So science has known about pseudoscorpions for a while, but we didn’t know until just today that tiny, scary-looking bugs like to inhabit books and papers, so forgive us for having a bit of a moment. In return, we’ll forgive you for taking a second to check how many shadows you’ve got.
We good?
If it’ll help you sleep at all tonight, book scorpions don’t hurt people despite their proportionally giant scorpion claws. The most common species is Chelifer cancroides, which only grows to a maximum of four millimeters in length. Book scorpions feast on the booklice and dust mites which are attracted to starch-based glue used in older book binding, which is why they like to hang out around books.
It’ll also make you rethink your love of “old book smell” a bit. Sure, it’s nostalgic and all, but it’s probably just attracting book scorpions.
They don’t have tails for stinging, either, so mostly all they really do is protect your books from getting eaten. But who knows? Maybe if their habitat gets destroyed as all the old books start to get replaced with less parasite-attracting books (or e-readers!), the book scorpions will be forced to all band together wherever we keep the largest library of vintage books, and then they’ll form together into swarms and—I’m going to stop there so we can all go to sleep tonight.
Here, watch this video which casts them in a much more endearing light:
Awww, now they seem almost friendly.
…
Awww, now they seem almost friendly. Awww, now they seem almost friendly. Awww, now they seem almost friendly.
(Scientific American via TOR.com, image via Doctor Who)
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