Quick answer: Millipedes eat mostly decaying leaves and rotting wood, so in an enclosure their main food is a deep substrate of leaf litter and white-rotted hardwood, topped up as it is eaten. On top of that, offer small amounts of fruit and vegetables, keep calcium available at all times, and add a little protein once or twice a week.
Feeding millipedes starts with a counterintuitive point: their main food isn't something you put in a bowl. It's the substrate they live in.
New keepers often picture feeding a millipede the way you'd feed a hamster - a daily portion of something in a dish. But a millipede is a detritivore, an animal that makes its living breaking down dead and decaying plant matter on the forest floor. It spends most of its life burrowing through and eating the material it lives in. Fruit and vegetables are supplements; the substrate is the meal.
Get that one idea right and feeding millipedes becomes simple. This guide covers the whole picture: the substrate-as-food principle, the supplementary foods millipedes enjoy, why calcium stays in at all times, when to offer protein, and what to avoid.
The foundation: leaf litter and rotting wood
In the wild, a millipede's diet is overwhelmingly decaying leaves and rotting wood, and that's exactly what should make up the bulk of its diet in captivity. These two things aren't optional extras or substrate decoration - they're the staple foods millipedes evolved to eat, and without adequate access to them a millipede cannot get the nutrition it needs to grow and moult successfully.
Leaf litter. Aged, partially-decomposed deciduous leaves are more palatable and digestible than fresh ones, because microbial conditioning has already begun breaking them down. Oak is tough and slow to break down, and beech, birch and maple are all good too. Our leaf litter mixes British hardwood leaves, collected from Southern England woodland and naturally aged, with tougher bamboo leaves that hold their shape for longer, and our finer leaf litter substrate - chopped and milled beech and oak - works well mixed through or as a surface layer.
Rotting wood. This needs to be white-rotted hardwood: pale, soft, crumbly, with a clean earthy smell. The white-rot fungus that decays it exposes the cellulose and floods the wood with nitrogen-rich compounds, making it digestible. Our shredded rotten wood is a white-rotted hardwood mix, frozen to remove pests before it reaches you. For a pre-fermented option, flake soil - oak and beech broken down through a composting process - is highly digestible and makes an excellent base.
Because these are food, they get eaten, which means the substrate gradually depletes and needs topping up. A millipede enclosure that's turned to plain soil with no leaves or wood left is an underfed one. Our millipede substrate guide covers how to build and maintain a nutritious mix.
Supplementary fruit and vegetables
On top of the substrate, most millipedes enjoy a range of fresh produce - though how enthusiastically depends on the species. These are supplements that add variety and moisture, not the core of the diet.
Commonly enjoyed foods include cucumber (a near-universal favourite), courgette, carrot, squash, banana, melon, apple, pear, oranges and cooked sweetcorn. Different species have their own preferences - keepers report carrot going down particularly well with Thai Rainbows, while the big unfussy giants like the Ghana Speckled Leg will eat almost anything you offer.
A few sensible rules:
- Go easy on sugary fruit. High-sugar fruits like banana and melon are fine in moderation, but they attract mould and pests, so offer them sparingly.
- Remove uneaten food within a day or two. Fresh produce moulds quickly in a warm, humid enclosure. A small ceramic dish as a designated feeding spot makes it easy to offer food and clear away what's left.
- Wash produce to avoid pesticide residues.
One important exception: dietary specialists
Not every millipede takes fruit and veg. The Amber Millipede (Pelmatojulus ligulatus) is a notable specialist - it largely ignores fresh produce and lives almost entirely on white-rotted wood and leaf litter. For species like this, the substrate isn't just the main food, it's very nearly the only food, so keeping a steady supply of well-decayed hardwood and leaves is essential. It's worth checking the specific needs of your species rather than assuming everything eats the same way.
Calcium: always available
Millipedes build calcium into their exoskeleton, and most eat their cast skin after moulting.
Calcium should be available at all times, not offered occasionally. Two good sources:
- Cuttlebone - soft enough for millipedes to scrape and consume easily, ideal left on the surface for grazing. You'll see worn indentations appear where they've been working at it.
- Crushed oyster shell - small pieces mixed through the substrate, so burrowing millipedes come across it as they move. Calcium matters in the wild too: the British Myriapod and Isopod Group notes that the pill millipede Glomeris marginata is most typical of woodland on lime-rich soils, and that in Flanders soil calcium was the strongest factor in how many there were.
You can also use ground limestone, but cuttlebone and oyster shell are the simplest options.
Protein: occasional but valuable
Millipedes need some protein, particularly growing juveniles and breeding females, who eat noticeably more when producing eggs. Protein is offered periodically - once or twice a week is plenty - rather than constantly.
Good options include tropical fish flakes, seven flake types with fish meal as the first ingredient and 47 per cent crude protein, crumbled dry onto the substrate a pinch at a time. Dried shrimp are whole and sun-dried, shells and all, at up to 62 per cent crude protein; drop in a few whole, or break them up for smaller species. Spirulina algae wafers, 15mm discs at 34 per cent crude protein, go in dry on a piece of bark and soften slowly in a damp tub, so millipedes can graze on one for a couple of days. Bee pollen, flower pollen that honeybees pack into small granules, is a hobby favourite; depending on the flowers, it runs between ten and forty per cent protein by dry weight, and a pinch on a dish or bare substrate is plenty. As with fresh food, don't leave protein sitting long enough to mould - clear away what isn't eaten.
Moss, lichen and the extras
Many millipedes graze on moss and lichen, and these make a nice naturalistic addition that several species appreciate. Cork bark and the leaf litter itself also get nibbled over time as supplementary food. None of these are essential, but they add variety and help recreate the forest-floor diet a millipede is built for.
What to avoid
- Softwood and conifers. Never feed or use pine, spruce or other conifer wood, needles or bark: conifer material is poorer food that millipedes eat less, and its resins may harm them. Hardwood only.
- Anything with pesticides or fertilisers. Whether it's wood, leaves, soil or produce, chemical residues are a real risk. Source carefully.
- Letting the substrate run dry. This isn't a food in itself, but it affects their food: the fungi and bacteria that break down leaves and wood slow sharply when the litter dries out, so the food in the tub decays far more slowly. Keep it appropriately moist so the wood and leaves keep breaking down.
- Over-relying on sugary fruit or leaving food to rot. Both invite mould and pest outbreaks in a warm, humid enclosure.
The simple version
Feeding millipedes comes down to one principle and a few additions. Build the diet on a deep, nutritious substrate of leaf litter and white-rotted hardwood, kept topped up and appropriately moist - that's the meal. Offer fruit and veg as supplements, keep calcium available at all times, provide protein once or twice a week, and avoid softwood, chemicals and anything left to go mouldy. Do that and your millipede has everything it needs to grow, moult and thrive.
Everything mentioned here is in our accessories range - substrate components, calcium, protein and supplements - and the listing for every species in our millipedes for sale collection covers what it eats. If you're putting together a feeding routine and want a hand, we are always happy to help, so do get in touch.
Frequently asked questions
Can millipedes eat banana?
Yes, as an occasional treat rather than a regular food. Banana is sweet, at about 12g of sugar per 100g against under 2g in cucumber, and like other soft fruit it moulds quickly in a warm, humid enclosure. Put a small piece on a leaf or in a dish, and take away what is left within a day or two.
Can millipedes eat apple?
Yes: apple is one of the regular fresh foods for millipedes, with cucumber, courgette, carrot and pear, offered two or three times a week rather than daily. It is sweeter than the vegetables, at about 10g of sugar per 100g, so offer a small piece, washed, and take away what is left within a day or two.
Do millipedes drink water?
Yes: they take in water with their food and from damp surfaces. In a 1985 study, Meyer and Eisenbeis watched dehydrated millipedes push the end of the gut out onto wet filter paper and take up water through it. Keep the bed moist: a millipede on a damp bed needs no water dish, and never give it a sponge, which harbours mites.
How often should you feed a millipede?
Offer fresh food two or three times a week, not daily: the leaf litter and rotting wood in the substrate are the main meal, so keep those topped up. Add protein once or twice a week, such as a pinch of tropical fish flakes or a few dried shrimp, keep calcium in the enclosure at all times, and clear away anything uneaten within a day or two.
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