Centipede

Insects have 6 legs.  But wait, we’ve already talked about millipedes that have more than 6 legs.  Spiders have 8 legs.  Scorpions have 8 legs.  Centipedes have way more than 8 legs.  So they are not insects?  In general we call then insects or bugs but they are not technically insects, rather all these animals are arthropods.   Centipedes, again, not technically an insect but closely related, belong to the class chilopoda, and can be found all over the world.  They can have anywhere from 15-177 pairs of legs.  Species of centipede come in many different colors and have different shaped legs.  They are carnivorous and use venom to immobilize their prey such as spiders, worms or other centipedes.  Centipedes are nocturnal and, unlike millipedes, are very fast.

Jessica Gibbons Rauch grew up in central Illinois, which was built on a swamp so she saw many centipedes.  Centipedes love dark, damp spaces.  One day she noticed a centipede crawling rather low on a wall.  Her cat, Butterscotch, also saw it.  As the cat looked excitedly at Jessica, Jessica said, “I dare you to eat that.”  With a look that said, “Challenge accepted,” Butterscotch stalked over to the wall and ate it.  Imagine a smiling cat with little legs sticking out of its mouth.

When Erin Anderson was in college she saw a centipede a couple times.  The first time she called her brother to come get it, which he did.  She second time she was watching tv with her roommate, Shelley, late at night.  They looked up and saw something in the dark, a centipede.  It was late and they were tired.  Not wanting to get anywhere near the thing, and after running around screaming for a while, Shelley got the oven cleaner and covered the thing in foam.  It was high up on the wall, mind you.  Of course the weight of the foam caused it to fall to the floor, centipede and all.  Shelley frantically told Erin to find something with which to squish the centipede.  Erin brought a flip-flop, which Shelley immediately used to squish the centipede.  Remember that it was covered in foam.  So yes, the centipede was now dead but there was oven cleaner all over the walls and floor from the impact of the flip-flop.