Humans and most other animals urinate to rid their bodies of waste containing ammonia. Roly-polies don't urinate because, quite simply, they don't need to. And although they require a moist environment, they cannot live underwater. These bugs typically range between a quarter-inch and a half-inch long, and they have seven sets of legs under their segmented bodies. They breathe through gills like other crustaceans, but their gills must remain moist even on land. Roly-polies are terrestrial crustaceans and the only crustaceans that have adapted to living entirely on land, according to the University of Kentucky's College of Agriculture, Food and Environment.
They are actually crustaceans, which means they are more closely related to shrimp, crabs and crayfish than they are to the ants and other insects that inhabit the same soil. One key difference between pillbugs and sowbugs is that pillbugs can roll themselves into a ball, while sowbugs cannot. They are also sometimes called woodlice, because they are often found under logs. Pillbugs are sometimes also referred to as sowbugs, although they are two separate species, according to the University of Florida. The official name for these creatures is pillbug. Some people call them wood shrimp or doodlebugs, and in England they have dozens of nicknames, including chiggypigs, penny sows and cheesybugs, according to the BBC. Roly-poly is a common nickname for these creatures, but it's certainly not the only name they go by. Here's a closer look at roly-polies and the role they play in the ecosystem. Who hasn't seen a roly-poly bug in the dirt and given it a quick touch to see it form itself into a little ball? That process that has entertained kids - and adults - for generations is a defense mechanism for the bugs, and it has a special name: conglobation, which is a big, fancy word that means "to form into a ball."Īnd while this ability to conglobate may be the most entertaining thing about these tiny critters – and where the term roly-poly comes from – there's much more to them than that.
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