um, what?

[juggalo69]

I was checking on my Discoids this morning and I saw a... well it is still attached to the roach but it looks kind of like the end of a nightcrawler. Is that an egg sack or something. I was under the impression that roaches give live birth. Also can I feed off of the first brood or do I need to wait for them to mature and breed again before I start using them. I started with like 13 adult/semi adult roaches. How many times will an adult roach breed in its life cycle?

 

[dtknow]

Female extruding her ootheca. She will retract it back into her body cavity and then some time later you will have babies.

 

[juggalo69]

So how long?

 

[Gesticulator]

Ootheca???

 

[Scorpendra]

egg sack thingy.

 

[Gesticulator]

So if B dubias are live bearers, they still have an ootheca??? What I have seen in the tub with the roaces were dried...are oothecas shed, then?

 

[Spaceman_Spiff]

The dryed ootheca you find with your B. dubia are infertile or aborted, no nymphs will hatch from them!
Other roaches (like Blatella germanica) atach their ootheca to structures and leave them, live-bearers like B.dubia retract the ootheca into a special bodycavity, where they are kept untill the nymphs hatch.
I've heard several times that abortion of ootheca is caused by stress, in my colonie it happens sometimes, but not frequently.
When your roaches always drop their ootheca, them something might be wrong (temps, housing etc.)!?

greets
Bernhard

 

[Gesticulator]

Thanks for the information, Bernhard. I have found 2 such aborted ootheca, and have about 20 adult female B dubia, so I don't think it's an "epidemic".