All About Arthropods

Surely no one will ever known every miniscule shard of information about any roach (or organism in general), but as far as things that the hobby concerns, you'll definitely get there. If there's one neat thing about hybrids, it is the color variation; I bet you'll see some beautiful looks thrown around.

No prob! I would say she's pretty much certainly mixed with G.oblongonota as they're the second most common hisser species in the hobby and she does show similar dark red coloration.

Unfortunately she is a Gromphadorhina hybrid; they can vary much in color from individual to individual. The male features much more of the classic MHC coloration, but he is still almost surely a hybrid as well since he wasn't gotten from one of the couple select sources for pure G.portentosa such as Kyle Kandilian of Roachcrossing.

Dang, sorry to hear about your health. Anyway, the part of the anatomy you're talking about is the pronotum.

That is even on the highest side for roaches, but I know a few hobbyists who keep their collections at about those temps and things go fine, so you should indeed be good now.

100 F is definitely too hot; when things got around that temp in my invert room, things started dropping like flies. I'm not sure exactly what species you keep, but 75 can be a tad too low to get some things breeding. Maybe you can get two small heating pads?

Exactly! In some pics they look like a more matte version of Elliptorhina javanica. No problem!

Yeah, I only learned through a discussion is a roach group on Facebook. Apparently it is a "natural heritage" species in Africa and only found within a national park, so there are many walls around it from entering captive culture. lol Even so, I believe a few people overseas were trying to culture it a year or so back, but I don't think they ever got far. If they ever were to become established in culture, they'd surely contend for prettiest roach in the worldwide hobby, I can tell you that much.

A.fusca is supposed to be a protected species in its native range and so unfortunately it doesn't look like it'll be in the hobby for a long while.

Blog post #100!!! A star-studded post on a long, drawn-out trade in honor of arriving at our destination after setting out on the long, drawn-out road to this number!

I would ideally feed 2-3 times a week, but I have only been able to feed once a week lately.

Blog post #99. While you're waiting for the 100th post, take a gander at this. ?

A history of and tribute to my first ever roach.

Not a problem.

Only hissers within the same genus can crossbreed. For example - G.oblongonota with G.grandidieri, E.laevigata with E.chopardi, etc. There is an exception with P.vanwaerebecki (which should be reclassified as a Gromphadorhina sp.) being able to crossbreed with Gromphadorhina spp., but that is all.

Just found out how to include links into posts after the forum updates, so here's my newest roach blog post! Enjoy.

Very nice! Do you have a picture or a description? I may be able to help with the I.D. Dang, I hope they're ok too!? Wow, really? What was the prey item and what was the darkling species? Awesome! I'm actually trying to get some Romalea eggs to hatch right now. I bet that those eggs would like a nice cool down to at least the 60 or so degrees for a couple months to induce hatching. It's just a guess, but I'm going to guess that people don't like visiting your house much. ?

Ah, ok. lol I personally am fine with spiders anywhere, but the invert room. I have seen them set up shop in my both my little garbage can and a few actual enclosures. I also can't have them in every corner of the room because if something valuable gets loose (the case a good portion of the time), I can't have it get eaten by some random spiders. ? Unfortunately my house only has a hobbit door. LOL That's a neat project; I certainly saw a little variation when they used to run rampant in the yard of my previous house. Same here; I'll be testing out to see if E.arcanum like some sand mixed with coconut fiber for constructing actual chambers/tunnels and such or if they are sensitive to commonly available sand like roaches and should just have a chunkier, sandless substrate. Sounds awesome!

He is technically still breeding these, although it is unlikely that there'll be a response from him here anytime soon since he doesn't browse the forums much at the moment.

Yea, it's easy to love their very interesting habits and behaviors for sure. Not to mention that there's a handful of species that are quite impressive in appearance. Do you like......just pick them off of your bed, counters, and from out of your clothes and drop them in a breeding container? ? Interesting experiment and I'd be curious to know the results; I'm pretty certain that they're like isopods though and don't require the cool period that they'd normally experience in the wild. Very nice! Doru taeniatum would be on my wish list if they couldn't climb and fly so well. lol Interesting, good to hear another account of the Europeans being good for use as feeders; I heard that Euborellia arcanum are at least thought to be toxic to other inverts. I guess I'll have to test that out sometime for myself. If I am able to breed them, I'd definitely make some available.

Very nice to hear more people are getting into earwigs! They're really an underappreciated and undercultured group, but I bet that has something to do with there only being like 10 species in the U.S and only a couple of those being particularly impressive. They're so awesome aren't they? I was breeding them for about a year before temps got too hot in the invert room and they all baked to death. Very excited as I have received an even larger species, Anisolabis maritima, recently and will be getting the Euborellia back again next week! Culturing methods for O.fasciatus have been around for a while now it seems, but I think the interest is just really lacking; I don't know a single person who is breeding them at the moment. I agree that they are very intriguing little things though and I'd definitely be breeding them if I had more space and a smaller wish list. lol

Welcome! No worries, I was simply a lurker for a while there too. lol It is indeed large enough for a single roach and even the smallest size would do. You would need to add some Vaseline or another barrier around the top though to keep it from escaping if it's small enough to fit through and/or it's a WC adult female that could be pregnant and have young. You would also probably need to mist every day or so since American roaches should never have their substrate dry out, especially in habitats with high ventilation such as these. The "Care Guides" section on Roachcrossing.com contains a good general husbandry guide and "For the Love of Cockroaches" goes into great depth on many aspects of their care as well as detailing individual species. Other than that though, this great community of roachers are usually pretty good at answering questions as well.

No problem! Pretty fortunate if you ask me; if they were crossable, I'm almost certain the hobby would be ran rampant with hybrids as it is with certain genera of cockroaches.

At least with species already in culture, this has not been observed. It seems like sort of a common practice for people to house different species together, so if it was possible, people would have surely found out by now.

I'm on a mission to try and breed a number of flower and darkling beetles currently and things aren't going as well as I had hoped (some of my darklings got a harmful fungal infection someway or another), but if I'm successful, there will be many beetles more easily accessible on the market. Have you heard that Goliathus goliatus, Goliathus regius, and Goliathus cacicus are now legal to own and ship in the U.S? There is a report of a new and easy method for breeding Asoblus verrucosus, but I need to see if it works with my own eyes. A couple species of pill millipedes are starting to be bred in the U.S. A very pretty species of U.S harvestman will hopefully be entering culture soon, Dalquestia Formosa. An impressive species of earwig is already pretty established in the hobby, Euborellia arcanum, and a few even more impressive species should be joining in soon as well! Have you seen all the exotic species that have entered culture recently? I wouldn't exactly call them "meh". ? They would indeed! I personally would much recommend hemipterans over mantids though as even though mantids are pretty much an experience like no other, I personally have found them VERY hard to keep alive. You might find them easy though, I don't know; I just always fail for some reason. lol With Hemiptera you still have a good amount of options that fit your criteria - predatory stinkbugs, assassin bugs, ambush bugs, certain species of water bugs, etc. I don't exactly know how easy the ambush bugs are to breed though since it's just never really been attempted except maybe once. Darkling beetles also make a good match, but they aren't predatory.