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Origin.  Madagascar (just off the east coast of Africa) abounds with fascinating critters.  Hissing roaches live on their forest floors and eat vegetation and whatever else falls to the floor.  They digest it like our dogs and earthworms and help build their soil.

LA Pic
Iowa roaches are disgusting little beasts.  They come up our drain pipes.

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Madagascar guy bigger and plumper.  And possibly tastier.

LA

Size.  Male hissing roaches top out at three inches; females stay a bit smaller.  Our Iowa roaches rarely exceed two -- no matter how much we feed them, voluntarily or involuntarily.

LA Pic
These two hissing roach males butted heads hard enough to knock this cork cave around.

Sexing.  Male hissing roaches grow blunt “horns” on the front of their heads.  They also grow hairier antennae.  Males also like to fight by butting heads.  Funny we never see these guys butting heads with Mountain Dew drinkers.  Hissing roaches get quite involved in their arguments.

LA Pic
Usually the youngsters hide in a different area from the breeders.

LA
These little guys usually run at warp speed.

Temp and Humidity.  Hissers will survive a wide range of temperatures -- probably coinciding with the day and night temps of Madagascar.  They breed best at 85^o and want to fight a lot at 90^o -- male hissing roaches butt heads.  Hissers go into a non-breeding phase below 75^o.  They like humidity, but misting can encourage mold.  At Aqualand they breed like crazy in July and August.

LA Pic
Little roaches tend to run (and escape) a bit more than the big guys.

Handling.  Unlike our U.S. roaches, hissing roaches will sit on your hand as opposed to running away faster than you can dance the Stomp the Roach Polka.  Hissers probably cannot survive in our locale because of their non-fear of humans.  They certainly can’t survive an Iowa winter.  They have no snow shoes.

LA Pic
Hissing roaches on display at our Des Moines "Night Eyes" Zoo.

Nocturnal/Diurnal?  Most roaches prefer to work the night shift.  You (and you know who you are) see them scurry for cover when you flip on the lights.  Hissers prefer less light than you like.  Some come out during the day.  Hissing roaches prefer to spend their days in hidey holes or under anything.  Day or night, you rarely see hissers scurrying.  They usually lumber.

LA Pic
Paul keeps his hissing roaches over (and in) Lizard Bark.  It teems with them -- all sizes.

Substrate.  You can keep hissing roaches atop nearly any substrate.  Research indicates bran enables you to see the babies (nymphs) more easily when cleaning their cage.  Contrasting colored aquarium gravels or sands should make for a more colorful display.  You need not try to duplicate the look of forest floor litter, although you can easily do so.  Obviously you want to avoid cedar chips.  And ground corn cobs mold too quickly.  Dirt and potting soil both make a hard-to-keep-clean mess.

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Sorry for the clutter.  Paul's 10 with lid shows the essentials:  food, water, cover.

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Paul set up this hissing roach habitat for Aqualand in about 10 minutes.  

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Add substrate and 20 breeder hissing roaches, then stand back and admire your work.

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Hissing roaches can climb glass.  Use clips cause they're strong little rascals.

Container.  Critter cages with snap-on lids make ideal containers for hissing roaches.  Hissers cannot fly (no wings) but they can crawl like crazy -- right up plastic or glass and on out.  You don’t want the wee beasties escaping and stampeding about your domicile.  They’d love a nice warm spot under your refrigerator.  Ten-gallon tanks with screen covers work very well also.  Add the locking clips.  Paul says his breeders can easily lift screen covers.  Glass tanks also provide more stability.  Light plastic cages seem to get knocked about a great deal.

LA Pic

LA
This wooden hamster hut makes a massive roach condo.  Newly shed to the right.

Hidey Holes.  Bugs (especially roaches) always find a place to hide.  You can treat hissing roaches like crickets and give them paper rolls or egg cartons.  Both provide lots of hiding room.  Even a piece of wood or bark will work.  Better yet, add a little style with a colorful ceramic cave or painted plastic palace.  We used the natural looking cork bark caves.  No point in building a bug slum.  Gentrify it with some plastic plants.  Hissers would probably eat live plants.

Water.  Provide a low water dish with a sponge in it.  Foolhardy nymphs will wade out past the safety ropes just like any kids.  The sponge provides a hissing roach Personal Floatation Device to prevent their drowning.

LA Pic
Pelleted iguana foods contain much more nutrition than hissing roaches find in the wild.

LA Pic
Hissing roaches seem to like these baby carrots best.

LA Pic
Hissers enjoy pelleted parrot foods also.

LA
Parakeet pellets work even better.

LA
Especially once they figure out where it is.

LA
But they don't all get the memo at the same time.

Foods.  Any pelleted food works -- iguana food, bird food, dog food, cat food or whatever.  Roaches (including hissers) adapt to nearly any substance with a carbon atom in it.  Fresh foods like Romaine lettuce and bits of orange tempt their delicate palates.  You will want to remove excess fresh food before it molds.  Hissing roaches appear to love sliced baby carrots -- especially if you candy them by cooking them in butter and brown sugar like my aunt Ethelyn.  No, Mike, my aunt was not cooked in butter and brown sugar.  And, speaking of mold, pelleted foods mold also -- especially if they get wet.

LA Pic
Young hissing roach right after molting.

LA Pic
They start out a bright white after molting.

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His insides are bigger than his outside.

LA Pic
Freshly shed hissing cockroach in the food dish.

LA Pix
Adult male immediately after molting plus his ex-skin.  Shredded peat moss is messy.

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Adult just emerging from exoskeleton.

LA

LA Pic
So much tastier at this stage.

Skin Sheds.  Lots of critters shed their exoskeletons as they grow.  Ditto hissing roaches.  Some devour their ex-skins -- especially if no other food is at hand.  The lower on the food chain (and the less picky), the more likely they are to eat their skins.  Most newly shed critters are very vulnerable (and especially tasty) at this stage.  If you insist on eating roaches, the newly shed ones taste best (but crunch less).

LA Pic
Of course, predators happily devour roaches at any stage.

LA Pic
Summertime suits them fine.

LA
You're more likely to spot this process if you have 200 or 300 head of roaches on your ranch.

LA
Here's one on the cage lid.

LA
We flipped her lid over.

LA

LA
Another female cranking out an egg case on the front glass.

LA
Here's the whole egg case.

Breeding.  Male hissers butt heads to establish dominance -- like mountain sheep and Mountain Dew drinkers.  Females usually breed with the dominant males -- the best butters.  Typical bug breeding (birds dew it, bees dew it, even educated fleas etc), but the female hissing roach pulls her ootheca (pronounced egg case) into her back end and totes her developing litter around internally for about two months.  Timing depends upon temp.

LA
Momma roach plus two probably unwilling baby sitters.

After Hatching.  When she ejects the ootheca, the larvae emerge and start eating the ootheca or whatever else might be near.

LA Pix
Most hissing roach nymphs stay away from the adults.

LA Pic
Right after molting, your roach takes a while to regain his color.

LA Pic
They darken usually within a couple days.

LA
Not a flying roach.  This roach was nabbed and hauled up by this little balloon spider.

Maturity/Lifespan.  The larvae (nymphs) shed and eat their skins as they grow.  They attain sexual maturity at about six months.  They live two to five years.  Female hissing roaches produce about 700 offspring during their careers.

LA Pic
Madagascar hissing cockroaches having a party at the Omaha Zoo.  Nymphs, too.

LA Pix
All stud male hissing roaches.  Cute or creepy?

LA Pic
Four cute little hissing roach girls.  One shy one.

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Showing size variations in the adult hissing roaches.

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Hissing roaches do grow quite large.

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"Ha, Chaco-san.  My superior kung fu has defeated you.  You are now my slave

LA Pix
Madagascar hissing roaches -- not just for breakfast anymore.

 

LA
Plenty of snacks to go around.

Last Word.  If you can get past the “creep factor,” hissing roaches make intriguing pets.  Kids love them.  They make good class projects.  LA

© 2003, © 2004, © 2005, © 2006, © 2007 LA Productions

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