FARMERS’ BULLETIN 658, 
or 
One other redeeming trait has been recorded of them, namely, that 
they will prey upon that other grievous pest of houses which are not 
subjected to careful supervision, the bedbug. Their habits in this 
direction have been recorded several times. One writer, in a narra- 
tive of a voyage,! makes the following statement in this connection: 
Cockroaches, those nuisances to ships, are plentiful at St. Helena, and yet, bad 
as they are, they are more endurable than bugs. Previous to our arrival here in 
the Chanticleer, we had suffered great inconvenience from the latter, but the cock- 
roaches no sooner made their appearance than the bugs entirely disappeared. The 
fact is that the cockroach preys upon them and leaves no sign or vestige of where 
they have been; so far it is a most valuable insect.? 
The cockroach is, however, far too much of a nuisance itself to war- 
rant its being recommended as a means of eradicating even the much 
more disagreeable insect referred to.* 
The local spread of roaches from house to house is undoubtedly 
often effected by their introduction with supplies, furniture, goods, 
etc. That the Croton bug, or German roach, and probably the other 
species also, may develop a migratory instinct has been witnessed by 
Dr. Howard and the writer in Washington.‘ This very interesting 
instance of what seems to have been a true migration, in which an 
army of thousands of roaches by one common impulse abandoned 
their old quarters and started on a search for a more favorable 
location, illustrates, as pointed out by Dr. Howard, what is proba- 
bly of frequent occurrence under the cover of darkness, and accounts 
for the way in which new houses frequently become suddenly overrun 
with these vermin. 
TRANSFORMATION. 
The roach in its different stages from egg to.adult shows compara- 
tively little variation in appearance or habits. The young are very 
much like the adults, except in point of size and in lacking wings, if 
the latter be winged in the adult state. In their mode of oviposition 
1 Foster, Henry. Narrative of a voyage to the Southern Atlantic Ocean in the years 1828, 29, 30, v. 1, 
p. 373-374, London, 1834. 
2 Proc. Ent. Soc. Lond., 1855, n. s. v. 3, p. 77. 
3 The following interesting letter from Mr. Herbert H. Smith, the collector and naturalist, gives a vivid 
picture of the roach nuisance in the Topics: 
Cockroaches are so common in Brazilian country houses that nobody pays any attention to them. They 
have an unpleasant way of getting into provision boxes, and they deface books, shoes, and sometimes 
clothing. Where wall paper is used they soon eat it off in unsightly patches, no doubt seeking the paste 
beneath. But at Corumba, on the upper Paraguay, I came across the cockroach in a new réle. In the 
house where we were staying there were nearly a dozen children, and everyone of them had their eye- 
lashes more or less eaten off by cockroaches—a large brown species, one of the commonest kind throughout 
Brazil. The eyelashes were bitten off irregularly, in some cases quite close to the lid. Like most Bra- 
zilians, these children had very long, black eyelashes, and their appearance thus defaced was odd enough. 
The trouble was confined to children, I suppose because they are heavy sleepers and do not disturb the 
insects at work. My wife and I sometimes brushed cockroaches from our faces at night, but thought noth- 
ing more of the matter. The roaches also bite off bits of the toenails. Brazilians very properly encourage 
the large house spiders, because they tend to rid the house of other insect pests. 
4U.S. Dept. Agr., Div. Ent., Insect Life, v. 7, no. 4, p. 349, March, 1895. 
