CLASSIFICATION
CLASSIFICATION
Cockroaches are among the oldest living insects. Fossil cockroaches that resemble today's species are commonly found in Coal Age deposits from more than 320 million years ago. About 3,500 species have been identified. Although the most notable varieties are those that infest households in the temperate regions, most species are tropical. Some reach lengths of several inches, and many are colorful. Several species of woodland cockroaches are found in temperate regions. These live amid decaying wood and other vegetation and do not enter houses. Cockroaches are well known and disliked as house pests, but less than 1% of all cockroaches are pests. Coackroaches are closely related to the grasshoppers, katydids, and crickets.
Madagascan rainforests in decaying vegetation.
Most cockroaches live outdoors where they hide under logs, stones, and bark, or in palm fronds and ant and termite nests. Hissing cockroaches need a tropical humid environment, which is why they would not survive in the wild in North America.
They eat decaying fruit and vegetables, wallpaper, food scraps, other household insects, stale beer, watercolors, and whitewash. Ours live on a diet of hard dog food and fruit.
Most species have two pairs of wings that are larger in the males. In most species the female cockroach carries her eggs in a leathery capsule called an ootheca that protrudes from the rear of the abdomen. Females of some common species lay 16 to 45 eggs at a time, which they deposit into an egg case. The eggs take from 4 to 12 weeks to hatch into nymphs that look like miniature white adults without wings. After exposure to air, the nymphs harden and turn brown, however it takes several molts for the roaches to reach adulthood.
Madagascar hissing cockroaces are different that most species of roaches because they give birth to live offspring. The ootheca is maintained inside the body and live young are delivered which sexually mature about 1 year later.
About 2 years.
Evidence linking cockroaches to the transmission of diseases is circumstantial, but because of the threat, much effort and expense are invested in the chemical control of cockroaches. Insecticides are usually effective, though in some places cockroaches have developed resistance to the most widely used poisons. In 1979 scientists succeeded in synthesizing the sex stimulant of the American cockroach, which may open the way to more successful roach control.