Martin's Magnificent Mirror Spot Roaches!!!

Martin's Spring Gift Series Pt. 1/4

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Got another batch of amazing new roach species to worth with, courtesy of my good friend Martinho of "The Wild Martin" blog! 😁 Let's start this series off with the beautiful Pseudoglomeris aerea, AKA the "Mirror Spot Roach". 

This species occurs in mountainous regions of temperate China, and the common name refers to the silvery/black, slightly reflective spots going down the sides of the abdomens on nymphs and females.

They've entered the US and EU hobbies once or twice in the past, however they died out quickly since people tried keeping them warm (75-85F°) year round. After doing some research on this species and looking at the locales they were collected from in scientific publications, I found out this was a mountainous species, and in lots of it's native habitat the temperatures during the warmest month rarely exceed 78F°, and even then, their specific microhabitat in the wild is probably cooler, since they don't love temps much higher than 74F°. In the winter, temperatures in their habitat range from the 40s to 60s in F° depending on locality, and so in captivity it seems they also need a winter diapause to do well (low 60s seems to work just fine). This is a requirement a lot of the Chinese Pseudoglomeris share in common, such as P.angustifolia, P.beybienkoi, P.magnifica "Chinese Copper", as well as plenty of other roach genera from more temperate regions of China. Failure to provide these conditions usually results in death of the culture within one or two generations.

I've got my two adult females, one adult male and ~16 small nymphs housed in a tall, very well ventilated enclosure with vertical bark for hides. I'm keeping a third of the enclosure humid, the rest dry, and have them sitting at room temps (72-74F). I'm offering dog food, pollen/artificial pollen, and fruits as the staple diet. 

Now, these roaches have a base coloration of black (except for males, which have brown wings), but they are normally covered in silver and green hairs and have a copper/green metallic iridescence to them. However, my females are denuded, from shipping perhaps, and have lost a lot of their hairs. And my camera sucks at getting pictures of species with metallic coloration... So trust me when I say they look a lot better in person, or in Martin's pictures (which you should check out on the roach forum here).

Here are the best pics I could get... 😅

Female under flash

Female under natural lighting

Adult male

Adult pair

L2 nymphs

So far they're doing great, and all the L2 nymphs have now molted to L3, and are developing the silvery hairs and metallic coloration already. I'm so looking forward to establishing these in the US hobby, here's hoping my nymphs keep growing well, and that my females develop more broods and give birth in my care! 😁🤞

Huge thanks to Martinho for these beauties, be sure to check out his YouTube channel, which he's been posting to daily for the past month or so! Great, informative content on roaches and ants! 

That's gonna do it for this post, but stay tuned, so much more species to share that I've accumulated over the past month from multiple sources, including some I collected myself! 😄 Thanks for reading, hope everyone enjoyed, stay safe, and I'll see you all next time! 😉