# Giant Bugs! **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [April 16, 2005, 3:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giant-bugs/299597 "2005-04-16T03:42:48Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2005, 3:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giant-bugs/299597/1 "2005-04-16T03:42:48Z")
Unfortunately I can’t find an online cite for what these are and who made 'em, but it’s a fullsize model of giant centipede based on fossils recently discovered. But you can see screen caps of it [here](http://usera.imagecave.com/tuckerfan/bug1.jpg), [here](http://usera.imagecave.com/tuckerfan/bug2.jpg), [here](http://usera.imagecave.com/tuckerfan/bug3.jpg), and [here.](http://usera.imagecave.com/tuckerfan/bug4.jpg) Good thing they’re extinct! (Feel free to forward those things on to people you want give nightmares to. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2005, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giant-bugs/299597/2 "2005-04-16T03:54:26Z")
Plugging “giant centipede” into Google news: Ah, here we go: [http://www.abqtrib.com/albq/nw\_science/article/0,2668,ALBQ\_21236\_3699656,00.html](http://www.abqtrib.com/albq/nw_science/article/0,2668,ALBQ_21236_3699656,00.html) > [@](#): > > Spectacular specimen > This bug’s a big one - 8 feet long - and New Mexico scientists nabbed some of its fossils > > By Sue Vorenberg > Tribune Reporter > April 14, 2005 > > Think mosquitoes and millipedes are nasty? > > Then don’t look too deeply into New Mexico’s past. > > Today, you can squish the tiny bugs, but 300 million years ago, 8-foot-long millipedes were in control of the landscape, and humans weren’t even a gleam in evolution’s eye. > > New Mexico is now a world record holder of such “exquisitely grotesque creatures,” as one worker at the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science calls them. Evidence of the largest arthropleura - its technical name - ever found was recovered by the museum on Friday. > > “In today’s world, you couldn’t have a bug this big,” said Spencer Lucas, paleontology curator at the museum. “This is basically the Tyrannosaurus of the Pennsylvanian period, millions of years before dinosaurs evolved. If you took a time machine back, you’d definitely want to check your sleeping bag for these suckers before getting in.” > > The Pennsylvanian time period lasted from 325 to 280 million years ago. > > The museum has not found the bug itself. What it did find in a remote canyon near Española were the fossilized tracks of such a creature - which looks like a 3-by-8 speed bump with flat wings holding hundreds of nasty, ribbed, horseshoe-shaped feet. > > “This is a very spectacular thing,” said Adrian Hunt, director of the museum, who went out in the field with the team to recover it. “Think of it as a much bigger cross between a millipede and a centipede. It probably lived in swampy forest debris. Something like this has never been found before in the Western United States.” ---
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2005, 3:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giant-bugs/299597/3 "2005-04-16T03:58:46Z")
You know, I tried that and got squat. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2005, 3:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giant-bugs/299597/4 "2005-04-16T03:59:13Z")
You can bet Hollywood will soon announce a new horror movie: ONE HUNDRED-LEGGED FREAKS!!! ---
**Author:** ![zagloba](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/977dab/32.png) [@zagloba](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zagloba)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2005, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giant-bugs/299597/5 "2005-04-16T13:42:17Z")
Rats. I’d hoped this was about the introduction of triple-sized VWs! ---
**Author:** ![Ale](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f19dbf/32.png) [@Ale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ale)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2005, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giant-bugs/299597/6 "2005-04-16T15:14:18Z")
I´ve had cockroaches about that size on my kitchen… ---
**Author:** ![Lissla\_Lissar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8491ac/32.png) [@Lissla\_Lissar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lissla_Lissar)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2005, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giant-bugs/299597/7 "2005-04-16T15:34:21Z")
Have I mentioned recently how much I hate centipedes? ---
**Author:** ![Darwins\_Finch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darwins_finch/32/20304_2.png) [@Darwins\_Finch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darwins_Finch)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2005, 3:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giant-bugs/299597/8 "2005-04-16T15:54:48Z")
> [@Tuckerfan](#): > > Unfortunately I can’t find an online cite for what these are and who made 'em, but it’s a fullsize model of giant centipede based on fossils recently discovered. To be specific, what was discovered were _ichnofossils_ (aka “trace fossils” - evidence of a creature, but not remains of the creature itself. In this case, the ichnofossils were trackways). The abstract for the paper in which these trackways were described is online [here](http://gsa.confex.com/gsa/2004AM/finalprogram/abstract_76052.htm). From the trackways, the size of the critter was inferred. Note that the _trackway_ has been given the name _Diplichnites cuithensis_ (the “-ichnites” part of the generic name indicates that it is the name of an ichnofossil), while the creature that made the trackway is _Arthropleura_. This find is important because, as mentioned in the article linked to by **GIGObuster** , these critters had not previously been known in the U.S. Although I really wish the association with _Tyrannosaurus_ would be dropped; it’s a dumb analogy. For one thing, it is unknown whether this thing ate plants or was a predator. For another, _Tyrannosaurus_ wasn’t the largest predatory dinosaur ever, and possibly not even the largest of its time.