This is my preserved millipede that I had for quite some time now that I staged for a focus stacking session at 5X magnification and I find them to be quite interesting creatures with their as many as 700 legs although most common ones have between 80 and 400. My specimen is in the lower range with less than 50. They have two pairs of legs on each side of their body on each segment except the first segment which only has two. I've included an image of it that I staged on some leaves last year that shows it in its entirety.
Millipede eyes consist of a number of simple flat lens ocelli (primitive eyes) arranged in a group on the front/side of the head. Millipedes have very poor eyesight which is sometimes nonexistent as in my specimen.
They sense their way around by using their antennae which continually taps the ground as the millipede moves along. The head contains a pair of sensory organs found just behind their antennae and are oval shaped. If you look closely you will see them on my specimen. They are probably used to measure the humidity in the surroundings which gives them a sense of where they want to be.
Millipedes are very clean creatures and spend a lot of time cleaning and polishing various parts of their body. They have a special brush-like group of hairs on the 2nd or 3rd pair of their legs (that you can see here) which they use to clean their antennae.
I could take a shine to these! Excellent shots, interesting info.
Excellent work Gary and interesting write-up.
quixdraw wrote:
I could take a shine to these! Excellent shots, interesting info.
Thanks, Quixdraw. I thought that I would start sharing a little info about the specimens that I post for others to become a bit more familiar with.
ecobin wrote:
Excellent work Gary and interesting write-up.
Thanks, Elliott. It's pleasing to know that you enjoyed seeing it.
Nice pair of images, sippy.
kpmac wrote:
Nice pair of images, sippy.
Thanks, Kpmac. Keep up the faith down there.
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