# Giant Millipede found in Oregon



## VictorHernandez (Oct 14, 2012)

So the dry season has JUST ended here in Oregon, and I wanted to go search for Tree Frogs in the wetland rainforest near my home. I found many many Tree Frog egg sacs, and I collected a few to try and raise some Tree Frogs, but I eventually just put them back where I found them. I looked under a few things then I found a large flat millipede maybe around 1-2 inches long. I put it in a ventilated jar, the only one that I had, then in the same spot I found the flat millipede, I found a very large pill bug. I kept looking under things, and then I found a woolly bear worm, which I put in the jar with the millipede and pill bug. The millipede was also very fast. I looked under another thing, and there I saw a huge grey millipede. I put it in the jar with the other creatures and went home. When I got home I realised that I should have never put the Tiger moth larva in there... The catipillar pooped acid poop ever and killed everything but the giant millipede. I know it was acid, because I let it crawl on my finger and I felt a burning sensation. I washed the pee and poo and there was a red mark on my finger. I'm sad the flat millipede died...when I was younger I really wanted a green anole, but I don't get one. Then I wanted a giant millipede. I didn't get one either. Some tine after that, I was riding ny bike on a logging road, and I flipped over a rock and there I found 2 giant millipedes. I don't know what made me not get them...well can you guys help me figure out what species it is. I'll provide pictures.

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## web eviction (Oct 14, 2012)

Posts pics man lol I did not know we had a wetland rainforest....

---------- Post added 10-14-2012 at 05:30 PM ----------

I find a lot of millipedes nothing bigger then about 2.5" though...


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## VictorHernandez (Oct 14, 2012)

web eviction said:


> Posts pics man lol I did not know we had a wetland rainforest....
> 
> ---------- Post added 10-14-2012 at 05:30 PM ----------
> 
> I find a lot of millipedes nothing bigger then about 2.5" though...


I posted pics. Hey cool you from around here too. And technically, western Oregon is a rainforest, but not a tropical rainforest. where I found it it is very swampy with many little ponds.


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## Galapoheros (Oct 14, 2012)

I don't know the species but it's likely defense chemicals from the millipede killed everything, done that before.


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## web eviction (Oct 14, 2012)

I was just teasin man... I can't remember what the label is on these guys for some reason I definetly see them everywhere my daughter is always bringing them in telling me look daddy I have a new pet for you lol


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## VictorHernandez (Oct 14, 2012)

I forgot to mention that this specimen is around 5 to 6 inches long.


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## web eviction (Oct 14, 2012)

?? Really do you have a pic next to a ruler? 
Have you found any glow worms yet? They eat theses millipedes lol


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## VictorHernandez (Oct 14, 2012)

web eviction said:


> ?? Really do you have a pic next to a ruler?
> Have you found any glow worms yet? They eat theses millipedes lol


I've never even seen a glow worm...lol
And I am not sure if this one is that long, it just LOOKS long. It looks as long as my p. imperator, which is like 6 in.


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## web eviction (Oct 14, 2012)

Hmmm well find a ruler and get a picture...


Ya the glow worms she be coming out soon there actually beetles the female if I remember right stays in larvae form but the male actually becomes a small beetle which also glows! Very cool creatures not something you would expect to find in Oregon! I have a picture somewhere


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## VictorHernandez (Oct 14, 2012)

Oh well turns out I was very wrong in the size. This one is just a little over 3 inches.


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## web eviction (Oct 14, 2012)

Lol no worries still pretty big for around here


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## VictorHernandez (Oct 14, 2012)

Yeah. I took a pic of it next to a ruler, but for some unknown reason it turns out I deleted it...
I have some pics of it on my hand in my gallery though.
10/15/12 edit:
I mentioned the millipedes to my teacher today, and she also thought it looked 6in long. But it is actually half that.


---------- Post added 10-14-2012 at 07:44 PM ----------

So nobody knows what species this is?


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## zonbonzovi (Oct 15, 2012)

IME, the most reasonable possibility for your locale is genus Hiltonius.


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## VictorHernandez (Oct 15, 2012)

zonbonzovi said:


> IME, the most reasonable possibility for your locale is genus Hiltonius.


Thanks.. I have been searching everywhere and looking at many books.. and I couldnt find anything. I only found  sirobolus marginatus called a common millipedes in this very old book at my school.


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## Elytra and Antenna (Oct 15, 2012)

zonbonzovi said:


> IME, the most reasonable possibility for your locale is genus Hiltonius.


 Hiltonius are fat, chunky, odd-shaped millipedes and most things labeled that genus on the board are Tylobolus.


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## VictorHernandez (Oct 15, 2012)

Elytra and Antenna said:


> Hiltonius are fat, chunky, odd-shaped millipedes and most things labeled that genus on the board are Tylobolus.


Thats what ive been finding online..so do you this one is a tylobolus? I am in the Southern willamette valley, at the mckenzie valley. I found her about half a foot away from a pond under a tarp thing in some river rocks. Maybe this species is active in the wet season and likes to be near water.


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## zonbonzovi (Oct 16, 2012)

Elytra and Antenna said:


> Hiltonius are fat, chunky, odd-shaped millipedes and most things labeled that genus on the board are Tylobolus.


Ah, OK.  I recall reading that they're indistinguishable in photos.  I had some of the "CA red stripes" that were being sold as Tylobolus and they didn't seem to have much girth, like say, N. gordanus.  Could it be that those previously mentioned as Hiltonius found in OR are actually Tylobolus?  I did note that Tylobolus has been found as far N. as Pierce Co., WA.


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## VictorHernandez (Oct 16, 2012)

I went back to the same spot last night as it rained, and I found another smaller female. I also found a female flat millipede.


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## VictorHernandez (Oct 16, 2012)

Millipede question: could I possible keep different species of large/giant millipedes communally with no worries? Like keep a 10 gallon with all kinds of species and such?


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## Elytra and Antenna (Oct 17, 2012)

The answer is pretty much yes.


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## VictorHernandez (Oct 19, 2012)

Good. I would like to get a 10 gallon and keep a male/female pair of Archispirostreptus gigas, and male-female pairs of other nice little "millipeds" such as some Anadenobolus monilicornis, Orthoporus ornatus and the ones locally here. I went out and found 3 more millipeds, but they are all females! It makes me a little annoyed how males are so hard to come by, I need one so I can possibly breed them. Ive got 2 large ones and 2 small ones now, im just going to be searching for males for now on.


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## Elytra and Antenna (Oct 19, 2012)

zonbonzovi said:


> Ah, OK.  I recall reading that they're indistinguishable in photos.


 There is a sexual dimorphism trait that qualifies that answer.


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## Bugs In Cyberspace (Oct 19, 2012)

The rains haaave just returned!

I've pulled in 12 of these in the last week too, as well as four Pleocoma rain beetles (awwyeah)! Also found 3 jumping bristletails, a teneb mimicking chrysomelid or cetoniid (haven't figured it out yet), a large female Antrodiaetus burrow in the middle of a 10-15 year old footpath/trail instead of the usual stump, two Scaphinotus ground beetles that are different than the Nebria that are swarming right now, lots of little Philoscia type isopods in addition to the typical three species we see, woolly bears aplenty, H. halys stink bugs en masse, a few straggler Western boxelder bugs, and just yesterday a very small stinkbug I've never seen before. Various insects are coming to my porch lights to escape the rain, just when I thought the season was coming to an end.

Oh, I also saw something I've never seen before. I thought I'd found yet another first for me lacewing sighting in my backyard the other day, but I later learned that some of our green lacewings turn yellowish as they prepare to overwinter. In all my years of looking at local green lacewings I've never seen a golden one!

More than likely yours are Tylobolus uncigerus.

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## VictorHernandez (Oct 19, 2012)

Bugs In Cyberspace said:


> The rains haaave just returned!
> 
> I've pulled in 12 of these in the last week too, as well as four Pleocoma rain beetles (awwyeah)! Also found 3 jumping bristletails, a teneb mimicking chrysomelid or cetoniid (haven't figured it out yet), a large female Antrodiaetus burrow in the middle of a 10-15 year old footpath/trail instead of the usual stump, two Scaphinotus ground beetles that are different than the Nebria that are swarming right now, lots of little Philoscia type isopods in addition to the typical three species we see, woolly bears aplenty, H. halys stink bugs en masse, a few straggler Western boxelder bugs, and just yesterday a very small stinkbug I've never seen before. Various insects are coming to my porch lights to escape the rain, just when I thought the season was coming to an end.
> 
> ...


Thank you so much. I have found a wandering male Antrodiaetus species I believe too. It was under a trunk, and it built a small retreat. I also found a small spider burrow I believe was from a Antrodiaetus in the same forest I find the millipeds, but I never got to get it out.. I am keeping the male in a small jar right now, and it has a view. He hasn't made the "door".


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## VictorHernandez (Oct 20, 2012)

Do you recommend the 50% coco fiber, and 50% rotting wood with leaves as substrate?


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## Bugs In Cyberspace (Oct 25, 2012)

The spiders won't always make a burrow in a confined/captive space, even though the container might be larger than the tube they build in nature. If you put some moss in the vial and nothing else, they'll usually web it up a bit and create some tunnels. That female I was referring to in the middle of the trail did have a plug at the top of her burrow. I don't recall exactly why it caught my eye that night, in the dark, with a flashlight. I always carry forceps with me and picked up the plug on top of her burrow. I was surprised to see her huge abdomen just an inch below the opening, not far at all from the bottom of the plug. Where else would a hungry mother be, I guess. I was mostly just surprised to find her burrow there in the middle of a trail and put her plug back. Males regularly wander into my pitfall traps, though I have seen less of them the last few weeks. It is really amazing just how small the females are when they become capable of producing offspring, compared with the huge ultimate size they can attain.

Back to millipedes though. To answer your substrate question, it is not critically important what ratios you use for your mix. What is essential is that you have properly decayed leaves and wood. The rest is just filler, though millipedes will often cycle most anything organic through their guts to some degree.

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## VictorHernandez (Oct 31, 2012)

*ID More Oregon Millipedes*

Hey, yesterday I when out looking for more Tylobolus, and I did find a single baby, but I also found these others I don't really know the species. I think the pill bug might be an Armadillidium vulgare, but are those found in Oregon? And I also found probably well over 50 of tiny common millipedes, that I just call "Minipedes". I think they are in mating season or something, so I just got some so they can mate in an enclosure. Winters coming up too, and it gets really cold, so I guess I spared them. I also found a pair of small dark flat millipedes, and a single flat millipede with yellow spots, but I don't think its a Harpaphe haydeniana. Can anyone help me out on the species? Here are some pictures. Thanks.
a yellow-spotted flat millipede with some small millipedes and a pill bug:


Some more of those small millipedes and strange flat millipedes and a pill bug


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## zonbonzovi (Nov 1, 2012)

Just a stab in the dark as details can't be made out with these photos but: orange flat millipede = Nearctodesmidae, other flats = Oxidus gracilis, others = Parajulidae.

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## VictorHernandez (Nov 3, 2012)

Tonight was a horrible bug hunt...I was searching for more Tylobolus next to a concrete trail, and accidentally stepped on a juvinile. I later found an adult, but then a man kicked me out of the vicinity, because he thought I was some hooligan up to no good...
I wanted to go back to explain I was searching for millipedes that come out only at night, but I didnt. I just ended up telling him quickly I was searching for rocks for some reason. 

But I really feel bad for stepping on the pede.


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## web eviction (Nov 3, 2012)

VictorHernandez said:


> Tonight was a horrible bug hunt...I was searching for more Tylobolus next to a concrete trail, and accidentally stepped on a juvinile. I later found an adult, but then a man kicked me out of the vicinity, because he thought I was some hooligan up to no good...
> I wanted to go back to explain I was searching for millipedes that come out only at night, but I didnt. I just ended up telling him quickly I was searching for rocks for some reason.
> 
> But I really feel bad for stepping on the pede.


Where is it your finding them?


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## VictorHernandez (Nov 3, 2012)

web eviction said:


> Where is it your finding them?


There are to places, a forested area with no homes, and a forested area where they recently started  building homes there. I wasnt in the area of homes, but I was behind where one was constructed. This is all along a logging road.


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## VictorHernandez (Nov 4, 2012)

Yay, the following days I looked under a abandoned carpet in the forest, and there was a huge a. Pacificus colony there! Ranging from tiny spiderlings, to giant adult males and females. I caught around ten, but I wasnt prepared, so all the juveniles where killed by the larger ones, an so I realeased some wounded ones, and kept 2 large females, and a ginormous male.


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## web eviction (Nov 4, 2012)

Sweet! Ya you definetly can't place them together....


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## VictorHernandez (Nov 4, 2012)

Yes, I now know that. I just came back from another hunt, and I found a juvenile Tylobolus, an adult Tylobolus, a large centipede, pill bigs, and mini-millipedes. Hurray.


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## Bugs In Cyberspace (Nov 6, 2012)

A. vulgare is our most common pill bug species. I'm having trouble this week finding Tylobolus too because of all the leaves that have suddenly fallen. Too many hiding places for millipedes! I found one of the red and yellow ones the other night, not too distant from a glowing firefly larva http://bugguide.net/node/view/720199/bgimage

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## VictorHernandez (Nov 6, 2012)

Bugs In Cyberspace said:


> A. vulgare is our most common pill bug species. I'm having trouble this week finding Tylobolus too because of all the leaves that have suddenly fallen. Too many hiding places for millipedes! I found one of the red and yellow ones the other night, not too distant from a glowing firefly larva http://bugguide.net/node/view/720199/bgimage


Yes, there's so much leaves. I have been finding grubs like those a lot when looking for Tylobolus, they are black though. I have seen about 20 of them so far. And I have also seen a large strange beetle eating a worm, and many small round millipedes that have stripes and move like snakes quickly in the leave litter.


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## VictorHernandez (Nov 21, 2012)

I have concluded that that the small millipedes are a Bollmaniulus spp., and the large orange flat millipede is a Kepolydesmus anderisus(even though they are found in Washington, I presume they are in Oregon, at least the genus).


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