though thats only MY opinion based on my own experience.
i haven't and dont intend to try this.


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## Drake Dracoli (Jun 8, 2006)

Owned. This only goes to show Arachnid inferiority to the Centipedes.


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## Scolopendra55 (Jun 8, 2006)

Whoever filmed it was very good at cinematography :worship: Thats was an AWESOME show (I watched it a month or so ago)


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## Ewok (Jun 9, 2006)

They should have put a 10" Blondi up against that pede and then see who ate who  j/k

better yet, a  mature P. murinus would have  gone ballistic on that pede lol


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## Tleilaxu (Jun 10, 2006)

How did they strage the snake getting eaten? I thought that happened, just goes to show how naive I was. Is it not proper to stage these things, I always assumed that the discovery channel was above that behavior. I don't mind it if it happens naturally but I dont like the fact that a major education companu thingy would resort to this. What a waste of a good spider. Again if this happen naturally then I have no issues with it.


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## Drake Dracoli (Jun 16, 2006)

[]Kaliningrad[] said:
			
		

> They should have put a 10" Blondi up against that pede and then see who ate who  j/k
> 
> better yet, a  mature P. murinus would have  gone ballistic on that pede lol


No. The pede would triumph. Your eight-legged kind sicken me.


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