Clown isopod
The clown isopod is a woodlouse with a costume. Its greyish brown back has rows of bright spots that can be white, yellow or red. It lives on the sunny coast of the Adriatic Sea and hides under stones.
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Fun facts
Its spots copy the red marks of a venomous spider, so hungry animals think twice before eating it. This trick is called mimicry.
It grows up to about 2 centimetres long, a little bigger than the common pill woodlouse.
It has three rows of pale dots on its back, and as it gets older the middle row turns yellow.
It is quite rare in the wild, but bug fans keep it as a pet.
Most asked questions about Clown isopod
?Is the clown isopod dangerous?
No. It only looks like a dangerous spider. It is a harmless woodlouse.
?How big is a clown isopod?
Up to about 2 centimetres long, which is big for a woodlouse.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Armadillidium klugii
- Group
- Woodlice
- Family
- Armadillidiidae
- Classification
- Malacostraca > Isopoda > Armadillidiidae
- Lives on
- Europe
Where the facts come from
- Armadillidium klugii (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
- Picture by Pasztilla aka Attila Terbócs. CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons. The sticker of this bug is drawn from this picture.
If we got something wrong, sorry, we are bug fans, not a science journal. Tell us at [email protected] and we will fix it.
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