Tiny yellow cockroach - Compsodes schwarzi

i would never have guessed this one is uncommon...

...based of what i see at my porch lights in c. TX (Brazos Co.)
during some nights you can see 10-20 of these on the outside walls of the house around lights
it's my favorite roach because i can collect it with a regular small aspirator, rather than reach into my pocket for a tube
i've got dozens mounted

all told, ~10 roach spp. show up at lights at my place -- all the usual culprits, i suppose: P. nivea, Ps. septentrionalis, both Ischnoptera, 4-5 Parcoblatta spp. (not sure which ones i'm getting, though)

on the other hand, i've never seen around my place any Periplaneta or Blattella (each represented by 3 spp. on the Campus, based mostly on student collections), or Picnoscelus (plenty on Campus) --or S. longipalpa, for that matter, which is the commonest indoors roach here, i'd say

members of some other genera, mainly blattellids, pop up in student collections every now and then (Cari- & ?Latiblatta, ?Chorisoneura...)

… v belov, 10 March, 2018 - 3:42pm

Interesting!

Perhaps they aren't as uncommon as previously thought then, just tiny and unassuming. :)

… Hisserdude, 10 March, 2018 - 4:22pm

yeah, but...

...i've never seen a single specimen in the student collections, which is weird; not that the students are good collectors, but it's kinda economy of scale (~130 collection submitted every semester), so everything shows up sooner or later...
in any case, i hope i eventually figure out all the species that occur in the area, that's how far my ambitions go...
i've never lived in an area with cockroach fauna this rich, so it feels almost tropical now, and quite exciting

… v belov, 10 March, 2018 - 4:31pm

Well I mean they are pretty bland looking,

I doubt many students would give them a second glance.

I envy you, here in ID we only appear to have one native cockroach species, (and I'm the only person who's even recorded that), and I've never even seen any pest species! -_-
Hope you are able to find even more roaches in your area!

… Hisserdude, 10 March, 2018 - 4:40pm

look, if you want some for your collection i will gladly send you a series, and also representative specimens of other local roaches

… v belov, 10 March, 2018 - 4:48pm

Thank you very much for the offer!

I don't actually collect pinned specimens though, just live ones! ;) I have kept colonies of most of the species you've seen so far, (except for Panchlora nivea and Ischnoptera bilunata). The main TX roaches I'm interested in are some of the more uncommon Arenivaga species, Eremoblatta subdiaphana, and Plectoptera picta. :)

… Hisserdude, 10 March, 2018 - 4:58pm

Maybe the myrmecophily makes

even winged males hard to find? Many insects are abundant in the right areas and invisible elsewhere

… C, 13 March, 2018 - 7:13pm

Not a Blattid, rather a Corydiid!

Particularly a rather uncommon little species known as Compsodes schwarzi, yours is an adult male. :)

Moved from Blattidae.

… Hisserdude, 3 September, 2017 - 8:37pm

Thanks!

Seems I unintentionally restricted my search to just one superfamily! Not that I could have matched this to the other photo on guide, anyway :)

… James Bailey, 3 September, 2017 - 8:45pm

No problem!

Happy to help! :) Thanks for the second BG record of this uncommon roach species!

The other photo on the guide does seem to showcase a much darker specimen than most of the C.schwarzi males I've seen, but it could just be the lighting. All of the adult males in my colony of this species look light yellow like yours.

… Hisserdude, 3 September, 2017 - 11:24pm

It's probably a variation

I've had a dark male pop up in my colony before.

… Alan Jeon, 4 September, 2017 - 1:07am

Cool!

Hope I end up seeing a dark male or two in my culture! Wonder if it's a morph that can be isolated...

… Hisserdude, 4 September, 2017 - 1:16am