Asian Flat Roaches
Welcome to another blog update!
I know I should be writing about my trip in Thailand, but I just got two new roach species, and I felt that I should share these fresh news first! As such, introducing to you the Asian Flat Roaches! Because the term “Flat roach” is already given to some Australian genus.
Yesterday I got from China, two new species of cockroaches.
One species with a black and white zebra like pattern, which belongs to the Homalosilpha genus, but unknown species at this moment.
Homalosilpha sp. nymphs
And the other species with a light brown coloration, which most probably belongs to the Mimosilpha genus.
Mimosilpha sp. nymphs
Both species are equally flat… and when I mean flat, I really mean it.
Homalosilpha sp. nymph
You may think I have stretched or distorted this photo, but I didn’t… the roach is so flat it gives the impression that the image has been stretched out. lol
After receiving a group of around 20ish, I rehoused them communally on a vertical enclosure with some bark slabs for them to hide behind. And gave them of course some food, which they immediately took.
Enclosure
Feeding on apples
I am still waiting to receive another mixed group of 16 or so nymphs from the same seller. I hope I can get them established very soon. And if all goes ok, to have them breeding for me! So wish me luck! :D
Mimosilpha sp. nymph
Homalosilpha sp. nymph
To wrap out the post, just share a curiosity.
From my research about their name, it seems that Homal or Homalos comes from Greek, which means flat, I wonder why lol. And silpha comes from Greek silphē which means cockroach. Hence the Asian Flat Cockroach.
Mimo was a bit more hard, and I can only find the following: comes from Greek mimos, meaning "mime”, which means "to imitate".
I think this is trying to make reference to the capacity of the brown flat roaches to imitate the bark in which they live in-between, the Bark Mimic Flat Roach.
Well this is all for this post! Thank you for taking the time to read!
And if you want to read more about roaches today, make sure to go read InvertebrateDude’s latest post! You will definitely enjoy!