154 Second Report on Economic Zoology . 
Four different species of Gamasidte were found belonging to four 
distinct genera. 
Mr. Albert Michael says that they not only do no harm but are 
beneficial, as they destroy other mites and insects. 
They are all found either on the ground, in damp places, or 
parasitic on some animal or bird. 
Millipedes and Centipedes. 
The following notes on Millipedes and Centipedes have been 
prepared for the Board* : — 
Millipedes and Centipedes belong to a group of the animal 
kingdom known as the Myriopoda. These animals are known 
by their having legs on every ring or segment of the body. In 
the Millipedes there are two pairs of legs to each segment, in the 
Centipedes one pair only. These differences are important to notice, 
as the Millipedes are injurious and the Centipedes are beneficial to 
the agriculturalist and horticulturalist. 
They are found in all manner of places, both in the field and in 
the garden, and are especially attracted by decaying vegetation, such 
as heaps of leaf-mould, rotting stalks, etc. They are also found 
crawling about under the bark of trees and in the soil. The 
difference in structure is also accompanied by a difference in habits, 
for Centipedes are very active and carnivorous. Millipedes are 
mostly herbivorous, living also upon sound and decaying vegetable 
matter. The bite of some Centipedes in the tropics is very poisonous 
to man, but none are so in this country. Millipedes are very often 
known as “ false wire worm/' but can easily be told from true wire- 
worm by the great number of legs the former have. The Millipedes 
have the mouth formed for chewing, there being two powerful biting 
mandibles with which they devour the roots of plants. Centipedes 
are provided with poison-claws. 
The life-history of the Snake Millipede (Julus terrestris ) is as 
follows : The female deposits her eggs from May to July in a nest 
made of pieces of earth fastened together with saliva, rounded in 
form, and with a small hole at the top through which the eggs are 
dropped. The eggs vary in number from sixty to a hundred. The 
hole is stopped up, and they mature in ten to fourteen days. The 
young Millipedes have only three pairs of legs. The other legs 
appear in groups by degrees. 
* These notes have appeared as Leaflet No. 94 of the Board of Agriculture, 
