80 Circular No. 16. 



under stones or loose bark, and rarely come about houses. They 

 are all active, running insects, belonging to the same insect order 

 as the cricket and grasshopper, tho to a different family. 

 The roach is an ancient type of insect which seems to have 

 flourished during certain warm, moist periods of geological 

 times, of which fact we have evidence in very well preserved fos- 

 sil wings and other parts of their bodies. The group cannot be 

 considered decadent yet, if we may judge from the statements 

 of travelers in tropical countries. Roaches are often so numer- 

 ous there as to become a veritable scourge, even attacking sleep- 

 ing children and gnawing off their eyelashes, while foods of all 

 sorts are literally devoured by the hosts of pests that come forth 

 at night and run riot among provisions in storehouses and pan- 

 tries. The accounts of their depredations on shipboard, par- 

 ticularly in olden times when man seemed to be completely help- 

 less in dealing with them, are most shocking. Food is not 

 merely devoured but that remaining is so covered with filth as 

 to be unfit for human food. 



The Croton-bug (Phyllodromia germanica). The smallest 

 and most commonly troublesome roach in Kentucky households 

 is a small brown insect, both sexes provided with well developed 

 wings which are longer than the body and lie flat on the back. 

 On the shield-shaped piece just behind the head are two parallel 

 black marks. The length to the tips of the folded wings is about 

 0.56 inch. This roach is supposed to have been brought here 

 from Europe; at any rate it is not a native of this country. 

 The fact that it is completely adapted to life in dwellings indi- 

 cates that it is an old associate of man and probably originated 

 where he did in India or some other section of Southern Asia. 



While all of the roaches are more or less noctural in habit, 

 this one is often seen roaming about in the daytime, and some- 

 times helps itself before our eyes to food on tables of hotels and 

 restaurants. The name Croton-bug appears to have been ap- 

 plied to it when the Croton aqueduct of New York was com- 

 pleted and the insect began to attract attention from its abun- 

 dance about water pipes. It is now scattered thruout the 

 "onntry. but, does not, thrive in some households, while in others 



