Cedric Lee was collecting slugs with another diplopodologist James Bailey when they stumbled upon a very odd creature; thin and string-like with lots of fine legs and a long body. “We recognized that it might be something special,” explains Cedric as he shares how they uploaded the image to iNaturalist. Enter Dr. Paul Marek, who saw the pictures and immediately got in touch. After some collection and analysis, they have a new millipede to share, Illacme socal, one of only three species in genus Illacme, which is the only genus of the family Siphonorhinidae present in North America. Millipedes are critically understudied and there’s so much more for us to learn. Listen in as Paul and Cedric tell you all about diplopodology and their new discovery!

Cedric and Paul’s paper “A new species of Illacme from southern California (Siphonophorida, Siphonorhinidae)” is published in issue 1167 of Zookeys.

It can be found here: https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.1167.102537

Watch a video of an individual of the new species burrowing here: https://vimeo.com/823446011?share=copy

New Species: Illacme socal 

Episode image courtesy of Paul Marek

A transcript of this episode can be found here: Paul Marek and Cedric Lee - Transcript 

You can find Cedric’s work on his inaturalist profile: https://www.inaturalist.org/people/cedric_lee

You can find Paul’s work on his university website: https://millipedes.ento.vt.edu/

Or on Twitter at @apheloria

A guide to myriapods by Paul Marek and WIlliam Shear: https://vtechworks.lib.vt.edu/bitstream/handle/10919/113652/CURBIO.18835_PEM_28Oct22_VTWorks.pdf?sequence=2&isAllowed=y

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Music in this podcast is "No More (Instrumental)," by HaTom (https://fanlink.to/HaTom)

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