Natures Wonders - Amma Centipede

And now a Nature Channel moment: After taking a tarp off a pile of potting soil today, we discovered this colorful ball. It was a female centipede in incubation mode.

Centipedes are normally cause for a bit of horror and a flurry to get away from them. Their bite is painful and the venom they inject can cause a lot of trouble at the injection site.

But today Amma Centipede is cause for wonderment at nature marvels. This awesome bizarre beauty (to us, not to her...) wraps herself around her eggs to protect her yet-to-be-born young.

Alarmed, she turned on her side. We can see the golden eggs she has her hundred (almost) legs wrapped around. Just below the pincer/antenna like appendages on the right are the "forcipules," the business end which can deliver the very painful sting. But we were no threat and moved her (with a shovel) to a safe place to continue incubating her eggs.