A Millipede that has only been observed 2 times in the past, has been found in South Wales.
The rare bug was found by a group of children on a bug hunt the night before Halloween in Craig Gwladus Country Park. It has since been identified as the Turdulisoma cf turdulorum millipede, so rare it is only the third known site where it has been found.
The Millipede pictured above.
Since then, it has been confirmed as a new species by Dr Jörg Spelda at the Bavarian State Collection of Zoology in Germany.
The bug has only ever been found in South Wales, with the Craig Gwladus discovery uncovered among leaf litter and under old wood along the former Gelliau Colliery Tramroad at the park.
Expects cannot agree on why the bug is so “rare.” Some suggest that it was brought over here by travellers, and others suggest that it has always been in South Wales, but “so few people record invertebrates in south Wales” says scientist Liam Olds, that it may have just been overlooked this whole time.
He is from the Welsh buglife conservation group, and he added that “Discoveries such as this highlight the importance of such sites and why they need to be conserved.”
