The Bugs!!!!

[JeffreH]

Wooooot! Love those guys! Congrats on the adults poison!

[poison]

Thank you very much Jeff Can't wait till I get my first babies from these guys. I heard they can have a LOT.

[poison]

What do you think, male and female?


Big size difference. The bigger one is missing a leg though

[JeffreH]

Any ventral shots?

[poison]

Lol. I gave up on taking the shots. They are just to red and my cam wont pic it up. I'll try again today. But the bigger one did die for some reason.

[JeffreH]

Sorry to hear that Poison =/ there will be more adults eventually I'm sure!

If you can't get good photographs, here is how you can try and determine yourself:

1) Look for styli in males. This is the easiest means of identification in some species (though I'm not sure if it is a universal rule). Every species, both male and female, should have two cerci on their abdomen used as a means of sensation, behaving much like a pair of antennae on their rear end. These often jet out to the side somewhat, but are positioned on one of the last abdominal segments. In a nutshell, you will see two little projections on the cockroach's butt. These will be in every cockroach, male and female...the cerci.


Styli are tiny projections that only MALES have, and these are oriented in-between the cerci. Basically, if you see 2 little antennae like projections on the abdomen, you likely have a female. If you see 4 (2 larger cerci located on the outsides, and the male's 2 styli located in-between these) then you have a male.


However, this is not true for all cockroaches to my knowledge. If you are uncertain about this, or there seems to be no clear styli in this species, we'll move on to step #2




2) Look at the last abdominal sternite (last segment on the underside of the body closest to the rear-end). This method can actually be used to positively ID sex of late-instar Blaptica dubia and other roaches before they reach adulthood.


If you flip your cockroaches over and look at them from the underside (ventral side) you can determine the sex. Notice that there are segments on the underside of the abdomen.... the very LAST segment, closest to the cockroach's 'butt', is what is called the abdominal sternite.


Females will have a very large last ventral sternite.
Males will have a very small ventral sternite.