Did you know that cockroaches have been around as long as dinosaurs? Before man stepped foot on our vast planet, there were millions of these disease infested critters crawling from rock to rock. There are thousands of species in the cockroach family. This may be hard to imagine, but considering how quickly they multiply-this is far from the unimaginable and a stark reality. The four main types of roaches that may be seen in the American household today range from the German cockroach, the American cockroach, the brown-banded cockroach and the Oriental cockroach.
The most common of these unattractive insects is the German cockroach. This roach is around ½ long with a light brown coloring and two distinct brown stripes behind the head. These critters can live for up to a year and give birth to more babies than any other species. The German cockroaches are acrobatics. They can literally crawl across ceilings! Both sexes of this species also sport wings, although they rarely fly. The female German cockroach carries her oothecae (her egg case) with her until it hatches. Other species usually drop their eggs after a few hours. An adult Female can produce anywhere from 4-8 oothecae in a lifetime. While that may not seem like very many egg cases, you may need to know how many eggs may grow inside of that case. Anywhere from 18 -50 eggs can grow inside her oothecae. Hatching time is only 30 days. Now for the fun part. It’s time for a quick math lesson.
We’ll begin with one female who lays one oothecae. This oothecae produces 50 eggs.
There happens to be plenty of food nearby and the nymphal development is complete in 8 weeks. Now let’s say that 50% of these nymphs are females. 30 of them are females.
These females lay one oothecae.
Here’s where the math comes in. We multiply 30 X 50 eggs and the answer is1500.
There’s still plenty of food to feed this family, so the nymphal development is 8 weeks and 50% of them are females.
These females lay one oothecae each. Time for more math. 750 X 50=37,500.
After nine months that adds up to over 37,000 German cockroaches. That’s assuming that all the babies hatched, remained alive. And these little pests have a 90% mortality rate.
You can see how quickly these insects multiply. That’s why it’s important to get rid of the first one you see, or mommy will be adding to the family pretty quickly!
This little oothecae may contain as many as 50 nymphs!
And when the oothecae hatches, you can bet these ugly critters are going to celebrate!