Surinam cockroach
The Surinam cockroach is a dark brown to black cockroach with shiny, lighter brown wings. It has a pale white band at the front of its head shield. It loves to dig in loose, damp soil and compost.
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Fun facts
Almost all of them are females. The mothers have babies without any father, and the babies are copies of their mum.
Its babies are born white and see-through. In 5 to 6 hours their skin hardens and turns shiny brown.
It burrows in soil, compost heaps and under rocks and dead branches.
It travels around the world hidden in the soil of potted plants.
It has wings, but it is a poor flyer.
Most asked questions about Surinam cockroach
?Is the Surinam cockroach a house pest?
Not usually. It sometimes ends up indoors in potted plants, but it lives mostly in soil outdoors and in greenhouses.
?How big is a Surinam cockroach?
It is about 1.8 to 2.5 centimetres long.
?Why are there no male Surinam cockroaches?
There are almost none. The females can have babies all by themselves.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Pycnoscelus surinamensis
- Group
- Cockroaches and termites
- Family
- Blaberidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Blattodea > Blaberidae
- Lives on
- Asia, Africa, North America, South America, Australia and Oceania, Europe
- Also known as
- Greenhouse cockroach
Where the facts come from
- Surinam cockroach (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
- Picture by Steve Kerr. CC BY 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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