Are there any "replacements" for cicadas? Catch a singing cockroach, and you can catch the whole summer!

"If you catch a cicada, does that mean you catch the whole summer?"

Someone once asked this soul-searching question to an American cockroach in his hand.

I don't know if catching a cicada can capture summer, but I can certainly hold the noisy reminder of summer in my hand - if it's a male cicada. However, if you just want to pinch a small insect that squeaks, some cockroaches can indeed replace the role of cicadas .

Cockroaches that can sing love songs

When it comes to cockroaches, most people's impression of them is based on a few species such as the German cockroach and the American cockroach. However, cockroaches are a large animal family with nearly 5,000 species (more if termites are included) , and only a very small number of them like to circle around humans. Cockroaches like the German cockroach that have entered the house are really outliers in the cockroach family; but because they have the most contact with humans, they have become the most representative cockroach in the eyes of humans. It can be said that this is a kind of observer bias.

German cockroaches and American cockroaches are the most common cockroaches in our homes. Their only advantage to us is that they are as quiet as chickens. However, many cockroach species living in the wild are actually quite "eloquent" .

The most famous of these is the Malagasy hissing cockroach (Gromphadorhina portentosa), a large, wingless cockroach native to Madagascar that is now found on every continent—not as a house pest but as the most popular pet cockroach species.

Male hissing cockroaches in the Falkland Islands｜Insect Songs in the Mountains

Unlike the cockroaches at home, the habits of the Falkland Islands hissing cockroaches are like bison in the microscopic world: the males have a pair of strong horns on their chests, and they will hiss and ram each other with their horns to compete for their status, territory and the opposite sex in the group . This scene is like a group of young and strong male Homo sapiens, full of hormones and hierarchy, wrestling with each other with their voices: "The sound is too quiet! I can't hear it!" "No power! Try again!" "Good, very energetic!" In addition, they also use sound to attract the opposite sex and intimidate enemies.

These sounds are produced by rapidly expelling gas from the body through a pair of specialized valves ; although much simpler than the sound production method of cicadas, it is sufficient to help them achieve their purpose.

Although it sounds quite unique, the Madagascar hissing cockroach is a bit unremarkable in the colorful cockroach family. In its native Madagascar alone, there are many other similar-looking hissing cockroach species .

Another cockroach that can make sounds, Elliptorhina javanica, from Madagascar | Songs of Insects in the Mountains

Elliptorhina is a species of cockroach that is smaller than the common Malagasy cockroach and can also make a hissing sound by blowing air through its spiracles. After analyzing the sounds made by one of the species, Elliptorhina chopardi, the researchers found that this seemingly simple way of making sounds actually has a lot of mysteries.

When courting, they can sing a "love song" with their spiracles, which is different from the sounds of fighting/self-defense . The "love song" contains at least three sound signals, which sound like whistles and birdsong, and sometimes even overlap and cross overtones - cockroaches are the only animals besides birds that can make such sounds.

There are five more who can sing!

There are 20 species of hissing cockroaches on the island of Madagascar; however, they are closely related and use similar vocalization techniques. However, there are 5 other types of vocalizations in the cockroach family. (Madagasi Hissing Cockroaches: There are 5 more like me!)

In addition to the spiracles, the second way cockroaches make sounds is by rubbing their abdomens against their wings - obviously, wingless cockroaches like the Falkland Island hissing cockroach cannot use this trick. However, winged cockroaches, such as the Blaberus genus, can use this method of sound, including Blaberus giganteus, which has a striking large body and a white background with black spots.

Blaberus giganteus, adults and nymphs that look like trilobites live together | Song of Insects in the Mountains

The third type of vocalization is percussion: the sound is produced by striking the body against the ground . Some species, such as Leucophaea madcrac, beat the ground with their abdomen to produce a courtship drumbeat when courting.

Several species of cockroaches use ground-banging as a courtship tactic, but ground-banging takes on a richer meaning when true social cockroaches, termites, are considered. Many soldier termites use their hard heads and mandibles to pound wood rapidly, loudly enough to deter unwanted intruders.

The fourth method is a bit like a combination of the second and third methods: beating the abdomen with the wings . The Pacific cockroach Diploptera punctata is famous for this kind of performance.

However, it is famous not because of its bulging belly, but because it is a true viviparous insect. Unlike ovoviviparous insects, the Pacific cockroach does not simply hatch the eggs in its stomach, but directly raises the embryos in its body and secretes nutritious protein crystals to feed them. In other words, they are lactating insects.

The fifth method of making sounds is Nauphoeta cinerea, which uses specialized friction structures. The front face of this cockroach looks like a raccoon, which is still cute.｜Song of Insects in the Deep Mountains

The fifth type is a specialized friction sound-producing structure .

Nauphoeta cinerea has special scratches on the lateral rear edge of the pronotum and the front edge of the forewing, which can make a sound when the pronotum rubs against the wing surface. Similarly, in addition to scaring the enemy, the main purpose of their sound is to seek mates - cockroaches are really good at talking about love, in the physical sense.

Panchlora nivea is another type of cockroach that has specialized friction structures for both males and females to produce sounds | Songs of Insects in the Mountains

The last type of cockroach to be described comes from Megaloblatta blaberoides, which has evolved a file-scraper structure that is in principle the same as that of crickets - when the uneven "file" rubs against the hard, smooth "scraper", a distinctive sound is produced.

The cricket's sound files and scrapers are on its wings, while the cockroach's pair of "files" and "scrapers" are located on the sixth and fifth abdominal segments respectively. The generators on both sides are independent of each other; when the researchers destroyed the sound generator on one side, the other side could still function normally.

The Megaloblatta genus is a type of large cockroach that lives in the rainforests of Central and South America; how big are they? Not really (about 9 cm), but they are indeed the largest known cockroaches in the history of the Earth .

People often think that there were prehistoric giant cockroaches, but in fact there were none. In the Carboniferous period and the brief period of giant insects that followed, there were no cockroaches - the cockroach-like insect fossils left behind at that time were actually close relatives of the ancestors of modern cockroaches.

Blattodea in the modern sense is not ancient, on the contrary, they are quite young, but they have evolved six types of vocalization mechanisms, including true viviparous, lactating, and eusocial animals. It has to be said that cockroaches are really a class of animals full of evolutionary vitality and imagination.

Author:ChenZ