#apheloria

[onenicebugperday]

I am visiting my sister in North Carolina, USA, and spotted this cutie pie on my morning walk. Any idea what it is? Thanks so much!

A very lovely flat-backed millipede! Probably Apheloria sp.

[herpsandbirds]

Black-and-gold Flat Millipede (Apheloria virginiensis), family Xystodesmidae, eastern U.S.

Poisonous.

photograph by Erin Huggins/USFWS

[continent-of-wild-endeavor]

It is also poison millipede season! I'm seeing them everywhere in the past week or two. So I'm back on my thinking about species/subspecies and dorsal spot variation in these Apheloria tigana around here. This one has no dorsal spots at all, neither on the first segment nor the last few, as are common/normal for the species.

[herpsandbirds]

Found this guy in SW Pennsylvania, near Dunbar, not sure who he is:

Millipede Friend

I believe it is most like the common...

Black-and-gold Flatback Millipede (Apheloria virginiensis), family Xystodesmidae

[continent-of-wild-endeavor]

Here are some with more spots. The bottom two pics show what's described as typical: dorsal spots on the last 3-5 segments. But they're not real clear/bright. The top two pics show one that has faint spots going most of the way up the back, in addition to the standard brighter spots at the end. I'm sorry I didn't get better pictures, including the front end of that one. It was hiding in the leaves and shaking its rear at me, so I left it alone.

I've also seen ones with clear yellow spots on every segment, which appear to be an undescribed Apheloria species that's been noted as existing south of the Cape Fear River. I am north of that river, but it always I'm not the only one who's seen them up here: https://bugguide.net/node/view/1218625/bgimage

So this one with more-than-normal spots (but not clear, and maybe not every segment) could be normal variation within the A. tigana species, or mixing between the species.

[saritawolf]

Black-and-gold Flat Millipede (Apheloria virginiensis) - (c) SaritaWolf - please do not repost

[pinkjacket110]

aposematic

[continent-of-wild-endeavor]

My favorite millipedes are out again!