Hawaiian Centipedes | Largest Centipede Species in Hawaii

When it comes to Hawaii, the first impression by most individual is a beautiful place like a paradise. But, you may be surprised to know that it is also the home of the largest species of centipede that is on the current record of the scientists. The average length of a fully matured Hawaiian centipede can actually grow between 5 to 9 inches long. Although, there were some witnesses who claimed that they have even seen longer sizes.

Since Hawaii is a tourist attraction, most of the vacationers are the once who often encounters large crawling centipedes either inside or outside their rooms. And as their natural reaction, they usually panic in fear that the insect might bite them. As for the permanent residents, they already got used to the presence of these large sized centipedes around their surroundings.

Hawaii is highly populated with large centipedes that the residents have developed the habit of ensuring their safety from getting bitten (Hawaiian centipede bite can actually inflict the most excruciating pain as compared to all other centipede species). So when they go out, it became a common practice that they always shake or inspect their clothing before wearing them. You may be surprised to know that there were already countless number of individuals that got bitten by the insect by simply "not checking" and directly wearing their clothes.

There was actually one reported incident that went viral around the internet which involved a Hawaiian centipede and a certain guy who went surfing on the beach. According to the report, he was a tourist who took a vacation along with his friends in Hawaii.

Due to their excitement, the victim removed and thrown his jeans onto the floor then immediately wore his board-shorts for surfing. He and his friends then went surfing where they enjoyed and had so much fan until they came back. Unfortunately, the victim wasn't aware that a centipede crawled inside his pants but being unaware about the presence of the insect, he wore it. As a result he got bitten by the creature.

According to the report, the victim was bitten three to four times starting from his thigh down to his ankle. These bites had immediately sent him into the hospital for treatment.

While crying in pain, none of his friends didn't even attempt to help the victim in fear that the centipede may also bite them.

Origin of the Hawaiian Centipedes

Large crawling centipedes of Hawaii didn't really originated from the country itself where it was introduced by the Polynesian Voyagers in 1847. And, it was not just introduced in Hawaii but also the entire Pacific and Tropical regions. Until now, their purpose for introducing these pesky insects remains unknown.

Moreover, Hawaiian centipedes thrives on warm and dry areas. So when it rains, it stirs them from their hideouts to come out and crawl all over various places. Thus, it is common to encounter them under tarps, plant pots, car tires or any objects on the floor that can provide cover for the insects to hide.

Giant Scolopendra Gigantea

According to some scientific findings about centipedes, most of their species are not venomous enough to kill humans or large animals unless they are allergic to the bite. But among all the species, one among the most threatening of their kind is the "Scolopendra Gigantea" which is more commonly known as the "Amazonian Giant Centipede".

Amazonian giant centipedes find their perfect dwelling place or habitat at the tropical climate of South America's Amazon jungle.

Amazon Jungle

A scolopendra gigantea can actually grow into a massive size which makes it unique and quite fascinating especially to any centipede pet owners. An adult or fully matured scolopendra gigantea can reach over 35 centimeters in length. This is comparable to the length of a man's forearm. And with such incredible size, anyone who hasn't encountered this kind of centipede will surely tremble and run away in fear.

The shell-color of an amazonian giant centipede is commonly "red-maroon" or "dark-brown". Most of them actually possess dark colors. No one is able to confirm yet if there's an amazonian giant centipede with bright colors.

When it comes to the legs, a fully matured scolopendra gigantea usually consists of around 46 color-yellow tinted legs. Common to all centipedes, if it happens that they lost one of their legs, they actually have the capability to grow a new one.

As a hunter or predator of the jungle, a giant amazonian centipede possess the power of speed to run around unnoticed. Due to this characteristics, some scientists describe them as "Swift Runners". Other than their speedy movement, these creatures are also good climbers. With their several pairs of legs, it allows them to climb through vertical surfaces with ease.

Scolopendra Gigantea are Carnivorous Creatures

All kinds of centipedes are actually both "carnivores" and "herbivores" (they eat dead plants). However, they are more categorized as carnivorous creatures because they prefer to eat meat. Probably, meat taste better to their appetite.

Small-sized centipedes have a long lists on their food menu which are other smaller creatures particularly insects as their prey. Some of these insects includes ants, beetles, spiders and termites. Common small-sized centipedes are the "House Centipedes" which can be observed running around the corners of an untidy room.

Unlike house centipedes, scolopendra gigantea does not invade house premises where they prefer to stay in the jungle. Due to their large sizes, they are surprisingly capable of hunting large rats in the rice-field. In fact, they can also hunt down small snakes. But above all, the most impressive display of their hunting skill is that, they can hunt bats living inside caves.

According to some biologists, the amazonian giant centipedes have highly developed quick responses. This is what makes them as "fierce hunters" and the reason why they can catch a flying bat in an instant.

Today, there's a growing number of exotic pet owners who are adding giant centipedes into their collections. If you are one of them and it's your first-time to own one of this kind of pet, you are advised not to touch or handle it with your bare hands. You have to know that a slight venom of the creature can cause severe reactions into your skin.

Although, some pet owners are able to handle their giant centipedes without getting harmed or bitten it's because they already have good handling experiences.

Finally, do you own a scolopendra gigantea giant centipede? If you do then it would be really grateful if you can share to us your experiences especially on how you handle and take good care of your pet.

How to keep Giant Centipede as a Pet?

There's a sudden interests of a growing number of individuals who wants to keep giant centipedes as one of their pets. Due to them, such creatures are now being sold from Pet Stores and even via online stores.

According to some centipede pet owners, they find the obsession of keeping centipedes as their pet due to their varied colors and their unquenchable appetite of eating their prey. As a matter of fact, most centipede pet owners are actually being fascinated by how these many legged creature catches their helpless victims and feed on them.

The best place to watch centipedes in action is to visit YouTube. In the past previous post, I have covered giant centipede versus other top predators such as mouse, snakes, scorpions and etc... Included in the discussion are the links to their YouTube videos.

You may already have probably seen some owners holding their own giant centipede pet with their own "bare hands". Be warned that only few individuals can do this act that only trained handlers can perform. In fact, even professionals handlers claim that there's still a risk of them from being bitten by the insect.

If it happens that you seem to have the interest of keeping a giant centipede as a pet, you have to be warned that they do bite resulting into extreme and excruciating pain. Due to this reason, they are pets strictly for adult individuals only.

Taking care a giant centipede as a pet isn't just like any other ordinary pets around. So before you start owning one of them, you need to conduct a thorough research about these creatures first.

Proper Housing of a Centipede Pet

The house or container of your centipede pet is of vital importance. If you do not provide them the right environment comparable to their habitat then they won't live long enough.

Here are the following tips on how to provide a proper housing for your many-legged pet:

1. Enough room

The house or the container must provide enough room for your pet to move around. If you are planning to take care two or more giant centipedes then you should make sure that there is enough room for them to stretch and explore around the corners.

2. Soil

Centipedes do really love to cover or bury themselves underground (particularly with soil). Thus, you should fill the bottom floor of the container with soft type of soil (maybe at least 2 to 3 inches). It is important that you must maintain the soil always at its soft condition.

3. Maintaining Temperature of the Environment

Since centipedes inhabit swampy and misty environments, it is important that you have to offer the same type of atmosphere to your pet's new home.

4. Other components

Aside from the soil, you should also add other components such as bark, leaf litter and rotting woods. You will be surprised to know that they also love to burrow themselves under them.

5. Container Walls must be High

The height of the container or its walls must be high enough that you centipede pet won't be able to reach the lid and escape out. Take not, sealing the opening of the container in order to prevent your pet from escaping out is not a good idea. Your pet won't be able to breathe air and die.

Centipede Pets that are for Sale

I myself actually have the interest of keeping a giant centipede as a pet. So I went visiting all Pet Shops near my place. As a result, there were only few numbers of giant centipedes that I found on-sale. When I asked the seller "Why?", he claims the there's a huge demand for centipede pets these days. Most of them are even requesting him rare species that they are willing to pay it for a very high price.

Here are the following giant centipedes that are commonly available on various Pet Shops:

Common Species

1. Vietnamese Giant Centipede

2. Red Head Tiger Leg Centipede

3. Amazon Centipede

(*Prices of the above species starts at $25.)

Rare Species

1. Barbados Giant Centipede

2. Chilean Centipede

3. Fan Tailed Centipede

4. Egyptian Centipede

5. Haiti Giant Centipede

6. Tanzanian Centipede

Catch or Buy your own Centipede Pet

If there are places you know where you can catch giant centipedes (such as in the forest) then you may choose to catch one provided that you know how to capture it. If you don't then you are simply putting yourself at risk of getting bitten by the insect.

In order for you to catch a wild-giant centipede, you need to wear appropriate protective gear. These includes boots, gloves and clothing that covers most of your skin body-parts.

Catching a wild centipede is best done by using a net rather than grabbing it by hand. Some people also use sticks but this isn't advisable to be used especially when it's your first-time to capture a centipede.

Anyway, if you have the extra-money and you do not want to put yourself at the risk of catching one then your best option is to buy it from the Pet Shop.

Giant Centipede Pet for Exterminating Bug Infestation

If your main purpose of keeping or owning a giant centipede as a pet is to exterminate bug infestation around your house, sad to say that this is not the solution into your problem. Assuming that you set your pet out "free" to roam around the corner of your house, what if you suddenly encounter it on your bed or on the sofa? If you didn't notice its presence and you lay down on it, you will surely feel an agonizing pain of its bite.

Giant centipedes are considered good pets for the adult individuals but they are not intended for exterminating bug infestations. The best method for bug infestation problem is "still" to seek immediate help from the professional bug exterminators.

Moreover, keeping a giant centipede as a pet is both interesting and challenging. However, some owners do gave up due to the reason that they could not sustain or provide the food that their pet needs. So if you do not have a good source of acquiring foods for your pet then owning a centipede pet is not for you.

Wild or Giant Centipedes versus Other Predators

Wild or Giant Centipedes proves to be at the "top of the food-chain" (specifically in the world of the insect) because they can actually prey on any kind of insects that they can come across around. To confirm their supremacy among other predatory insects, I have conducted further researches and found several interesting results at YouTube.

Here are the following results of my research which confirms that centipedes are the kings and queens of the insects:

Giant Centipede versus Giant Tarantula

If a giant centipede goes against a giant tarantula, who do you think is going to win?

First, let's discuss both qualities of the two predators regarding on how they attack and defend themselves. Through their attacks and defensive mechanisms, we can derive our speculation on who will gain the glory of supremacy against one another.

The Giant Centipede

Giant Centipede Attacking Mechanism

Common to all kinds or species of centipedes are their fearsome "poison claws". Scientists identified them as "toxicognaths" (which is like a pincer) located at the adjacent part of their head.

As compared to other venomous insects that stings, centipedes does not inject their poison but they do deliver it right into their victims through their bites. When a centipede is going to attack its prey, it will grab its target followed by a quick bite and at the same time releases its toxic venom. The poison will immediately take effect paralyzing the victim making it unable to move.

Giant Centipede Defensive Mechanism

No matter how fierce the centipedes as predators, they can also end up as prey against other more superior creatures in the forest. In order to defend themselves, centipedes has the ability to "camouflage" (conceal or hid themselves). But their most interesting defensive mechanism is that, if a tougher predator managed to grasp a centipede's leg, the centipede can actually drop or release its leg off from its body to flee itself.

The Giant Tarantula

A giant tarantula is a spider-specie that is feared by many individuals especially in the US. The size of this spider alone is very frightening and the threat of their bite to humans is also similar to the centipedes. Tarantulas also possess "neurotoxic venoms". According to some scientific studies, a tarantula's venom isn't good enough to kill humans or animals. In fact, there weren't any recorded incidents or verified cases of human death concerning about a tarantula bite.

Giant Tarantula Attacking Mechanism

A tarantula's main offensive weapon is its pair of fangs. The fangs posses muscular base that is attached from the head. It can be described as a "backward-pointing" fang in which the venom comes out (secreted from the glands inside the basal part).

When a giant tarantula attacks its prey, it will aggressively drive its fangs right into the body of its victim. At the same time, the venom is injected causing its prey to be completely paralyzed.

Giant Tarantula Defensive Mechanism

According to some scientific research, the hairs of a giant tarantula spider can penetrate through the soft skin tissues of your skin. This can result into "urtication" or "irritation".

Who do you think will win the match between a giant centipede against a giant tarantula?

Before you derive on your own conclusion, you may first want to watch this short video of an actual battle of the two competitors above.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qf8pAwGsuF4

Based from the video, the giant centipede easily preyed on the unsuspecting giant tarantula. The spider got bitten from behind (or ambushed) making it unable to fight back and defend itself. If it happens that the tarantula managed to avoid the centipede's sneaky attack, do you think that the spider have the chance of beating the centipede?

The answer is "No". If the tarantula will simply run away then it will have better chances of surviving but if not, the giant centipede can still take the spider down. It's because the giant centipede has tougher armor and equipped with more legs that can easily out-power the pitiful tarantula.

Giant Centipede versus Giant Hornet/Wasp

When a giant centipede will aggressively attack its prey, you will be surprised by its fast and very speedy crawling prowess. When you see one coming or charging towards you, you can actually outrun it provided that you are a good runner. But, not for the case of a flying giant hornet.

Giant hornets actually belong to the "Wasp" family. They are flying insects with large, fat rounded bodies and they do emit a noisier sound as compared to their ordinary species. The most fearsome about them is their powerful sting filled with high-volume of venom that they use as defensive mechanism.

Despite of the hornet's fearsome appearance and annoying vibrating sound, they are not aggressive to anyone. To tell you something interesting, there were already several stunts performed by different individuals allowing themselves to be crawled by a large number of hornets all over their bodies. As a result, no harm was done to them by this kind of friendly wasps.

Is the hornet venom dangerous to human?

Unfortunately, there were a few records of individuals who died from wasps sting. Most of these individuals were those with allergic-reaction to the flying insect's venom. Hornet's sting can be really painful where the damage or harm that it can bring to their human victim is comparable to the Yellow Jacket or Bee.

As mentioned above, hornets are not aggressive type of insects but they won't hesitate to attack anyone who are blocking their flight-path or moving rapidly towards their nests.

Common to all wasps, a hornet's stinging apparatus consists of a "sac" which contains the venom. Along with the sac is a sharp injection-tube which they use to penetrate their victim's flesh before extracting the venom in.

According to some scientists, a hornet's venom sac contains around 50 mg of venom. And when they do sting their prey, they usually inject about 10/15 mg of their venom which means that they can sting up to 3 to 5 five times before their sac of venom is emptied. Once their sac got completely depleted, it may take some time before it gets to be filled up again.

Here is an interesting video that I found about a giant centipede preying on a giant hornet:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qZZE_Trw5zE

Based on my observation, the battle between the giant centipede against the giant hornet was a "slaughter". If you are going to take a close look, you will realize that the two contenders were enclosed inside a glass-cage. With such battleground, the giant centipede surely does have the upper hand.

Hornets actually rely on their flying capability to hunt down their prey (usually by surprise). But with an enclosed environment, the hornet cannot barely fly around until it got tired and was caught by the giant centipede.

Giant Centipede versus Giant Scorpion

Scorpions are just like crabs where they posses two-large pincers which they use to grab and wrestle their prey. They also have eight pairs of legs which allow them to move quick enough to catch their food. However, the most dangerous part of a scorpion's attacking mechanism are their tails.

A scorpion's tail actually consists of several segments with an average length that ranges from 9 to 21 cm. At the end or tip of their tail is called the "stinger" or "telson". This stinger or telson is a very sharp needle in which they use to sting into their prey and at the same time, apply their venomous toxins.

Are scorpions dangerous to humans?

There is actually a very large number of scorpions belonging to different species. But, most of their species are harmless to both humans and animals. According to some researchers, they had an estimate of about 2000 species of scorpions that currently exists on this period of our time. In addition, there are only 25 to 40 unique species that has the capability to inject potent venom to kill their human or animal victims.

Here's a video owned by "Monster Bug Wars" where they had featured a fierce battle of survival between a giant centipede and a giant scorpion.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XE-LMPHR_TY

As shown on the video, the giant centipede was the aggressor. It keeps on attacking the scorpion that was simply waiting and trying to defend itself. At first, the giant centipede was having a hard time on its attempt to grab the giant scorpion. This was because of the scorpion's large and strong pincers that prevents the many-legged creature from getting close to it.

After several engagements, the centipede was finally able to grab the tail of the scorpion. It then bit off the scorpion's tail to disable it from delivering or injecting its poison.

With the scorpion's tail disabled, all it can do now was to rely on its pair of pincers. Unfortunately, the giant centipede has a bigger size body with more number of legs which makes it impossible for the scorpion to out-wrestle it. As a result, the scorpion was defeated.

Centipede versus Grasshopper Mouse

Normally, centipedes only prey on small sized insects such as bugs, spiders and cockroaches. Interestingly, giant centipedes can also hunt larger-sized prey such as the "Grasshopper Mouse".

National Geographic Channel have a wonderful discovery about the outcome of a giant centipede battling a grasshopper mouse. You can watch the video on the link provided below:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AOsmeOceOsg

As shown on the video, the giant centipede had aggressively invaded the mouse's nest without fear. Those new born babies of the mother grasshopper mouse can easily be devoured by the giant centipede.

An interesting fact about a grasshopper mouse (especially females or mothers) is that, they won't back out from any challenge that involves threat to their offspring. And the most interesting fact is that, the females are the main combatants while the male goes to hide.

Going back into the video, the mother mouse went to confront the giant centipede. Their battle involves lightning-reflexes that when one of them receives a "vital hit", surely the creature that got hit will be the end of it. Fortunately, the grasshopper mouse was able to pin and disable the giant centipede saving its young from the unwary predator.

Snake versus Giant Centipede

Snake do belong into the "reptilian" world of creatures (while centipedes into the world of insects), but do you know that some giant centipede can go over-board by also attacking snakes as their prey?

The majority of individuals claim that there is no way for a snake to fall as prey by any giant centipedes. It's because any snake can easily crush the centipede with their constricting-body (or inject their poisonous venom with their fangs). However, this was not the case from an interesting encounter between a giant centipede and snake in the plantation area in Penang, Malaysia.

Here's the video that went viral around the web which was about a giant centipede feeding on its snake prey:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ooFSFR2s7Ig

As shown on the video, you can see that the giant centipede had genuinely grabbed the lower-half portion of the snake's body. The snake seem to panicked probably it doesn't know what to do. Suddenly, the snake rolled and twisted around showing some kind of painful struggle. At this point, the giant centipede had actually embedded its fangs deep into the snake's flesh.

After a few more minutes, the centipede's venom finally took effect where the snake can no longer move.

Giant Centipede versus a Young Viper Snake

In the Island of Macedonia, Golem Grad which is also known as "Snake Island", a group of scientists were surprised on what they had found on their exploration around the island. They had surprising encountered a young dead viper snake with a head and nose of a giant centipede sticking out from its stomach.

The scientists took both of the creatures in an attempt to solve the mystery. To find out the answer, they had dissected the snake's body to take the centipede out.

According to the scientists' speculations, both creatures had a duel and at some point, the viper managed to devour the centipede as a whole but still remained alive. Since the giant centipede was still alive, it chewed and ate the inside tissues of the snake. This was due to the findings of the scientists that the internal organs of the snake got dissolved and what only remains were the snake's stomach-wall. As a result, the snake died while the giant centipede died from suffocation or got poisoned by the snake's deadly venom.

The young snake viper measures exactly 20 centipedes in length while the giant centipede was about 16 centimeters. Thus, their difference in length is only 4 centimeters.

Overall, wild or giant centipedes have proven that they are indeed at the top of the food-chain specifically in the world of small creatures.