Decapitation?

[TheBeesKnees]

I woke up this morning to find my favorite 'pede, Hypatia, dead. And I suspect it was a murder.

She wasn't just dead, you see. The exoskeleton around her head was cracked right open, and she was almost completely decapitated. Could it have been that one of the males were too rough with her when trying to mate, and just--broke her?

I have no idea what happened. She wasn't about to molt or anything, I don't think. She'd just done so a few weeks ago. Does anyone have any idea what might have caused this? I'm a little upset about it :<

 

[Orin]

Any chance you caught her head in the lid and didn't notice?

 

[TheBeesKnees]

Absolutely none; it's a relatively high terrarium, and they've been unable to scale the glass walls. But the substrate is just dirt and cocohusk, so if she *could* scale it, and somehow fell, it wouldn't have been a high enough drop, nor a hard enough landing surface, to do any damage. On top of this, there is no lid! Just a mesh top, with overlapping flaps that, even if they did get caught in it, are too soft to do any damage at all * n*!
These are also gigantic millipedes, so I would have definately noticed her if she was hanging around the top of the terrarium somehow ; u; <3

 

[Orin]

Although uncommon it's not impossible and I've made that mistake a few times over the years (usually hear a crunch though). Otherwise she may simply have died and the joints by her head rotted the fastest.