Any advice for AGM odd behavior?

[GiannaR]

Hello all! I work for an institution and we have two colonies of African Giant Millipedes. We have also had very successful colonies and currently we have seen a shift in done what we thought were one off things happening. We opened our bins to feed the millipedes yesterday and found that one in each bin was doing the same odd movement at the same time. We have only ever seen this once before and our vets have no idea what it could be. The millipedes were laying on the surface on their sides with head curled in but the rest of the body straight and all legs move in a synchronous wave. They also seemed to be excreting some liquid at some point while this is happening. 1 have a video as well but here is a picture of the curled head and extended body. If anyone has any idea what this could be or mean I would appreciate all info. For more context the other millipedes in the tanks were acting completely normal.

 

[Charliemum]

It looks like some sort of fit or irritation to the mill', very strange that it's only 1 in each group. Are they cb or wc?

@Ratmosphere I know you play with cent's any chance you know anything about mill's or know anyone on ab that does? I can't think of anyone off the top of my head.

 

[GiannaR]

These are all captive bred and different blood lines.

 

[Ratmosphere]

Were the leaves collected locally? Any chance they could have come in contact with pesticides?

 

[GiannaR]

Leaves are from our campus, no pesticides, and they sit for a few months and get microwaved before use. The substrate does get mushrooms sometimes.

 

[Brewser]

The substrate does get mushrooms sometimes.

Certain Mushrooms have been known to alter Behavior.

 

[Smotzer]

Leaves are from our campus, no pesticides, and they sit for a few months and get microwaved before use. The substrate does get mushrooms sometimes.

So as someone that has done tree & pest work on campuses it is a possibility that the leaves were easily contaminated by numerous chemical sources. Campuses are very residential/commercial areas I would only ever use leaves from true forest areas. Based on this it look to me like some type of dyskinesia from chemical exposure.

 

[Ultum4Spiderz]

So as someone that has done tree & pest work on campuses it is a possibility that the leaves were easily contaminated by numerous chemical sources. Campuses are very residential/commercial areas I would only ever use leaves from true forest areas. Based on this it look to me like some type of dyskinesia from chemical exposure.

Yep especially weed killer and pesticides. Dks symptoms.

 

[GiannaR]

So my institution is a zoo. Our grounds are monitored really well. So the leaves these millipedes received were direct from a tree being trimmed. Other interesting bit is that it was only one millipede in each bin. The one bin has 15 (now 14) in it and the other 6 (now 5). I would assume and sadly hope that if there was a chemical introduced it would show in more than one millipede in a bin full of others.
As an update they have been euthanized after 3 days of this behavior and no true cause or cure to help. We’ve only had this happen 1 other time in the past in a completely different area . If anyone thinks of anything else I am all ears! I don’t want more millipedes to go through this if I can do something to prevent or explain it.

 

[mantisfan101]

So as someone that has done tree & pest work on campuses it is a possibility that the leaves were easily contaminated by numerous chemical sources. Campuses are very residential/commercial areas I would only ever use leaves from true forest areas. Based on this it look to me like some type of dyskinesia from chemical exposure.

I'm on a college campus right now and I second this. It may not have been actual pesticides but there are definitely other chemicals that are used. It is unfortunate since there's always branches or leaf litter I would like to use, but I only collect from heavily forested areas away from campus.