P. aegyptiaca ooths!

[Roachsmith]

I checked my p. aegyptiaca tank today and was sad to see one of my females had died. While I was sifting through the dirt though, I found these! They look like ooths, one is smaller than the other.

I was wondering how I can tell if they are still alive (they're pretty hard is that normal?) and how long till they hatch?

I put them in a separate container because I want to see the little ones when/if they emerge. I put them on top of a slightly damp paper towel in a plastic box with airholes. Will that be ok for hatching or should I bury them in some substrate. This is my first roach ooth. I'm kind of excited

[Matt K]

I was wondering how I can tell if they are still alive (they're pretty hard is that normal?) and how long till they hatch?

I put them in a separate container because I want to see the little ones when/if they emerge. I put them on top of a slightly damp paper towel in a plastic box with airholes. Will that be ok for hatching or should I bury them in some substrate. This is my first roach ooth. I'm kind of excited

First, they look viable to me. Small ooths and large ones can both hatch out. In the larger one in your photo you can see the developing nymphs as pale segments within the ooth casing. Imagine a milky orange-wedge shaped egg with several others all lined up within the case. I took the liberty of enhancing your photo to illustrate this (I highlighted the egg in the ooth):

Visible eggs are likely viable but no guarantee. They can dehydrate and still look like that sometimes. If the egg died right away, though, it may look like a dark cell or look like the egg is missing in the row. In some species the ootheca takes on a color or darkens and you can't see for certain. Ootheca should dry hard when deposited. Some species even glue substrate over the ootheca which seem impossibly hard for a nymph to get out of, but they do.

Now look at the protrusions that I pointed to with the red arrows. In most species, it is absolutely imperative that you DO NOT handle the ootheca ! ! Mostly because these apparatus are very easily damaged and/or affected by human skin secretions. These little 'nodes' are how the developing nymphs breathe and take in water vapor so they do not dry out. Damage unseen to the human eye can kill the nymph connected to the node. Handling them is no guarantee that you would kill the ooth, but it is likely to knock off some or several of the nymphs, if not all, so just don't handle them any more than necessary.

Now this will really flip your lid... the best way to incubate an ootheca is to leave it exactly as the female roach put it. Ootheca can be hatched out in a seperate container, but the best way to do it is in the same substrate in the same kind of container that they were originally deposited in for best results. Just the way you found them, then continue to water just like when you had the adults running around, by mist or water gel or however to keep the humidity the same. Keep the temps the same, etc.

Ootheca of different species can take 3 weeks to over a year to hatch. With polyphagids I think it takes 6 or 7 months but I am not complete sure about that. With P. aegyptica I think the ooths hatch a little sooner, like 4 months, but I have not timed one so I can't say for sure.

[Roachsmith]

Wow! That's really amazing. I didn't know all that about ooths. Thank you! I think I better put them back in and leave them alone. Hopefully I'll have some babies in a few months!