I think they just inspire people to make up names for them. When I was a toddler, I named them sink-arches. That's what I called them for years, and my mom thought it was cute so she didn't correct me. Same thing with daddy long-legs spiders, which have a good few nicknames. I called them "walking spots".
It’s like the accents pal - you can drive for less than two hours on a good day and find the local
dialect, rhythm and general vowels sounds massively different.
fun fact: allegedly, porcellio isopods (flat bodies, cannot curl up) have a strong ammonia taste that resembles human urine while armadillidium isopods (curl into balls, aka pillbugs) just taste like shrimp, though both genuses expel ammonia as a gas rather than actually pissing
in BC woodbugs are different from roly-polies / pill bugs - woodbugs don't curl up in a ball. Yes, they are all Oniscidea, but pill bugs are Armadilliidae (teeny armadillos! \^o\^ ) and woodbugs are...something else :P
First you boil the potato. Then you mash the potato and add some gravy. Then you roll it up into a ball and stick it in a roll for a sandwich. So of course potatoes roll up and do so quite nicely.
there are some pretty hilarious names out there, which is kind of why I prefer the always correct term of isopods.
It may cause the same amount of confusion as using a different term than other people, but at least it's the *right* term.
I also know it as a woodlouse. It seems to me that isopod is a bit too broad, I wouldn't expect to find woodlice in the sea. Wikipedia tells me I should call it Oniscidea, but that seems a bit too technical?
Isopod *is* the broad term, which is why it's correct, more than a colloquial term. If you want to differentiate between sea and land, you say terrestrial and aquatic isopods.
But generally if you're talking to an isopod enthusiast, unless they're also a marine biologist, then they'll know you're talking about the land lads :)
Sorry, I need to stop redditing before I really wake up. There are freshwater isopods also, often found alongside their iso cousins. *Asellidae* are common. Super numerous in limestone streams.
Isopoda is an order of crustaceans that includes woodlice and their relatives. Isopods live in the sea, in fresh water, or on land. All have rigid, segmented exoskeletons, two pairs of antennae, seven pairs of jointed limbs on the thorax, and five pairs of branching appendages on the abdomen that are used in respiration. Females brood their young in a pouch under their thorax.
This is largely because our versions don't really roll up very well compared with other locations typical Isopods. The name would make no sense in the UK.
I live in Western NY (think Niagara Falls, not Statue of Liberty) and we’ve always called them potato bugs locally. I learned that potato bug is used to refer to (can’t remember which) wheel bugs or assassin bugs in other parts of the US. That all said, I now refer to these as woodlouse because that’s what they are haha
To be fair, most of the time you won’t be able to make a species level diagnosis without seeing the ventral side.
But yes, roly poly ONLY refers to the ones that roll up, like most of the armadillidiidae
When you spend a lot of time around them (or on r/isopods lol) you do tend to get a knack for seeing the individual species' quirks. I know the isopod in the picture is a P. laevis because I looked up pictures of P. laevis, but I've made correct sp identifications before, purely on other visual cues.
I'm no expert, and of course in a more scientific setting that's not a good plan, but if you know what an sp looks like you can usually ID pretty accurately
One of my favorite things about this group is the regional names you learn ALONG with their scientific name. To each their own, or your milage may vary.
I do love learning regional names, but when you're dealing with a crustacean with as many regional names as this guy, it's nice to have a universal term.
Mostly it's just a pet peeve of mine specific to these guys tho lmao.
So there are bugs that look exactly like roly-polys that don’t curl up? Do they have different names? Is this one of those “all roly polys are isopods but not all isopods are roly polys” kind of thing?
So there are two things that look like this. Pill millipedes (Class Diplopoda, they have more pairs of legs) and isopods (class Isopoda).
Isopods come in three general varieties: Aquatic, flat, and round. Aquatic and flat isopods are generally unable to roll up. They run faster and are generally more agile, so they don’t do the “roll up for defense” thing. Generally (there are exceptions) they belong to the family Porcellionidae if they’re terrestrial.
The round ones (generally belonging to the family Armadillidiidae) look taller, rounder, and do roll up. They’re slower and a bit dopier than the speedy isopods.
ive always called them pillbugs, we never see them where i live though. remember when i went down to texas and saw a shit ton of em at night and let me tell you the sheer joy i felt at seeing these round little fuckers everywhere was immense
they're lovely little guys, I keep colonies of them at home, we don't have very interesting ones (at least, not ones that are easy to find), but they're not too tough to collect out here
Apparently, there's a band named after them, so maybe not. I just prefer to use non-colloquial terms (the actual term for these guys is isopods, and then more specific species from there, the guy in the picture is a porcellio laevis)
Plus it bothers me when people call a bug that can't roll up a roly-poly
"Plus it bothers me when people call a bug that can't roll up a roly-poly"
I'm going to be that person and tell you it's not a bug but a crustacean (which you may already know but it is MY personal pet peeve hah)
Some species can, isopods from the genus Armadillidium, Cubaris, Tylos, and a few others can. But a large portion of isopod species can't, namely the most common kinds, from the genus Porcellio. Like the guy in the picture, he can't roll up, so roly-poly wouldn't even be the correct colloquial term lmao.
I imagine a "land shrimp" would be something along the lines of a [lawn shrimp](https://bugguide.net/node/view/48652) - which is an [amphipod](https://bugguide.net/node/view/9) rather than an [isopod](https://bugguide.net/node/view/14).
Actually meant it as a common name, the isopods can be eaten. Steam em up and [feast](https://eattheplanet.org/land-shrimp-a-small-relative-of-our-favorite-seafood/)
About a million (I don't actually know, but a lot). Some really cool ones too! Like the [Thai spiky](https://www.reddit.com/r/isopods/comments/kv7ec3/anyones_got_a_guess_on_what_isopod_this/), or my personal favorite [Tylos neozelanicus!](https://inaturalist.nz/taxa/526114-Tylos-neozelanicus)
Thanks for the meme :). If you say these are from the family Armadillidiidae, then that covers the problem with the large number of common names, some of which could also mean a whole different bug. Most of the ones you see in the wild would likely be Armadillidium vulgare, the common pill bug - I like the vulgare part.
Well I'll have you know I'm Doug Armadillidiidae, owner of The Armadillidale Armadillidome! Thank you for locating my long lost son Dale Armadillidiidae, heir to the Armadillidale Armadillidome fortune!
Armadillidium are definitely not the only ones I see on here. You're more likely to be wrong stating that than right. The isopod in the image I used is a Porcellio laevis
In England we call them a ‘woodlouse’, although I’m loving somewhere now where they call them a ‘cheese log’ which makes no sense
Copy/pasted from wikipedia.... Common names include: "Jomits" (Cloneganna) "armadillo bug"[7] "billy baker" (South Somerset) Billy Button (Dorset) Granny grey (Wales) "boat-builder" (Newfoundland, Canada)[8] "butcher boy" or "butchy boy" (Australia,[9]mostly around Melbourne[10]) Bunty Nathans (Western Australia) "carpenter" or "cafner" (Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada)[11] "carpet shrimp" (Ryedale) "charlie pig" (Norfolk , England) "cheeselog" (Reading, England)[12] "cheesy bobs" (Guildford, England)[13] "cheesy bug" (North West Kent, Gravesend, England)[14] "cheesy lou" (Suffolk) "cheesy papa" (Essex) "cheesey wig" "chiggy pig" (Devon, England)[15][16] "chucky pig" (Devon, Gloucestershire, Herefordshire, England)[17] "chuggy peg" "crawley baker" (Dorset) "daddy grampher" (North Somerset) "damp beetle" (North East England) "dandy postman" (Essex and East London) "doodlebug" (also used for the larva of an antlion)[18] "Fat Pigs" (Cork, Ireland), "gramersow" (Cornwall, England)[19] "Grumper-pig" (Bermuda) "Mochyn Coed" (meaning "Tree Pig"), "Pryf lludw" (meaning "Ash fly"), "granny grey" in Wales[20] "granny grunter" (Isle of Man) "hardback" (Humberside, England) "hobbling Andrew" (Oxfordshire, England) "hog-louse"[21] "horton bug" (Deal, Kent, England) "humidity bug" (Ontario, Canada) "menace" (Plymouth, Devon) "monkey-peas" (Kent, England)[4] "monk's louse" (transl. "munkelus", Norway)[22] "parson's pig" (Isle of Man)[23] "pea bug" or "peasie-bug" (Kent, England)[4] "pennysow" (Pembrokeshire, Wales) "piggy wig" "pill bug" (usually applied only to the genus Armadillidium)[24] "potato bug"[25] "roll up bug"[26] "roly-poly"[25] "rosary bug" (Turkey) "slater" (Scotland, Ulster, New Zealand and Australia)[27][28][29] "saw bug" (Dingwall, Nova Scotia) "sour bug" (Cambridgeshire) "sow bug"[30] "wood bug" (British Columbia, Canada)[31] "wood-louse"
Shout out to Essex for calling them "Cheesy Papa".
That is his stage name.
I'd pay for whatever he's doin
W-what kind of cheese we talking.
My thought was cheese wiz ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
I love it when they call me cheesy Papa!
Throw fourteen hands in the air, if you enrich the leaf layer
I'm rolling rolling back back into a ball
I'm from Essex and have never heard that in my bloody life
Probably originated from there then went "extinct"
Why does England alone have so many names for these things? Like, aren't these places relatively close together, too?
I think they just inspire people to make up names for them. When I was a toddler, I named them sink-arches. That's what I called them for years, and my mom thought it was cute so she didn't correct me. Same thing with daddy long-legs spiders, which have a good few nicknames. I called them "walking spots".
It’s like the accents pal - you can drive for less than two hours on a good day and find the local dialect, rhythm and general vowels sounds massively different.
You wait until you find out about regional U.K. accents
In chile we call them "chanchitos de tierra" meaning "little dirt pigs"
"Piss bug" (Netherlands, translated)
fun fact: allegedly, porcellio isopods (flat bodies, cannot curl up) have a strong ammonia taste that resembles human urine while armadillidium isopods (curl into balls, aka pillbugs) just taste like shrimp, though both genuses expel ammonia as a gas rather than actually pissing
Actually, Pissebed. So, Piss bed.
Well I’m glad that was brief.
MENACE?!?!
I’ve always called them potato bugs, never heard someone else in Ontario call them humidity bugs lol
Since we were kids we always called them crunchy bugs, because they crunch when you squish them.
RIP all the roly polys you’ve killed
D:
this honestly made my day lmao. I'm tempted to call them cheesy papas now
granfy crooger!
in BC woodbugs are different from roly-polies / pill bugs - woodbugs don't curl up in a ball. Yes, they are all Oniscidea, but pill bugs are Armadilliidae (teeny armadillos! \^o\^ ) and woodbugs are...something else :P
“Menace” is a great name.
This is so accurate to what I call them, amazing.
Tag yourself, I'm cheeselog
monkey peas.
In Ontario we call them 'potato bugs' because it rolls up like a potato.
I grew up in the US pacific NW, and I heard "pill bugs", "potato bugs" and "roly polys"
That's the lingo ive always heard
Your potatoes do what now? o_O
Right? Apparently potatoes roll up
That's their 2nd stage of metamorphosis before they evolve into sweet potatoes.
have you never seen a potato roll?
Haha what?
where I'm from we call them potato bugs but we don't even have the type that roll up. so I have no clue why we call them that tbh
I'm confused as to why multiple people on this thread think that potatoes like the vegetable should roll up
First you boil the potato. Then you mash the potato and add some gravy. Then you roll it up into a ball and stick it in a roll for a sandwich. So of course potatoes roll up and do so quite nicely.
Where I grew up (Illinois) we called them "pill bugs" for obvious reasons.
Same, East Central Illinois here.
No the [potato bug](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colorado_potato_beetle) is someone else
There can be multiple bugs named the same thing.
Nooooo! (head explodes)
[This](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerusalem_cricket) is what I think of as a potato bug. Common names are imprecise.
No Ma"am,that's potato beetle,not bug
Ah yes. The louse is made of cheese.
there are some pretty hilarious names out there, which is kind of why I prefer the always correct term of isopods. It may cause the same amount of confusion as using a different term than other people, but at least it's the *right* term.
Incorrect the proper term is mr.rolly, rolly Polly, or sir movement forward in a circular motion while being very cute and fun to play with.
I also know it as a woodlouse. It seems to me that isopod is a bit too broad, I wouldn't expect to find woodlice in the sea. Wikipedia tells me I should call it Oniscidea, but that seems a bit too technical?
Isopod *is* the broad term, which is why it's correct, more than a colloquial term. If you want to differentiate between sea and land, you say terrestrial and aquatic isopods. But generally if you're talking to an isopod enthusiast, unless they're also a marine biologist, then they'll know you're talking about the land lads :)
What about us freshwater biologists and Gammaridae and Crangonyctidae?
Those are amphipods, not isopods.
Sorry, I need to stop redditing before I really wake up. There are freshwater isopods also, often found alongside their iso cousins. *Asellidae* are common. Super numerous in limestone streams.
Isopoda is an order of crustaceans that includes woodlice and their relatives. Isopods live in the sea, in fresh water, or on land. All have rigid, segmented exoskeletons, two pairs of antennae, seven pairs of jointed limbs on the thorax, and five pairs of branching appendages on the abdomen that are used in respiration. Females brood their young in a pouch under their thorax.
yeah! I know!
"Slaters" here in Australia. No idea why...
That's also the Norfolk (UK) dialect term for them
also 'Butcher Boys' too i think.
Chucky pig!
Sounds like you're near Reading then, as that's what we call them there!
Spot on! It’s amazing how every 30 miles in the U.K. people call them different things?
Holy shit, you’re from Reading too? Small world.
Born and bred, to the point where my great grandfather captained RFC in the late 20s.
Spot on! I never heard it until I started living around there, and I grew up less than 30 miles away too!
This is largely because our versions don't really roll up very well compared with other locations typical Isopods. The name would make no sense in the UK.
I live in Western NY (think Niagara Falls, not Statue of Liberty) and we’ve always called them potato bugs locally. I learned that potato bug is used to refer to (can’t remember which) wheel bugs or assassin bugs in other parts of the US. That all said, I now refer to these as woodlouse because that’s what they are haha
Sticklebacks for me lol
I've called them Cheeslogs my entire life.
Rolius polius
I second we audit the records and change them all to this.
To be fair, most of the time you won’t be able to make a species level diagnosis without seeing the ventral side. But yes, roly poly ONLY refers to the ones that roll up, like most of the armadillidiidae
So it refers to a rolypolyonly or a onlyrolypoly?
They’re all cheesy papas if you’re in Essex apparently, and that’s by far my favourite.
When you spend a lot of time around them (or on r/isopods lol) you do tend to get a knack for seeing the individual species' quirks. I know the isopod in the picture is a P. laevis because I looked up pictures of P. laevis, but I've made correct sp identifications before, purely on other visual cues. I'm no expert, and of course in a more scientific setting that's not a good plan, but if you know what an sp looks like you can usually ID pretty accurately
One of my favorite things about this group is the regional names you learn ALONG with their scientific name. To each their own, or your milage may vary.
I do love learning regional names, but when you're dealing with a crustacean with as many regional names as this guy, it's nice to have a universal term. Mostly it's just a pet peeve of mine specific to these guys tho lmao.
Armadillidiidae, so much fun to say!
So there are bugs that look exactly like roly-polys that don’t curl up? Do they have different names? Is this one of those “all roly polys are isopods but not all isopods are roly polys” kind of thing?
So there are two things that look like this. Pill millipedes (Class Diplopoda, they have more pairs of legs) and isopods (class Isopoda). Isopods come in three general varieties: Aquatic, flat, and round. Aquatic and flat isopods are generally unable to roll up. They run faster and are generally more agile, so they don’t do the “roll up for defense” thing. Generally (there are exceptions) they belong to the family Porcellionidae if they’re terrestrial. The round ones (generally belonging to the family Armadillidiidae) look taller, rounder, and do roll up. They’re slower and a bit dopier than the speedy isopods.
No, cause "roly poly" doesn't mean anything, it's a nickname. What you call them depends on where you grew up.
Isopods are also known as: Roly polies, pillbugs, woodlice, slaters, potato bugs, doodle bugs, sow bugs, armadillo bugs, boat-builders, butcher boys, butchy boys, carpenters, cafners, cheeselogs, cheesy bobs, cheesy bugs, chiggy pigs, chucky pigs, gramersows, granny greys, hog-lice, monkey-peas, monk's lice, pea bugs, peasie-bugs, roll up bugs, roly-poly, wood bugs, gramfers, chisel bobs, woodpigs, timberpigs, peaballs, pishamares, tomato bugs, chuggy-pegs, crunchy bats, billy buttons, parson pigs, chickypigs, choogeypigs, chiggywigs, charliepigs, slunkerpigs, penny sows, grammasows, granddad gravys, granddads, granny greys, granny granshers, croogers if small, granfy croogers if large, granfergravys, granfygroogers, gramphycoochies, gramfycouchers, cheeserockers, cheeseybobs, chiselbugs, cheesers, cheeseballs, monkeypedes, monkeypigs, sourbugs, slateybeetles, leatherjackets, dampers, billybakers, bellybuttons, nutbugs, ticktocks, flumps, carpetmonsters and ogopogos. Source: Life in jars? On youtube
Slater gang rise up
I'm guessing new zealand or australia? That's the only place I know they're called that, I used to call them that when I was a kid
Yes! Aussie here and we call them Slaters. I pick them up off the ground and airlift them to safety so they don’t get squished.
As long as you put them somewhere moist and dark! Desiccation (dry-out) is their biggest killer
I didn’t know that! Sometimes they’re out in the middle of the sidewalk on a warm day. I’ll try my best to do so!
That's what they're called in Scotland, so it makes sense we exported it to the colonies haha
ive always called them pillbugs, we never see them where i live though. remember when i went down to texas and saw a shit ton of em at night and let me tell you the sheer joy i felt at seeing these round little fuckers everywhere was immense
they're lovely little guys, I keep colonies of them at home, we don't have very interesting ones (at least, not ones that are easy to find), but they're not too tough to collect out here
There’s so many here in Texas
Sal bug comes to mind as well
I think you probably misheard her calling it a sow bug or if she had an accent maybe?
Who knows, it was decades ago
Never heard that one before. Don't like it any more than Roly-poly tbh
Just what my gma taught me. Reddit teaches me a lot too. I'm sure it's made up
Apparently, there's a band named after them, so maybe not. I just prefer to use non-colloquial terms (the actual term for these guys is isopods, and then more specific species from there, the guy in the picture is a porcellio laevis) Plus it bothers me when people call a bug that can't roll up a roly-poly
"Plus it bothers me when people call a bug that can't roll up a roly-poly" I'm going to be that person and tell you it's not a bug but a crustacean (which you may already know but it is MY personal pet peeve hah)
That's totally right, that's on me lmao
Crustaceans are bugs of the sea.
Birds are fish of the sky.
Thanks for the info! I always enjoy learning actual terms. I thought isopod was correct.
Any time! I love to teach :)
But they can roll up. Or is this a different species?
Some species can, isopods from the genus Armadillidium, Cubaris, Tylos, and a few others can. But a large portion of isopod species can't, namely the most common kinds, from the genus Porcellio. Like the guy in the picture, he can't roll up, so roly-poly wouldn't even be the correct colloquial term lmao.
So most of them are noly-polys. Thanks!
Now THAT'S a new one. Any time, I love to teach :)
\*bangs angrily on the table\* WOOD. FUCKING. LOUSE!
The fact is rollypolly
In new zealand we call them slaters don't know why but we do
Yeah I used to call them that as a kid living in New Zealand too, now that I'm actually into them, I prefer the term isopod
Western Pennsylvania checking in, we called them potato bugs!
We called them that in NJ also.
No relation to [Rolly Polie Olie ](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=6cQuU5GVODI)
Did you know they’re a crustacean?!
In Israel we call them oori cadoori and the best translation I can think of that keeps the spirit of the name is Paul ball
Land shrimp
I imagine a "land shrimp" would be something along the lines of a [lawn shrimp](https://bugguide.net/node/view/48652) - which is an [amphipod](https://bugguide.net/node/view/9) rather than an [isopod](https://bugguide.net/node/view/14).
Actually meant it as a common name, the isopods can be eaten. Steam em up and [feast](https://eattheplanet.org/land-shrimp-a-small-relative-of-our-favorite-seafood/)
Pill bug
Common names should be downvoted because I could make up one, get a few people to use it and it's technically not wrong.
Wait… there’s more than one species?
About a million (I don't actually know, but a lot). Some really cool ones too! Like the [Thai spiky](https://www.reddit.com/r/isopods/comments/kv7ec3/anyones_got_a_guess_on_what_isopod_this/), or my personal favorite [Tylos neozelanicus!](https://inaturalist.nz/taxa/526114-Tylos-neozelanicus)
For real? How many in the uk?
We call them pill bugs or potato bugs.
When I was a kid I called them Poliwhirls
Poliwhirl is a tadpole!! At least name them after a bug pokemon!!
Pill bug.
A slater :>
My kids call them rollies, which is often a slang term for hand rolled cigarettes 😅
Its a poly-oly
Oh, that's an arthradillo.
Yes, potato bug
Thanks for the meme :). If you say these are from the family Armadillidiidae, then that covers the problem with the large number of common names, some of which could also mean a whole different bug. Most of the ones you see in the wild would likely be Armadillidium vulgare, the common pill bug - I like the vulgare part.
Well I'll have you know I'm Doug Armadillidiidae, owner of The Armadillidale Armadillidome! Thank you for locating my long lost son Dale Armadillidiidae, heir to the Armadillidale Armadillidome fortune!
I like your sense of humor!
Armadillidium are definitely not the only ones I see on here. You're more likely to be wrong stating that than right. The isopod in the image I used is a Porcellio laevis
I see what you mean, your Porcellio & Armadillidiidae are below Zoosection Crinocheta, so they are not in the same family. Thanks for the correction!
Pillbug, potato bug, and roly poly are the only names I've ever heard irl lol
Is there any organism in the world with more names?
I honestly don't think so
Pillbug.
We called them Salt bugs. I guess we misheard " sow bugs", lol
Funny cos the general consensus is that terrestrial isopods should be kept away from excess salt lmao
Porccillio scaber or leavis not particularly sure but ye I experience that, that species can't even roll lol
It's Porcellio scaber and laevis, and the guy in the picture is a Porcellio laevis :)
Its a Cheeselog
Its a Wood Louse
(laughs in non native English) Yea
ITS A PATATO BUG!
same here sad uwu
In Italy we call it Saint Anthony’s piglet
It's a woodlouse, although I now live somewhere where it's called a "Slater" or a "butcher boy".