Giant centipedes appeared in the Carboniferous period, why were insects so large at that time?

Because the Carboniferous period is the era of the highest oxygen content in the air on the earth, the oxygen content of the air breathed by animals reached 35%, these insects can breathe oxygen directly through the tiny stomata on the body surface, and the high concentration of a large amount of oxygen supply enables these animals to grow to a larger size, so there are giant centipedes close to three meters long, giant dragonflies one meter long, etc.

Giant centipedes are one of the five poisons that are feared and hated by many people, although they are only a few centimeters long, and the largest is about 10 centimeters, but they can still make people's hearts hairy. If there is a giant centipede in nature, it is tantamount to a nightmare in people's lives, and it is also a thrilling plot that can only appear in commercial movies, but in the Carboniferous Period, which was known as the "Age of Giant Worms" more than 300 million years ago, there were actually many giant centipedes with a body length of nearly three meters on the earth, and this kind of monster in human imagination actually existed!

The largest centipede found on the earth is 30 centimeters long, known as the "giant centipede", but compared with the centipede of the Carboniferous period, it is a small thing, according to the fossils excavated by archaeologists, this centipede has a length of meters, a body width of half a meter, and it is a mutant monster in Hollywood blockbusters. However, this centipede is not actually a real centipede, but a terrestrial arthropod that is very close to the shape of the centipede, called the thorax thorax, the size of the thriath varies greatly, some of the thorax species are only a few centimeters long, and some can reach nearly three meters, which is the largest of the terrestrial arthropods that have ever appeared on the earth.

In addition to the warm and humid climate, plants and vegetation can provide enough food, the biggest reason is that the abnormally lush plants produced a large amount of oxygen through photosynthesis, making the oxygen concentration in the air the highest ever, and the insects were able to breathe oxygen directly through the interstitial holes in their bodies, so their body circulation and metabolism were enhanced, and their body size also increased.

Not all of them, are the ones that are reported to be large. High oxygen energy supports the largeness of animals, and the giant centipede evolved in the Carboniferous period, where oxygen concentrations are very high. Only if the environment allows it to provide feasibility for animal enlargement.

It was the need to survive, and it evolved into a huge body size. At that time, the living environment was relatively harsh, so it was impossible to survive without the huge size as a support, so this was the need for survival.

Because the earth was very rich in resources and high in oxygen during the Carboniferous period, the insects at that time were very large.

In addition to the giant insects on the earth during the Carboniferous period, there were also these amazing creatures!

1.Spinosaurus. I believe that friends who have watched "Jurassic Park 3" know that Spinosaurus is described as a super killer, which is a terrible name, and he has another name for "tyrant". Spinosaurus lived in Africa and was 18 meters long and weighed more than 10 tons. In terms of length, the Titan Python is long but slightly less weighty.

Which of them is stronger between the two, we may never know, so it can only be guessed.

2.Titan Python.

The Titan Python is certainly a terrifying presence in the history of the Earth. Compared to the Titan Python, the biggest snake in modern life is also just a petite one. Studies have shown that the length of the snake body of the titan python can reach 15 meters, which is equivalent to the 5th floor.

It is also 90 centimeters in diameter and is very thick. After the extinction of the dinosaurs, the Titan Python followed the law of the jungle and became the alternative ruler of the earth.

3.Megalodon.

The megalodon is one of the largest animals, and it is known from various film documentaries that it is considered the greatest creature in history. Scientists believe that the Megalodon in the Carboniferous season resembles a great white shark, but the size varies greatly. A great white shark is only meters, while a megalodon can grow up to 14 meters and weigh more than 40 tons!

4.Leeds fish.

Leeds is a prehistoric fish that lived hundreds of millions of years ago, i.e. they lived in the same period as the dinosaurs. Leeds fish may be the largest hard skeleton in history. If this is correct, it may be the largest fish on the planet.

So, how big is a leeds fish? Currently, scientists say it's only 10 meters long, and some say it can grow to meters in a 2013 study at the University of Glasgow. There are even rumors that they can grow up to 35 meters long, surpassing blue whales, but this number may be partially exaggerated.

5.Giant rhinoceros.

The giant rhinoceros is the largest land animal in history. Generally speaking, it can reach a height of meters at the shoulder and a body length of more than 8 meters, almost twice the length of a modern elephant. It also weighs a terrifying 20 tons, three times that of an elephant.

While there is no physical resemblance between the two, the giant rhinoceros and the modern rhinoceros do have a connection.

6.Aeolus pterosaur.

Aeolus pterosaur is the largest known flying animal, with the largest wingspan reaching meters. However, their bodies are light and weigh only 250 kilograms.

7.Ancient Blue Whale.

There is no doubt that the ancient blue whale was the largest animal in the Carboniferous Age, and there are clear differences among the ancient blue whale population, with the largest blue whale being 33 meters long and weighing 180 tons.

8.Fragile two-chambered dragon.

This is the creature most likely to surpass the size of a blue whale, but only one spine has been found so far. Its spine is 15 meters long, and if its shape is the same as the length of its spine, then it could reach a terrifying length of 58 meters and weigh up to 22 tons. Of course, this is just an assumption.

This is the introduction of the Carboniferous giant creatures here.

Titan pythons, giant rhinos, dragon whales, nautilus, etc., these creatures all exist, and there are many types of these creatures.

There are a lot of corals. Brachiopods. Shark. Bony fish. Ray-finned fish. Amniote. Slingshot taxa. In fact, the creatures of this period were very prosperous.

And dinosaurs. Dinosaurs were the largest creatures on Earth during the Carboniferous period, living in water and air, herbivores and carnivores.

Plants and marine animals, amphibians, their bodies are very large, and they are very powerful.

The reason for this is inseparable from the environment of the Carboniferous period. During the Carboniferous period, most of the Earth's climate was warm and humid. The warm and humid climate is very conducive to the growth of plants.

The Carboniferous period was a period of great prosperity in the plant world. The plants extend from the coastal area to the interior of the land, and large fern forests appear on the land. Land arthropods like centipedes breathe mainly through organ systems.

They rely on the ventilation and diffusion of the tracheal system to allow the tissues in the body to directly absorb oxygen from the air and expel carbon dioxide. They breathe differently than terrestrial vertebrates. Their breathing bypasses the circulatory system.

As long as the oxygen content in the air increases, terrestrial arthropods can get more oxygen from the air. As a result, the bodies of many arthropods have grown to a very large size.

It may be because the weather and climate there are more suitable, and there are no natural predators, so they slowly form the largest appearance.

During the Carboniferous period, the entire earth was only a complete continent (known as Pangea). At that time, the climate was suitable and humid, and a large number of plants began to grow and spread rapidly. The entire continent of Pangea is covered with dense vegetation, and due to the vigorous growth of plants, the amount of the earth has gradually increased.

In the late Carboniferous period, the Earth's oxygen content reached a historical peak of about 45%, almost twice as much as it is now. The increase in oxygen content objectively allowed animals to have a larger body size, and many animals at that time were frantically evolving to huge sizes, and the larger the size, the easier it was to survive and pass on to the next generation. In short, the increase in oxygen levels greatly increases the size limits of the animals.

The giant centipede is at the top of the local food chain not only because of its size, but also because of its unique venom, which is hidden in pincer-like appendages, which are also known as centipede's "fangs". In addition to this, these centipedes also possess hard "armor" that protects every part of their body.

Because these giant centipedes had few natural predators, and the oxygen levels at that time were nearly twice as high as they are today. They were terrifying, prone to giant phobia, much larger than centipedes today.

Because at that time, marine organisms would evolve step by step to the land, and the creatures on land were becoming more and more abundant, and some creatures would have greater survival pressure in order to survive and obtain food, and if they were larger, they would have a competitive advantage, and the larger the size, the easier it was to survive; This kind of harvest is very terrifying, the appearance, it looks particularly scary, and the attack power is very strong.

I think this centipede is even more terrifying than the giant python now, because the oxygen content in the air was very high at that time, so this giant insect appeared.

The Carboniferous period is about 100 million to 100 million years ago. It divides dividends into two periods, the Early Carboniferous (about 100 million years ago - 100 million years ago) and the Late Carboniferous (about 100 million years ago - 100 million years ago), which lasted 60 million years in between. The Carboniferous period was warm and humid, with land and air accumulation increasing from time to time, forest area expanding from time to time, and swamps lining up one after another.

Since coal was mainly composed in the Carboniferous, the Carboniferous period also got its name.

The giant centipede, which is actually the arthropod centipede, is a prehistoric dipod. They are very distantly related to centipedes, because centipedes belong to the phylum Arthropoda - Myriapoda - Lamipoda, while arthropods belong to the phylum Arthropoda-Myriapoda - Dippoda. Therefore, the knotthrothracic centipede is closely related to Malu.

Arthrothoracic animals range in size from meters to meters and can reach 50 centimeters in width. They lived in the late Carboniferous period, 340 million to 280 million years ago, and are scattered throughout North America and Scotland, and are the largest known invertebrates on land. Fern spores and the remains of lycopodium plants have been found in fossil specimens of intestinal residues and feces of the arthrthorax centipede, and scientists generally believe that it is herbivorous.

The insect landings date back to the early Devonian period, about 400 million years ago, but why did these arthropods evolve so much during the Carboniferous period? This may be due to the unusually high levels of oxygen in the atmosphere at that time. In the late Silurian period, hundreds of millions of years ago, the naked fern among the terrestrial plants first appeared on the land, and the plants finally began to develop from the water to the land, which is a very serious event in biological evolution.

At the same time, along with the development of terrestrial plants, the earliest insects and arachnid arthropods were also presented. Although ferns and insects have been able to live on land, they have always been unable to adapt to the soil and water.

At the end of the Carboniferous period, about 100 million years ago, a minor extinction event altered the vast coal forests that covered the equatorial regions of Europe and the Americas, and could have led to forest solidarity, dwarfing and shrinking plant and animal species, and soon after, species extinctions, including the most affected insects, amphibians, and creeping species.

The Carboniferous period is an era of the evolution of the earth, about 100 million years to 100 million years ago, is the main formation period of modern fossil fuel coal, so it is called the Carboniferous, the land area of the Carboniferous period is much larger than now, the life on land has been unprecedentedly developed, the temperature at that time was warm and humid, swamps were everywhere, and a large scale of forests was formed on the continent, which is also the reason for the large-scale formation of coal.

The Carboniferous period is also called the age of giant insects, the insects at that time were not as small as we see in modern times, the spiders at that time were the size of human heads, and the wingspan of dragonflies was nearly one meter, which was the largest insect found in modern times. So what is it that makes insects so huge?

We all know that the oxygen content of our earth is about 21%, and at the peak of oxygen in the Carboniferous period, it reached an astonishing 35%, which is very suitable for arthropods to reproduce, thus giving birth to a large number of giant insects.

Each of these giant insects is now a creature that only appears in science fiction films, and dragonflies now feed on mosquitoes, so I wonder what dragonflies with a wingspan of nearly one meter will feed on?

Insects have actually ruled the earth, they are not as small as we seem today, and they have ruled the earth for 65 million years. During this period, the high concentration of oxygen provided the basic elements of life for many giant organisms, and the flight activity of insects was highly metabolically demanding, and higher oxygen concentrations meant that more cells could be respirated.

It is reported that in the course of the study, scientists also specifically analyzed the relationship between the body size of modern insects and the length of their trachea. For example, in those days, a dragonfly could reach 70 centimeters on its wings. Scientists explain that more than 300 million years ago, the ratio of insect body size to the size of their trachea reached a very high level – because the higher the concentration of oxygen in the atmosphere, the less capacity the respiratory system has to process the air.

With the current relatively low oxygen concentration, the theoretical size of the insect does not exceed a few centimeters. However, once the level of oxygen in the atmosphere increases to the level of the Paleozoic, then the mosquitoes and cockroaches that we usually see may pose a great threat to human life.

However, at the end of the Carboniferous period, a long fire ended the age of giant insects due to excessive oxygen levels. Due to the abundance of vegetation over tens of millions of years, large quantities of coal are buried under the forest. It may have been a volcanic eruption that ignited the coal buried underground, and the high oxygen levels contributed to the spread of the fires, turning the entire forest into a sea of fire.

This devastating fire continued to burn for decades, and the high temperatures combined with the toxic gases released by the burning of coal caused the extinction of 46% of the planet's species at that time, known as the Carboniferous coal extinction event.