{"id":120715,"date":"2025-09-05T01:42:21","date_gmt":"2025-09-05T01:42:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/120715\/"},"modified":"2025-09-05T01:42:21","modified_gmt":"2025-09-05T01:42:21","slug":"it-might-only-be-15cm-long-but-it-can-run-at-16kph-and-its-deadly-jaws-are-one-third-the-length-of-its-body-and-strong-enough-to-shear-through-bone","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/120715\/","title":{"rendered":"It might only be 15cm long, but it can run at 16kph and its deadly jaws are one-third the length of its body and strong enough to shear through bone"},"content":{"rendered":"

Growing up to 15 centimetres in length and possessing huge jaws strong enough to shear through the small bones of their prey, camel spiders may look fearsome \u2013 but they\u2019re among the most misunderstood of all arachnids<\/a> says Summer Rylander.\u00a0<\/p>\n

What are camel spiders?\u00a0<\/p>\n

Despite their name, camel spiders aren\u2019t actually spiders. They belong to the arachnid order solifugae and possess neither silk-producing organs nor venom. Remarkably, there are more than 1,000 species of solifuges, though the lot is broadly referred to as camel spiders, sun spiders or wind scorpions.<\/p>\n

What do camel spiders look like?<\/p>\n

Camel spiders have eight legs and two pedipalps \u2013 leg-like appendages used to sense and seize prey \u2013 and they\u2019re often brown or tan in colour for optimum desert camouflage. <\/p>\n

How big are camel spiders?<\/p>\n

Camel spiders can reach up to the aforementioned 15 centimetres in size.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Where do camel spiders live?<\/p>\n

Solifuges are international. Camel spiders can be found in deserts and arid regions throughout the Middle East, North Africa, India, Mexico and the southwestern United States. They\u2019re present on every continent except Australia and Antarctica.<\/p>\n

What do camel spiders eat?<\/p>\n

Capable of running at speeds up to 16 kph, camel spiders are skilled nocturnal hunters. Under the cloak of darkness they seek their prey, ready to chase down small rodents, lizards, insects and even small birds<\/a>. Since camel spiders aren\u2019t venomous, they kill using their powerful jaws, which can be so long as to comprise one-third of their body length.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Are they deadly to humans?<\/p>\n

Their bite may be painful, but camel spiders are not a threat to human life due to their lack of venom.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Do camel spiders attack camels?<\/p>\n

A long-perpetuated myth alleges that camel spiders will leap up to slice open a camel\u2019s belly and feast upon its innards. Another version claims that camel spiders lay eggs in the skin so that the babies can burrow into the camel\u2019s abdomen and eat it from the inside. Neither tale is true.<\/p>\n

Are there camel spiders the size of a man\u2019s leg?<\/p>\n

Another untruth purports camel spiders to be of mythical proportions. Even the largest camel spiders aren\u2019t as big as they appear in a widely circulated photo from 2004, which partially shows two US soldiers holding two camel spiders in such a way that they seem to be nearly half the size of a human. This is merely a trick of perspective with the camel spiders\u2019 placement in relation to the camera lens.<\/p>\n

What else isn\u2019t true about camel spiders?\u00a0<\/p>\n

Camel spiders do not leap into the air, they cannot reach speeds of 40 kph, they don\u2019t scream and they don\u2019t chase people. What a camel spider might do is seek out shade by following the shadow of a nearby human \u2013 but they aren\u2019t out for blood.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Growing up to 15 centimetres in length and possessing huge jaws strong enough to shear through the small…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":120716,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[49,48,66,323],"class_list":{"0":"post-120715","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wildlife","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-science","11":"tag-wildlife"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120715","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=120715"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120715\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/120716"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=120715"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=120715"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=120715"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}