local species ID

[mitchrobot]

i caught two of these today, curious about what they may be. ive been flipping rocks here since i was a kid and have never come across these before, thought it was weird finding two in one go (they were maybe 15 feet from each other). anyways, just wondering if anyone can identify them. theyre pretty blue.
i found them in northern california BTW (Napa, about 45 minutes from san francisco)

 

[DawnW]

Hemiscolopendra marginata maybe?

 

[zonbonzovi]

Wha...?! Can't imagine it being anything other then another color variant of Scolopendra polymorpha from that general area, although a very nice variant. Couldn't tell from the pix, but is there a ring furrow just behind the headplate? Cool find, fo sho!

 

[DawnW]

Mine was just a bit of a guess, I don't know centipedes really. I saw some for sale here a while back that looked like this one, labelled simply as blue centipedes, so I done some googling and found a name and pics that could match the OPs.

 

[zonbonzovi]

Not a bad guess at all, just a little out of range for that species. Some of the S. polymorpha variants can look nearly identical to H. marginata, esp. in a photo.

 

[DawnW]

Ah cool cool I like to practice the ID game. Geography could probably do with improvement as well, come to that!

 

[Galapoheros]

It does kind of look like a polymorpha, but I feel like people are still not used to considering those with the yellow colored body and dark head that get around 6 to 7 inches. I can't remember the name but it's something like Scolopendra aztecorem, corum... don't remember, does anybody remember? The young ones are blue.

 

[zonbonzovi]

^I thought the same before seeing the location. If this is that, it would be stretching the range pretty far, but with little to go on for a historical range...it reminds me of A. chilensis in color...very pretty.

Argh...I always forget about all the potential viridis subspecies:

http://chilobase.bio.unipd.it/search/result_species.php?TaxId=1147&post=1&

 

[mitchrobot]

they looked very similar to the blue polys ive seen, but i dont believe they are found this far north?

they are very pretty pedes, seem to be doing alright, i figure ill keep em and see how big they get. thought it was strange, never seen this sp, not in 20 years of bugging, neat to find two in the same day. going to go back to that area next week and see if i spot anymore (although probably wont keep them, happy with these guys)

 

[zonbonzovi]

Scratch the viridis comment. North Mexico, yes, CA, no.

Polys range into SE Oregon, but yours are definitely peculiar in color if that's what they are. Any chance you can get a closer head shot?

 

[mitchrobot]

meh?

 

[Pulk]

Looks very similar to Palo Alto polymorpha (but prettier).

 

[neubii18]

I agree that it looks like a younger polymorpha,hence the blue.It is definitely different though!