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Unknown species of Parcoblatta adult male.  Median segments like Parcoblatta caudelli.

Caught from Wake County (?), North Carolina

More pictures of this male here

Caring for Aquatic and floating plants

12/26/2014

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PictureMy guppy grass (Najas guadalupensis). The dirt (potting soil) you see on top of the plants is what I put in a few days ago because I have not given these guppy grass any fertilizer in a while. Be careful not to kill the water plants with an overdose of fertilizer.
The plants I just gave you are simple to keep.  You need some water and soil.
If you do not put in a little soil in the container with water, the plants slowly die I think because of lack of nutrition.  

The water in the container can be shallow or deep (I usually prefer shallow, 3 or more inches deep of water) and the soil can be an inch or less deep.  

If you use fertilizer, do not use too much or you will burn/kill the water plants.

You can also just put in a fist full of potting soil that does not really make a layer of dirt on the bottom, but the guppy grass might need a layer of substrate or a synthetic sponge for it to grow it's roots into, the floating plants like the frog bit love to grow their roots all the way from the surface where they float down to the substrate.

After you got the plants in the container where you will let them grow, you should not shake their container or move the plants around while they start growing their roots.  Just leave them alone for a few months (not exactly sure how long it takes) for them to grow roots into the soil in the container with water.  Also, if the water evaporates, pour in more water, but do it slowly/gently for the plants.

Put the plastic shoe box or goldfish bowl (whatever you are keeping the plants in) in an area with some sunlight.  More sunlight is better, except for the guppy grass (Scientific name: Najas guadalupensis) which will burn if kept in strong sunlight.  I gave you just a small amount of the guppy grass so you might not be able to grow them.  I will get some more of the guppy grass next time we see you.  The guppy grass I read are sensitive to different water conditions from what they are used to growing in, such as when put it in a new tank.  So the guppy grass might take a while to get started growing, but after it is doing alright and growing roots they will probably grow well.  

The guppy grass can be kept with much less sunlight than the other plants I gave you, and the guppy grass I think could live with just artificial light.

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Frogbit (Limnobium laevigatum). If you give these some soil and a lot of sunlight and leave them alone in stagnant water, they will grow very well and fast with long strands of roots going down all the way to the bottom of the container filled with water.
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Fairy Moss and Frogbit. You can see some damage on the Frogbit's leaves that was caused by the cold or freezing water. I was told these Frogbits are not able to go through winters, but these Frogbits in this particular plastic bin on our back porch have only died back a little.
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Some Parrot Feather plants and floating Duck Weed plants (Lemna species).
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You can see how shallow the water is, and the plants grow fine like that.
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To give you an idea on how big this container is, that is my left hand touching the corner edge of the container.
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Another picture of another container!
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Blue gill (?) juvenile in a small aquarium with frogbit. The frogbit on the top in this photo have very short roots. If the frogbit is cared for better by letting it have stagnant water and a little fertilizer, the frogbit would grow very well with big leaves and long roots.
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Psychomantis borneensis

12/14/2014

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Here are some links to pictures of Psychomantis borneensis.  Hymenopodidae; Acromantinae; Acromantini.
http://www.boldsystems.org/index.php/TaxBrowser_Taxonpage?taxid=303803
ID by Dracus
https://www.flickr.com/photos/artour_a/355519055/in/set-72157618071726495
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New genus of Praying Mantis (2014) Mantidae; Mantinae; Polyspilotini; Tenospilota Roy & Ehrmann, 2014

12/14/2014

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New genus: Tenospilota nova.  Mantidae; Mantinae; Polyspilotini.  Mantodea.speciesfile.org. http://mantodea.speciesfile.org/Common/editImgSnd/GetThumb.aspx?ImageID=199846&Width=640

"Plistospilota nova".  The last Beier, 1930 (Page 452) https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0B_iJfIsJ4GB0NTY4MmEyY2QtZGM5My00ZmMxLThlYTMtYzViZTVkNjdiOGNj&usp=drive_web&ddrp=1#
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Parcoblatta female found in Southwestern Idaho!

12/3/2014

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"Hisserdude" on Roachforum.com caught a female Parcoblatta (looks like Parcoblatta americana) as a sub-adult from southwestern Idaho, Boise Idaho.  I have read that there are no native roaches in Idaho, Montana or Wyoming from here:  http://insectexpertphd.com/cockroaches.aspx

     He has allowed me to post some of his pictures of her on my blog, here:



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How to care for Cockroaches (Blattodea)

12/1/2014

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How to breed and raise cockroaches.  Because some people may have no idea how to keep roaches here is some general information over how to do it.

Gather a lot of deli containers. lol Put many needle sized holes on the deli container lid or cut out a chunk of the deli container lid and glue small screening (such as no-see-um screening) to cover the patch on on the lids for oxygen and ventilation. Get something like potting soil. Put a layer of potting soil of about 1cm deep or less in the deli container. Put a few pieces of bark that do not grow mold, and a few dried leaves. First test to see if the particular roaches you have do better in a semi moist or slightly dryer than that conditions. I have kept my roaches in the past too moist and so they did not do well. Keep the substrate just a little moist to a little dry on the surface on the substrate (some species of roaches though may need to stay moister than this). Feed them bread or other stuff. There should be some foods to avoid like coconut oil (I have read that it is toxic to roaches) and things with pesticides. Store the deli containers with roaches in a shady spot where the sunlight does not shine on the roach deli containers because sunlight will heat up the deli containers until it gets too hot for the roaches and so the roaches roast to become BBQ. lol I do not know of much else you need to do.  Some roaches have less tolerance for extreme heat than others, for example Byrsotria sp. "Cuba" cannot withstand some hot temperatures that other roaches like Turkestan roaches and Pycnoscelus femapterus can live through.

Keep the oothecae like the roaches.  Probably for most species slightly moist conditions is best for oothecae, but that possibly is not true for some species, like desert Arenivaga possibly will need dry conditions for the oothecae (I do not know.).  

You can also try using net cages to breed roaches. Just keep some substrate on a plastic sheet on the bottom of the net cage and keep the substrate moist (Because you have so much ventilation in a net cage you probably will not have problems with too much moisture.). Put slabs of bark on top of the substrate in the net cage for shelter for the roaches.


Other types of cockroaches, like the Blaberidae will probably do better with different care, with deeper substrate and some rotting wood.  The Blaberidae are usually easier to raise than most egg laying species of roaches.
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Pycnoscelus nigra (Shadow Roach)

12/1/2014

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Large nymph of Pycnoscelus nigra
Beautiful black roach.  These are said to be parthogenetic and the females reproduce without males.  I do not know if males of this species exist, but at least in the hobby there seem to be only females.  These love to burrow and eat through moist, soft rotting wood.  I care for this species of roach like Pycnoscelus femapterus (I even keep the two species together in the same containers) and like P. femapterus I have had the same problem in that without dead oak leaves or wood these roaches started to die off.  
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