Face it, cockroaches are downright ugly little creatures that love to crawl around our homes, producing lots of babies and excreating wherever they go.
Below is a list of some of the fascinating facts about cockroaches thanks to David G. Gordon, author of The Complete Cockroach (available through Amazon publications).
1. Cockroaches can bite. The larger roaches have even been known to bite humans.
2. Cockroaches live in dirty & also very clean homes. They have larger colonies in less clean homes because there is a bigger food supply available.
3. German roaches lay about one sac of eggs per month with each sac can containing approximately 40 babies whilst American roaches lay a sac every 2-3 days, each containing about 12 babies. (That equates to an average of 480 little German Cockroaches from the one mum or a whopping 1752 American Cockroaches!!).
4. Cockroaches are active primarily for a 4 hour period during the night although they are seen at other times as well.
5. Cockroaches are not afraid of light. They just prefer darkness as to them the light signifies humans are around so they scurry to get away.
6. Some people think roaches must have eyes in the back of their heads, but they don’t. They do have tiny little hairs that gage the air movement around them, so they feel you, they don’t see you from behind.
7. Cockroaches come out for water far more often than they come out for food. Normally, one night of feasting is enough to last at least several days for a roach. They can live a month without food, but only a week without water
8. The reason substances like boric acid works to kill roaches is that they routinely clean themselves and each other. Thus, boric acid on their bodies will be consumed and kill them, and some of their friends. Boric acid can be made into a paste with flour and sugar and used as bait.
9. Roaches love onions.
10. Roaches eat meat, they are omnivores, so they will eat just about anything including dead animals.
11. Crushed cockroaches when applied to a wound, can help ease the sting
12. Cockroaches have white blood
13. A roach can live a week without a head. It dies after a week due to lack of water
14. A cockroach that has just shed it’s skin is white and has black eyes. It takes 8 hours to reproduce the skin layer.
15. Laboratory female roaches are able to reproduce without aid of a male. They produce all female offspring
16. The largest roach in the world is the Macropanesthia rhinocerus from Australia weighing in at up to 50 grams.
17. Cockroaches thrive in all conditions and live in the desert as well as the arctic
18. Most roaches, but not all, have the ability to fly.
19. Fried Cockroaches are common snacks in Cambodia
Click here for information on Cockroach Control and Prevention in and around the home.
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{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
This is a slew of interesting, and useful, tips about cockroaches. We should get a copy of that book and leave it in our office for clients to look over. Thanks for the list and thanks for the heads up on that book!
Additional amazing fact # 20: Cockroaches can live up to month without head.