25-1-2016 JURONG, SINGAPORE - PARADOXICAL KEELED MILLIPEDE (Anoplodesmus saussurii)

Anoplodesmus saussurii is a species of millipedes in the family Paradoxosomatidae. It was once thought endemic to Sri Lanka, but it was later found in Fiji and Mauritius.

It is about 21–33 mm in length. Adults are shiny dark brown to black in color. They are much largely aggregated species that can be found undercover of decaying litter layers in the agricultural and horticultural land areas and forests on humid soils. Mainly herbivores, they are known to eat any decaying and rotting leaves and vegetable parts, and even wood, decaying fish, and cow dung. After 20 to 25 days of copulation, female laid 200 to 400 eggs in earthen nests. One female may lay 2 to 4 times of egg masses in her lifetime. After seven moultings, stadia come out to surface after the onset of the rainy season.

Millipedes have two pairs of legs in each segment of their body, whereas centipedes have a pair per segment. That’s how you identify these harmless leaf litter-eating creatures from their more irritating family members. This yellow-striped dark leaf-mulcher, the Anoplodesmus saussurii, is a very efficient converter of leaf to soil, common across the tropics (being reported from Madagascar, Fiji, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam, the Philippines, Brazil, USA, Martinique), and is said to have an Indian or Sri Lankan origin. Based on colour, it is sometimes mis-identified as the Harpaphe haydeniana, (which is found only in the Pacific coastal region of North America, from Alaska to California) or the Orthomorpha Weberi (which is rare, and has been found only in Bogor, in Java).

Darwin’s last work was his study of the transformation of a landscape by the action of earthworms. This was the founding study of what is now called bioturbation, the perturbing of soils by biological action. Mulching and home recycling of food waste uses earthworms, but gardens with their leaf litter, so useless to most animals, are turned over by millipedes. That’s why these yellow-striped dark leaf-mulchers are so common around gardens and urban areas, as well as in undisturbed ground. They are said to be extremely efficient at breaking down the detritus and recycling it into soil.