Art, Nature, & Living

Cyanide Millipede
© Lawrence Duncan

Here in the lush temperate rain forests of the Pacific Northwest there lives a small little creature known as the cyanide millipede, also referred to as Harpaphe haydeniana. Without a bone in its entire body, this little critter grows to about two inches long and will live for only about two or three years.

But don’t let the small size of H. haydeniana fool you: of all the creatures in the forest, from the ferns, flowers, and trees, to the birds, bears, and cougars, the cyanide millipede is one of the absolutely most influential creatures in the entire ecosystem. Without it, the forest would be a very different place indeed.

The cyanide millipede plays its role as the principal “shredder” of the forest, chewing up leaf litter and other plant parts that fall from the canopy above. This may sound like a pretty lowly task, but the effects of this shredding are truly profound.

The vast majority of minerals and nutrients that forest species require to live are found in the living creatures themselves. And so when a tree dies or loses its leaves, or a flower has finished flowering, the essential nutrients that it holds are bound within its parts that will become detritus on the forest floor.

Enter our friend the cyanide millipede: It has been estimated that more than 50% of all leaf litter passes through the guts of this humble little creature. And in so doing, the nutrients available to other creatures in the forest are increased by about 40,000 times!

It’s this kind of “recycling” that allows the forest to continue to rebuild itself, freeing minerals and nutrients to percolate through its complex systems, from one creature to the next, to the next, until finally the cycle is started all over again.

Next time you see a gargantuan 300 foot tall Douglas fir tree that has been alive for perhaps 1,000 years, remember also the millipede. It is thanks to this little two inch long fellow, crawling around on the forest floor and chewing on dead leaves and twigs, that the forest as whole is the wonder that it is.

For art, nature, & living,
~ Obadiah Green

Further Reading:

Wikipedia: Harpaphe haydeniana
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harpaphe_haydeniana

Concepts in Ecosystem Management: Underground Ecosystems
http://www.fs.fed.us/r6/olympic/ecomgt/unecosys/undergrd.htm

Mostly Millipedes
http://www.humboldt.edu/~natmus/newsletter/Miriapoda/index.html

Species Harpaphe haydeniana – BugGuide.net
http://bugguide.net/node/view/15008

Forest Ecophysiology & Ecohydrology Telemetry Transect
http://oregonstate.edu/feel/