Narrative

Cockroaches (Family Blattidae) are sometimes given separate order status, but here are included with the Orthoptera. There are about 3,500 roach species known in the world, and about sixty of them are found in the United States. (Many additional species await scientific description.) The roaches are an old group of insects as fossils over 300 million years old have been discovered.

Several species of roaches infest houses and other buildings and are difficult to exterminate. They hide in the day, and are active at night eating tiny particles of food.

Several of the better-known pest species are:
Blatta orientalis - Oriental Roach
Blatella germanica - German Cockroach
Periplaneta americana - American cockroach
Periplaneta australasiae - Australian cockroach

Taxonomy

References