326 million years ago, there were centipedes the size of a car.

Many people are afraid of insects and spiders - when looking at these creatures it seems that they can crawl into their ears and other places to lay eggs there. They cause special fear centipedeswho have a vile-looking shiny bodyand fast moving limbs. It's good that we do not live in the Carboniferous period, in a time when dinosaurs did not exist. Because during this period of Earth's history, there were centipedes the length of a whole car. They weighed up to 50 kilograms and could well be predatory animals. In 2018, scientists found a fossil of the largest centipede in the world and, thanks to an unexpected find, learned a lot about this subclass of invertebrates. They also put forward several explanations for why these creatures grew to such an impressive size.

Arthropleura centipede fossil found in England - largest in Earth history

The largest centipede in history

According to the scientific publication Science Alert,the discovery was accidentally made in the county of Northumberland (England). According to one of the authors of the scientific work, Neil Davies (Neil Davies), the centipede fossil of the extinct species Arthropleura was discovered thanks to a lucky coincidence. While walking around the grounds, one of the graduate students at Cambridge University noticed a boulder that fell and split in two. On it one could discern the imprint of the body of an ancient creature with a huge number of limbs. To study it thoroughly, the stone had to be moved - it was so huge that it took 4 people to do this.

Body print of the largest centipede in the world

According to the calculations of the researchers, the age of the fossilis about 326 million years old. The length of the print did not exceed 75 centimeters, but the structure of the body indicated that the torso of the ancient centipede extended by as much as 2.7 meters - according to this indicator, it can be compared with a modern car. The body weight could be 50 kilograms, so it would be difficult for a person to lift this vile creature into the air, especially given the large number of actively moving legs.

Arthropleura centipedes were as long as a man or more

Scientists have discovered fossils beforecentipedes of the Arthropleura species. For example, two such finds were made in Germany, but the individuals found there were clearly smaller in size. Fossil features indicated that centipedes lived in coal swamps. Such areas attracted them with an abundance of nutrients.

See also: A new species of centipedes has been discovered in Japan that can attack animals

Why were ancient animals large?

But why were the specimens found in England sobig? Today, they definitely cannot grow to such an impressive size due to the limited amount of oxygen in the air - there must be a lot of this chemical element to feed such large organisms. However, in the Carboniferous period, the level of oxygen concentration in the atmosphere was only 23%. Today this figure is 21%, that is, the difference was not very large. This means that the increased concentration of oxygen in the atmosphere could not be the only reason that allowed arthropods to reach such incredible sizes.

The body width of the centipedes was about 50 centimeters.

Most likely, centipede growth is the mostcontributed to the abundance of nutrients in the environment and the absence of threatening predators. It is possible that ancient centipedes were predatory creatures like centipedes.

Although we may not know exactly what they ate during thosetimes (Carboniferous period) there were many nutritious nuts and seeds in the leaf litter. They may have been predators that fed on other invertebrates and small vertebrates such as amphibians, noted Neil Davis.

Huge centipedes disappeared from the face of our planetin the Permian period, between 299–252 million years ago. The exact reason for their mass death is unknown to scientists - perhaps they were ousted by other animals. New fossils of the Arthropleura centipede will help fill this knowledge gap. At the moment, scientists have not been able to find the imprint of the head of the giant creature, but it is she who can tell the maximum of interesting information. Scientists continue their search, but their work may not bring results - centipedes have very soft bodies and quickly decompose.

Arthropleura giant centipede video

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So, the largest centipede in the history of the Earthfound, but this species is already extinct. But the creatures with the largest number of legs are still alive - these are the centipedes of the Eumillipes persephone species, which have 1306 limbs. You can read more about them on our website.