The Orange Titan is a big, docile millipede sold at around 15 to 18cm, orange from head to tail with legs and antennae to match, and it is one of the easier large millipedes to keep. It needs a deep, damp hardwood substrate that it can eat, 22 to 26°C, and a quiet start while it settles in. It is a Thyropygus from Thailand that has never been matched to a described species, and ours are wild-caught, which shapes most of what follows.
What the Orange Titan Is
'Orange Titan' is a trade name. The animal belongs to Thyropygus, a genus in the family Harpagophoridae and the order Spirostreptida, and nobody has published which species it is, so it is sold as Thyropygus sp. The genus is South East Asian and centred on Thailand. Around 67 species are described, most of them found only in Thailand, and they run from about 6cm to 23cm long, so a 15 to 18cm animal sits comfortably inside the range. Ours are sold as coming from Thailand, which is a trade report rather than a published record.
Wild-Caught, and What That Means for You
The Orange Titans we have are wild-caught. Captive-bred Thyropygus are rarely offered, though one UK keeper found a young millipede in the enclosure two months after buying two adults.
Wild-caught means two things for a keeper. First, nobody knows how old a wild animal is when it arrives, so how long each one lives in your care will vary. No lifespan has been published for Thyropygus, and our guide to how long millipedes live covers what is known for the bigger species. Second, the start matters. A millipede that has just come out of a shipping box wants deep, damp substrate, darkness and to be left alone, and it will spend much of its first couple of weeks underground. Treat the first few months as settling-in, and do not dig to check on it.
Wild-caught millipedes often carry small mites. What those mites feed on is still unsettled, so watch the numbers rather than reaching for a treatment. If they clog the face or legs, we use a soft dry paintbrush and at most a brief trickle of tepid water, and a millipede should never be dunked in water to shift them. Mites swarming over the substrate itself are a different problem, usually a sign of too much damp and uneaten food.
Setting Up the Enclosure
The rule we use for millipede enclosures is a floor at least twice as long as your longest animal and at least as wide as it is long, so a pair of 18cm adults needs at least 36 by 18cm of floor. More room is better, and a tank of around 60 by 30cm suits a small group. Orange Titans will climb a branch now and then, but they live mostly in and under the leaf litter, so floor space and depth come before height. The lid needs to be secure and gap-free, because a millipede this size is stronger than it looks. Give enough ventilation to keep the air fresh without drying the substrate out.
Substrate: The Floor Is Also the Food
Depth is most of the husbandry. Give at least 15cm, deeper if the tank allows, and never less than the length of your longest millipede, so it can bury itself completely to moult. The mix is the diet as well: flake soil, white-rotted hardwood and organic topsoil, with hardwood leaf litter on top, all of it free of pesticides. Use hardwood only. Softwoods are poorer food that millipedes eat less of, so we leave them out, and coir is no use as a base because it holds water but feeds nothing. If you want leaves from the same part of the world, our Asian leaf mix comes from Thailand and Vietnam.
Keep the substrate evenly damp all the way down and never waterlogged. Squeeze a handful: it should hold together and leave your hand damp, with no water running out. Mist the surface litter, not the air, and top the litter up as it disappears, because it is being eaten. Our pet millipede guide goes through the set-up in more detail.
Temperature and Humidity
Our care panel gives 22 to 26°C. An English living room averages about 19°C through the heating season, so through the colder months that means a heat mat on a thermostat, fixed to a side wall of the enclosure. Never put heat under the substrate: a millipede digs down to get away from warmth, and with a mat underneath it digs straight towards it. The UK keeper who found young kept the adults in the low twenties, so there is no need to push the top of the range, and through a warm summer the mat may have little to do.
The panel's humidity is 75 to 85%. In practice that comes from the substrate rather than from spraying the air: deep, evenly damp bedding under a layer of litter holds it, and a hygrometer reading is a guide rather than a target.
Feeding
An Orange Titan eats its way through the leaf litter and rotten hardwood, and that is the diet. On top of it, offer a little soft vegetable or fruit two or three times a week and a small protein food once or twice a week, and take away anything uneaten before it goes mouldy. Keep a piece of cuttlebone in the enclosure all the time: millipedes build calcium into their exoskeletons, and most eat their old skin after a moult.
Moulting
Millipedes moult underground, sealed into a chamber in the substrate, and they are soft and helpless while they do it. If an Orange Titan disappears for weeks, leave it alone, because digging into a moulting chamber can kill it. Deep, damp substrate is what makes a safe moult possible, and our article on millipede moulting explains what happens down there.
Handling and the Defensive Fluid
Orange Titans are slow and docile. The safest way to hold one is to let it walk onto your hand rather than lifting it, and to stay low over a soft surface. Disturbed, it winds into a tight spiral. It cannot roll into a ball; that is what pill millipedes do, and they belong to a different group.
Like other large millipedes it can release a defensive fluid when it is handled roughly, and new arrivals may release it more readily. The fluid of Thyropygus has never been analysed, but that of another member of the same family from north-east Thailand has, and it contains benzoquinones, the same class of chemicals as the African giants. On skin it stains and irritates, and from a large tropical millipede it can blister. In an eye it is a chemical burn that needs treating: rinse with plenty of clean water and get it looked at. Seven of the eight published eye cases were children of seven and under, so supervise any handling, and wash your hands with soap afterwards and before you touch your face. There is more in our guide to whether millipedes are dangerous.
Sexing and Keeping Them Together
Adult males carry gonopods, modified mating legs, in place of the walking legs on the seventh body ring, which shows as a gap in the leg row near the head. A small group can share one enclosure.
Orange Titan or Thai Ruby?
We keep a second Thyropygus, the Thai Ruby Banded. It is smaller, sold at around 10 to 14cm, banded in red, and our care panel rates it Medium against the Orange Titan's Easy. Both are sold as separate forms, and neither has been matched to a described species. If you would rather start with a millipede captive-bred in the UK, the Siamese Glow is a much smaller Thai species, about 5 to 6cm, that fluoresces blue-green under ultraviolet light.
Frequently Asked Questions
How big do Orange Titan millipedes get?
They are sold at around 15 to 18cm. Described Thyropygus species run from about 6cm to 23cm, depending on the species.
Is the Orange Titan a real species?
It is a real animal with a trade name. Nobody has matched it to one of the roughly 67 described Thyropygus species, so it is sold as Thyropygus sp.
Are Orange Titan millipedes poisonous?
They are not venomous, but their defensive fluid irritates skin and is a chemical burn in an eye. Wash your hands with soap after handling and before you touch your face, and supervise children.
Do Orange Titan millipedes climb?
Now and then. They will go up a branch or a slab of cork, but they spend most of their time in and under the leaf litter.
How long do Orange Titan millipedes live?
No lifespan has been published for Thyropygus, and wild-caught animals arrive at an unknown age, so it varies. Large tropical millipedes can live for many years as adults.
Can you breed Orange Titan millipedes?
Rarely. Ours are wild-caught, and captive-bred Thyropygus are seldom offered, though one UK keeper found a young millipede two months after buying two adults.
Do Orange Titan millipedes roll into a ball?
No. They coil into a tight spiral. Rolling into a ball is what pill millipedes do.
What temperature does an Orange Titan need?
22 to 26°C, from a heat mat on a thermostat on the side of the enclosure through the colder months.
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