Invertebrates
Giant African Millipede
Archispirostreptus gigas · also called giant African millipede, shongololo
The giant African millipede is a foot-and-a-bit of glossy dark segments and shuffling legs, moving slowly through the leaf litter of East African forests. It is the biggest millipede on Earth, and one of the most harmless large animals you could meet — a gentle recycler with no bite, no venom, and a talent for curling into a tight coil.
Overview
Giant African millipedes live in the leaf litter and rotting logs of lowland tropical forest and moist woodland in East Africa. They are nocturnal detritivores, eating decaying leaves, rotten wood, and soft fruit and returning it to the soil as nutrient-rich droppings — an important part of how a forest floor decomposes. They are slow, solitary, and long-lived for an invertebrate.
Not a thousand feet
At up to 38 centimetres, it is the largest millipede, but it has around 300–400 legs, not a thousand — two pairs per segment (the feature that distinguishes millipedes from the fast, venomous, one-pair-per-segment centipedes). The legs move in smooth waves that give it the pushing power to burrow.
Harmless defence
The giant African millipede has no bite and no venom. Threatened, it curls into a tight flat spiral protecting its soft underside and oozes a foul, staining, irritating fluid from pores along its body. This is safe on the skin if washed off, but harmful in the eyes — so hold one gently and away from your face.
Mite passengers
Wild individuals carry tiny mites around the legs and head. These are almost always commensal cleaners eating fungus and debris, not parasites.
Status
The giant African millipede has not been assessed for conservation. It is common in suitable forest and is heavily collected for the pet trade, where it is one of the most popular invertebrates.
Giant African Millipede: common questions
Is a giant African millipede dangerous?
No. It has no fangs, no venom, no sting, and no bite of any consequence — it cannot hurt a person by any active means. Millipedes are peaceable plant-litter eaters, quite unlike centipedes, which are fast, one-pair-of-legs-per-segment predators with a venomous bite. The one caution with the giant African millipede is its chemical defence — when alarmed it can release a brownish liquid from pores along its sides that smells strongly and can stain and irritate skin, and it is genuinely harmful if rubbed into the eyes or mouth (there are cases of temporary eye damage). So it is safe to hold gently, but you should wash your hands afterwards and not handle one near your face, and keep it away from young children.
How many legs does it actually have?
Nowhere near a thousand. The name "millipede" comes from Latin for "thousand feet," but it is an exaggeration for the whole group. A large giant African millipede has roughly 250 body segments, and most segments carry two pairs of legs, giving a total in the range of about 300 to 400. (The current record-holder for leg count is a completely different, thread-thin Australian species with over 1,300 legs.) The double pair of legs per segment is the key feature that separates millipedes from centipedes, which have a single pair per segment. The many short legs move in graceful travelling waves that push the animal slowly forward, and the extra legs give it the pushing power to burrow through packed leaf litter and soil.
What does it do for the ecosystem?
It is a decomposer, and an important one. The giant African millipede spends its life eating dead and decaying plant material — fallen leaves, rotting wood, soft fruit — grinding it up in its gut, and excreting it as pellets that are far more accessible to bacteria, fungi, and other soil organisms than the original tough litter was. By doing this at scale, millipedes accelerate the breakdown of leaf litter, recycle nutrients back into the soil, and help build soil structure. In a tropical forest, the combined action of millipedes, termites, earthworms, and fungi is what keeps the forest floor from simply burying itself in undecayed leaves.
Why do so many have mites crawling on them?
Almost every wild giant African millipede carries a population of tiny mites, clustered especially around the leg bases and head, and this alarms new pet keepers. In the great majority of cases these are commensal mites, not parasites — they ride on the millipede for transport and shelter and feed on fungal spores, bacteria, and organic gunk in the millipede's leg joints and body grooves, effectively grooming it. The relationship is usually neutral to slightly beneficial for the millipede. A heavy mite load can be a sign of a stressed or unhealthy animal, and captive-bred millipedes are generally mite-free, which is one reason to prefer them.