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Sticker of Speckled cockroach
Bug card No. 1267 of 1,500

Speckled cockroach

Nauphoeta cinerea
Eats: A bit of everythingCockroaches and termitesHouses and farms6 legs

The speckled cockroach is a mottled brown cockroach with wings. It first came from north-east Africa, but it has hitched rides on ships all around the warm parts of the world. It can even chirp like a tiny alarm.

Lives in
First from north-east Africa, now in warm countries around the world, often near people
Length
3 cm (1.2 in)
Top speed
about 3 km/h (1.9 mph)
On foot, estimate
Can it hurt you?
Harmless
Harmless. It does not sting and is even kept as food for pet lizards and spiders.
What does it eat?
Like most cockroaches, it eats many different kinds of food. Its babies even eat the egg case they hatch from.
For real!Photo of Speckled cockroach
Picture by Ypna. CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

How big is it?

How long is it?

Speckled cockroach about 3 cm long (1.2 in)A grain of rice about 6 mm (0.24 in)A toy building brick about 3.2 cm (1.3 in)A crayon about 9 cm (3.5 in)
as long as 5 grains of rice in a rowcould run across a dinner table in 1.2 secondsmoves 28 times its own body length every second

How big is Speckled cockroach compared to YOU?

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How fast is it?

cool stuff

Fun facts

1

When it is scared, it chirps by rubbing parts of its body together, almost as loud as an alarm clock.

2

The mother carries her eggs in a pouch, and the babies come out while she is still carrying them.

3

Males can chirp long songs, up to three minutes, to win a female.

4

Scientists baked bread with a little flour made from these cockroaches, and people could hardly taste the difference.

5

A female can raise about six groups of babies in her life, with around 33 in each group.

you asked

Most asked questions about Speckled cockroach

?Is the speckled cockroach dangerous?

No. It does not sting or bite people and is often kept as food for pets.

?How big is a speckled cockroach?

It can grow up to about 3 centimetres long.

?Can cockroaches make sounds?

This one can. It chirps when scared and males sing to females.

For bug experts

Scientific name
Nauphoeta cinerea
Named by
Olivier, 1789
Group
Cockroaches and termites
Family
Blaberidae
Classification
Insecta > Blattodea > Blaberidae
Lives on
Africa, Asia, Australia and Oceania, North America, South America
Also known as
Lobster cockroach, Cinereous cockroach

Where the facts come from

  1. Nauphoeta (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
  2. Picture by Ypna. CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons. The round sticker of this bug is cut from the same picture.

If we got something wrong, sorry, we are bug fans, not a science journal. Tell us at hello@bugwiki.app and we will fix it.

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