Centipede stories

[Glen Miyashiro]

The centipede we see in Hawai‘i is called the Vietnamese Centipede (http://www.petbugs.com/caresheets/S-subspinipes.html) (Scolopendra subspinipes). It isn't the biggest in the world -- that prize goes to this South American species (http://news.yahoo.com/photo/050831/481/lon80608311303) -- but it's big enough, thank you very much.

As a Boy Scout I used to run into these guys when camping at Bellows under the ironwood trees. They love the ground cover provided by all those fallen ironwood needles. We'd be taking down our tents at the end of the weekend, and garans we'd find at least one snuggled underneath our ground cloths. Yipes! I tried stepping on one once, but forgot that I was wearing slippers not shoes. My slipper caught it halfway down its length, and the thing whipped its front section around trying to get at my bare foot. Good thing it was a thick kamaboko slipper, not the cheap thin kind! Boy, that was one good adrenaline rush. :D

[scrivener]

Oh, I have a bunch of these, but here's my favorite:

When I was in sixth grade, I was in the parks and rec summer fun program at Honowai Elementary. As many of you know, one of the highlights of summer fun is the annual camping trip to Kualoa. We had an archery activity that year, and the archery range was down the road a hike from the campground. I'm not exactly sure where it was, but I believe it was toward the base of the mountain.

Anyway, we had a lot of hanging out time for some reason -- perhaps the archery range wasn't ready or something -- and we were in this grove of young trees arranged in long, neat rows. Hundreds of yards of plastic sheeting had been laid down and covered with soil, and the trees were growing up through the plastic, each tree slender and about fifteen feet high. Grass had grown in the soil atop the sheets of plastic, but the edges of the plastic stuck up here and there through the young grass.

Someone grabbed one of these edges and gave a little yank. The grass came up, and beneath the sheet were at least a dozen centipedes, none of whom was very happy.

"Centipede!" came the cry, and as the freaky creatures came swarming from beneath the plastic, some of the braver boys grabbed long, thin branches from the trees and whipped down upon the centipedes in an effort to cut them in half (which is the fastest way to kill them, by the way). Soon, there must have been twenty or thirty boys, each armed with a thin tree branch, yanking up plastic, hollering, and whipping centipedes to death in what can only be called pure bloodlust. Those of us who were less brave got close enough to see the action, but kept far enough away to avoid any centipedes who made it through the gauntlet. I don't think it would be a stretch to say that we killed a hundred of them before our leaders made us drop the sticks and head back to the campground.

That still gives me the serious oojies, I tell you. All those angry centipedes running toward us only to be mowed down. *shudder*

[lavagal]

When I first started working over here at Oceanic Institute next to Sea Life Park back in February, there was one particular day that was very rainy. Some of these buildings are like houses with open lanais, etc. So out of the rain and onto the lanai comes this centipede, about 6-8 inches long, nothing spectacular. I kinda got close and was checking it out as I find them a bit fascinating. It was looking back, lifting its head.
Then out comes the secretary, an older gal, pretty much the matriarch of the place. Off comes her slipper and man she whacked that centipede like you wouldn't believe. I was astonished at the energy she put into it. I mean, she must really HATE centipedes! I walked away from that experience with a whole new perspective on the sweet woman who runs the place and how I hope I never piss her off.

[kimo55]

Off comes her slipper and man she whacked that centipede like you wouldn't believe. I was astonished at the energy she put into it. I mean, she must really HATE centipedes! I walked away from that experience with a whole new perspective on the sweet woman who runs the place and how I hope I never piss her off.


that's the minimal energy needed. Those things are tough! You can't spray em with raid or anything. they just look up at ya and give ya the finger and walk away.
I use channel lock pliers. and squish em to death. each section. cuz ya never know if it's like a lizard's tail;' da buggah grow back anodda head or whatevah and come back next week and getcha!

[Glen Miyashiro]

Let's not forget cezanne's centipede story from the Cane Spider thread (http://www.hawaiithreads.com/showthread.php?t=5534).

[LikaNui]

It isn't the biggest in the world -- that prize goes to this South American species (http://news.yahoo.com/photo/050831/481/lon80608311303) Oh... my... GAWD!
(swoon)
:eek:

[AbsolutChaos]

Our kittens love to "play with them" and bite their heads off. We're constantly finding beheaded insects all over the house. Obviously we'd prefer the kitties not to play with centipedes, but living on the Windward side makes that near impossible.

[lavagal]

Let's not forget cezanne's centipede story from the Cane Spider thread (http://www.hawaiithreads.com/showthread.php?t=5534).
Wow! Quite a thread! I especially like Eric's post about how when his dad was a small kid they'd tear off the centipedes' antenae and let them run up and down their arms. Like you need to do that to get chicken skin around here!

[Albert]

My policy with insects is, stay off my body and I'll leave you alone. But after a night when I suffered two really nasty centipede attacks, if I see one of the things anywhere, I stomp it, grind it into the sidewalk.

[Glen Miyashiro]

Albert, I've never been bitten by a centipede but a friend told me that they're more sore than bee stings. True?

[kimo55]

bee sting. wasp sting. scorpion sting. centipede sting. they ALL feel different from one another. Bumblebee sting, manini. goes away half hour.
Does not compare.

[Eric]

Wow! Quite a thread! I especially like Eric's post about how when his dad was a small kid they'd tear off the centipedes' antenae and let them run up and down their arms. Like you need to do that to get chicken skin around here!When you look at him now, my dad is such a quiet, friendly, easy-going guy. It's hard for me to imagine him doing such cruel things. But I guess there wasn't much for kids to do back then on the plantation.

[kupomog]

Only time I had to deal with a centipede was a few years ago during summer school. I was at the bus stop by Aala park, that big Tong Fat building. I was sitting on the bench waiting for the bus and I guess there was a baby centipede around. I got on the bus, sat down, put my backpack on my lap, and saw the centipede crawling around on top of it. So I jumped up and ran to the backdoor while the bus was moving and knocked it off. It felt out of the bus through a little space between the door and the stair...I felt kind of bad for it after.

Other than that, I rarely see them. I might find a dead one in our backyard once every 6 months or so. My brother had one sting him in his room a long, long time ago but I don't remember it.

[Fondoo2]

my wife mentioned the centipede thing but I didn't give it alot of thought because she's so twitchy around our very very small ants but after seeing a picture of a centipede in the bathtub on the cane spider thread I must say GEEEEEZ those things are Big!!
So they have large pinchers for defense/cutting food but no venum?I am imagening very big strong painfull pinchers /shivers

In southern cali we have alot of Black Widow spiders but they keep to themselves but are pretty toxic,one day when I was a kid I had a yard cleaning job for a nieghbor,he asked me to tear apart this small tool chack is was about 6 feet high and only a few feet wide,just big enough to store some rakes and such.Well I decided to flip it over to the center of the yard to have more room to break it up so I nocked it down and when I picked up the bottom to give it a flip I was face to face with about twenty of the biggest black widows all with huge egg sacks eeek I dropped that sucker and ran for the raid!

[Glen Miyashiro]

Oh no, they have venom, too. Here's a sketch of a centipede head, from the bottom. See the fangs?

http://www.aragonesasi.com/natural/fauna/escalope.jpg

We also have black widow spiders.

[Fondoo2]

Eek!!!!!!!! Maybe he will be my friend? :confused:

[kimo55]

with friends like that, who needs antennaes?

[helen]

Kauai is known for it's centipedes, there are pretty big there, at least during the 60 and 70's. I suspect that the chickens maybe eating them.

[kimo55]

eeeewww! dunno if i want those eggs!

[EastCoastTropics]

The centipede we see in Hawai‘i is called the Vietnamese Centipede (http://www.petbugs.com/caresheets/S-subspinipes.html) (Scolopendra subspinipes). It isn't the biggest in the world -- that prize goes to this South American species (http://news.yahoo.com/photo/050831/481/lon80608311303) -- but it's big enough, thank you very much.


Eeeewwww! I hate centipedes with a passion!! When I was high school age kine, I was awakened in the middle of the night.....my foot was sore and I knew that I was bitten but had no idea it was by a centipede. I took a look at the bottom of my foot and there were two small red dots. Then out of the corner of my eye I spotted it! It was a 6 inch long, half-ingh wide centipede, and he was trying to make his getaway! I quickly went to wake my parents. At first they didn't believe me...hey, it was 2:30 in the morning! But after showing them the bite marks and telling them how big the sucker was, they got out of bed. It took my dad about 20 minutes to get it. The centipede crawled under the carpet but after much pounding by my dad, it came out and my dad smashed it! Centipede bites hurt!!!

[Albert]

"Albert, I've never been bitten by a centipede but a friend told me that they're more sore than bee stings. True?"

Definitely true. A bee sting hurts like hell for maybe half an hour but then goes away with no trace. A major centipede attack is swollen, itchy and uncomfortable for days.

[helen]

eeeewww! dunno if i want those eggs!
I assume people on Kauai don't eat feral chicken eggs and beside those eggs would contain chicks ready to be hatched anyway.

[Glen Miyashiro]

I assume people on Kauai don't eat feral chicken eggs and beside those eggs would contain chicks ready to be hatched anyway.And there are lots of Filipinos on Kaua‘i last time I checked. Balut, anybody? :D

[helen]

I had the impression Balut was duck eggs.

[cezanne]

In early '90s, my wife used to volunteer as a camp counselor during the summer. I would drop her off at the Kualoa Beach Park campgrounds for her 3-night stays. Anyway, one time on our way, we were talking about centipedes and how she saw one the week before having never seen one before growing up in Florida. So I'm telling her about how we always find them while camping and stuff...

Well, we get to the campsite and we kiss and say our goodbyes when I feel something bite the heel of my foot. I'm like "Ow!" and lift my foot up to see what was up... and there's this thing still biting me and dangling and wiggling! I'm freaking out yelling "CENTIPEDE!"... I'm trying to shake it off and my wife runs out of the truck and its still rolling lol! I almost roll into a concrete piling before I stepped on the brakes with my left foot. Man, turns out that it was one of my homemade barracuda fishing lures that I left on the floorboard (the fishermen out there know what I'm talking about: a piece of 6-inch long surgical tubing with a flexible wire leader inside and on the end a 3 pronged hook).

My wife was screaming and her co-workers ran over to see what was up. I was so embarrassed, I had to act like I was just pulling a prank on my wife... but I really freaked lol.

[TurquoiseDuck]

I had the impression Balut was duck eggs.


Balut can be either chicken or duck eggs. I have eaten the chicken egg ones on Kauai.

Da Duck

*no can eat any kind duck eggs, could be one of my relatives* :rolleyes:

[Glen Miyashiro]

This centipede video isn't from Hawai'i, but what the hell. It's pretty creepy regardless. I am not sure how big this particular bug is, but it can catch and kill a bat in midflight. :eek: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mJiHDqE7cbo

[manoasurfer123]

I think this should be moved to the you gotta see this video web find...

that's one scary centipede! :eek:

[LikaNui]

13" long... OH... MY...GAWD!!!
:eek:

[cezanne]

It always amazes me... the videography (is that a word?) on those nature shows. You know how we saw the one where the centipede kills and eats he mouse? There's another one where a mouse kills the centipede to protect her babies... yay mouse!

[timkona]

Okay men. I got the best story of all.

I was asleep late at night. Rolled over. WHAM ! Got bit in the sack. Right between the legs. You talk about ouch. Was one of those little blue suckers too.

I jumped out of bed, screaming like a sissie, and my wife says I did this crazy ass dance while jumping and spinning in circles, bent over looking like Kokopele, trying to play his flute. Yeah, real funny now.

[mamapuleta]

Ha ha ha.... tooo funny!

:D

[Smudge]

OK.....suddenly them flyin roaches I been worryin about don't seem quite so scary :eek:

Luv Smudge

[Glen Miyashiro]

I did this crazy ass dance while jumping and spinning in circles, bent over looking like Kokopele, trying to play his flute.There you go. A flute needs a lot of holes along its length. The centipede was just trying to help you poke some holes in your flute. :D

[Paul]

I've never been bit by a centipede but I'm very very paranoid about it after hearing so many horror stories of how painful it is. Any kind of crawling sensation I get on my body immediately triggers a response because I think it's a centipede. A few years ago I was on my computer when I felt something crawling on my leg. What I saw when I looked down made me jump out of my chair. It was an 8 inch centipede. I killed it with a metal rod I had. The next night I was telling a friend what happened when he looked at the wall and said "is that the centipede you killed?" It was a different one but just as big. I also killed this one after expressing my surprise. The next night, guess what happened? Another encounter. This same friend and I were watching TV when one comes crawling across the room headed straight for me. My friend saw it and promptly stomped on it. Good thing he was wearing shoes in the house.

After these three incidents all in a row I became very afraid of them. I thought I was living in a centipede infested area but that's I'll I've seen of them so far in my house. Well I did see a tiny baby one a few weeks ago but I just squished it with my fingers.

[LikaNui]

I did see a tiny baby one a few weeks ago but I just squished it with my fingers. You sure it was a centipede and not a harmless millipede?
(Not to be confused with Milli Vanilli. :p )

[Paul]

You sure it was a centipede and not a harmless millipede?
(Not to be confused with Milli Vanilli. :p )

No it was a centipede. My place has millipedes too. Fat red ones but they don't bother me.

[kaneohegirl]

hey how about taking a shower an feeling 2 somethings hit your back... an look down an get centipedes crawling around your feet.... ohhh an den a 3 walking along da top of the shower head..... not a good thing when you one small keed

I have had a paranoia of things coming out of showers ever since...

[mamapuleta]

Okay you guys, you know how sometimes you feel like 'what da hell's da use?' Well I was feelin more and more like dat da las couple years, so I knew when I came across dis site I should inject myself wit some terapy and sign up, so I did and yup I was right! I'm beginnin to lighten up already jus hangin out wit you guys, and now wit the senapee stories, I even feel da old curiousity/heebegeebee, oooooo, youngish kinda emotions comin back....and I just gotta chuckle, ben my right leg back, kick my fat ass, pick it up again and get back out there...tanks evrybody!!! (Man, writing pidgin is hard)

[Samurai123]

Last summer I hear by neighbor screaming and I go outside to check it out and he has this big butane tourch going and he is full on roasting a pretty big centipede. After he roasted the thing he impaled it on one of those bamboo BBQ skewers, then stuck the skewer in the ground leaving the centipede dangling in the air as a "warning" to other centipedes who dare come onto his property. Looked like something out of an Attila the Hun movie.

[craigwatanabe]

man just this morning I woke up, went to the bathroom and when I came back there was this baby centipede (usually the most painful) right where my head was not more than a minute ago crawling around.

My wife slammed it with a broom and separated half of it's legs from it's body. All of the severed legs were twitching! Okay what a way to get up!

[shaveice]

ha! ha! wooo hooo!!! man, that's such a funny story! thanks for making my day!



In early '90s, my wife used to volunteer as a camp counselor during the summer. I would drop her off at the Kualoa Beach Park campgrounds for her 3-night stays. Anyway, one time on our way, we were talking about centipedes and how she saw one the week before having never seen one before growing up in Florida. So I'm telling her about how we always find them while camping and stuff...

Well, we get to the campsite and we kiss and say our goodbyes when I feel something bite the heel of my foot. I'm like "Ow!" and lift my foot up to see what was up... and there's this thing still biting me and dangling and wiggling! I'm freaking out yelling "CENTIPEDE!"... I'm trying to shake it off and my wife runs out of the truck and its still rolling lol! I almost roll into a concrete piling before I stepped on the brakes with my left foot. Man, turns out that it was one of my homemade barracuda fishing lures that I left on the floorboard (the fishermen out there know what I'm talking about: a piece of 6-inch long surgical tubing with a flexible wire leader inside and on the end a 3 pronged hook).

My wife was screaming and her co-workers ran over to see what was up. I was so embarrassed, I had to act like I was just pulling a prank on my wife... but I really freaked lol.