why do cockroaches die on their backs?
96882
A couple of reasons:\nRoaches cannot flip themselves back onto thier stomach once they flipped onto thier back, and so a flipped roach will eventually die. This is because in nature roaches would live on surfaces that are not as smooth as the kitchen floor, and will have some kind of bumps in the ground that could help them flip back. \nSecond reason is that pestocides contain nerve poisen, and when the roach is poisened, it will have muscle spasms, that will cause it to flip. \nBy the way, roaches die of pestocides because they are actually clean creatures. The pestocide will stick to thier feet, and they will lick it off and that's how they get poisened.
21750
big flying cockroaches
238189
Cockroaches, like all insects, breathe through a system of tubes called tracheae, a word similar to the name of the tube leading to our lungs. The tracheae of insects are attached to the spiracles which are small valved openings on the side of each body segment, excluding the head.  Thus the cockroach can breathe without its head!  The valves open when the CO2 level in the insect rises to an unacceptable level; then the CO2 diffuses out of the tracheae to the outside and fresh oxygen diffuses in. The tracheal system brings the air directly to cells because they branch continually like a tree until their finest divisions tracheoles are associated with each cell allowing gaseous oxygen to disolve in the cytoplasm lying across the fine cuticle lining of the tracheole. CO2 diffuses out of the cell into the tracheole. \n\nMost insects do not have muscular lungs and thus do not actively breathe in the vertebrate lung manner. However in some very large insects the diffusion process may not be sufficient to provide oxygen at the necessary rate and body musculature may contract rhythmically to forceably move air out and in the spiracles and one can actually call this breathing. This might be associated with such activities as the energetic flight of the migratory locust.
252802
yes, sometimes bugs will crawl inside people's ears while they are asleep.  these are primarily nocturnal insects who are seeking a safe hole to hide in.  thinking that they've found a cozy little nook that will protect them from predators, they hunker down inside your ear.  they don't intend any harm, and don't realize they're trying to hide in a person, they're just looking for a home.\n\nthere are several varieties of moth known for this, and cockroaches will also do this on occasion.\n\nit is possible for them to do some damage.  cockroaches may feed on the ear wax in the ear, and incidentally nibble on the flesh inside the ear.  they also have very spiny legs which can scratch and poke, making it very painful even if they don't do any permanent damage.\n\nif you get a bug in your ear, don't use a Q-Tip or other device to try and squish it.  that may cause it to retreat deeper, causing more pain or serious damage as it runs into the eardrum.\n\nthe best way to make them get out is to squirt the bug with some alcohol.  rubbing alcohol works well, but even vodka will do in a pinch.  oad up a syringe or even a water pistol and hit the little guy with a short blast.  the rapid evaporation of the volatile alcohol will convince the bug to exit out of there fast.  then you can squish it.
366509
This was a question that intrigued me as well. Whenever I sprayed a roach, it would always flip over and die on its back. Very strange. \nThe Straight Dope has some theories on this position. See http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a1_024.html .
810353
they breathe through their skin, and if their skin dries up they can't breathe, thats why u see all the dead crispy worms on the sidewalk in the summertime
1046830
If you go to the Tree of Life WWW page at the level Arthropod (Phylum), you will see that cockroaches are insects (Class Hexapoda) and lobsters are decapod crustaceans (Class Crustacea); they are two groups in the same phylum, URL:\n \nTree of Life (at Arthropoda level) - http://tolweb.org/tree?group=Arthropoda&contgroup=Bilateria\n \nYou can move up the tree to see how arthropods are related to other animals.\n \nBeyond classification which should reflect the lobster and cockroach evolutionary relationship, the term 'roaches of the sea' reflects the behavior of lobsters as omnivorous scavengers.   Cockroaches will eat almost anything organic and so will lobsters.   They clean up the dead and dying plants and animals in their environment.\n \nSo much for the delicious taste of lobster?
1017672
Because insects use a different type of respiratory system than people do.  Rather than breathe air in through centralized nostrils to their lungs, they breathe air in through a de-centralized network of smaller tubes located all over the surface of their body known as spiracles.\n\nBecause of the large area they take oxygen in through, they are able to store enough air to breath for an extended period of time when deprived of oxygen, as they are when they're trapped underwater.  The water's surface tension keeps it from draining into the spiracles on their body, which is why it simply doesn't flood their respiratory system and drown them.  \n\nUsing this method of respiration allows roaches extra time to find their way back to a surface where they can get more air, and cockroaches aren't too particular about where they live, being well armored and equipped to survive in just about any conditions.\n\nSo, when you flush the roach, it just holds its breath, goes along for the ride, and when it gets to the sewer either drowns eventually or just crawls its way to the surface and moves on with life.\n\n\nP.S.-- This is also why pesticide makers have to either find an ingredient to break down the surface tension of water they suspend their poisons in or just go with another liquid base for their poisons... if the surface tension of the water is normal, the poison just sits on the outside of the roach's dead armor shell, and it holds its breath and waits until it dries off and the poison is no longer an issue.\n\nP.P.S.-- Have you seen how misclassified most of the questions on Yahoo Answers are?  Folks are asking jokes in philosophy, biology questions in engineering, sexual health questions in cooking, cooking questions in religion, and questions about dogs in the math section.  I'd be willing to bet a lot of people don't bother to pay very much attention to where the question is classified any more.
915195
Good question. Perhaps birds, their main predator, are sleeping at that time making it more safe to forage for food or collect nectar and so forth. So then why don't all bugs just do that? Not a question that is easily answered. Perhaps other bugs are much better at escaping becoming lunch or reproduce more rapidly. I am not positive about that. Bugs, and sometimes a lot of animals, don't always do things that would seem logical to a human being. But the way the question is posed it does make it appear as though the moths are somehow contradicting themselves or doing this that don't seem totally logical.
1046240
Absolutely not. People believed that the eggs could be carried on shoes and eventually hatch somewhere else. If a cockroach dies then so does the eggs because they cannot survive in a dead body or outside of it. To kill them is a matter of personal preference, squash them,spray them or put poison down
255563
Dead things often end up on their backs because that is the equilibrium position with their center of gravity lowest to the ground. Dead fish float upside down because that places their center of gravity nearest the surface. Either way, the energy of the system is minimized. SUVs easily tip over for the same reason - too high a center of gravity
414007
Yes, hot (preferably boiling) water would indeed kill cockroaches, assuming you could keep them in the water for the several seconds it would take to kill them.\n\nCockroaches, like most insects, have a waxy coating or cuticle on their exoskeleton that aids them in regulating water loss from their bodies.  Because of this, most insects have at least some ability to swim, and cockroaches are no exception.\n\nAssuming you had a captive cockroach and a pot of boiling water, what would probably happen is you would drop the cockroach in the pot, and the cockroach would immediately swim for the edge of the pot, climb out and run away before the boiling water killed it.\n\nShould you be able to contain the cockroach and keep it from getting out, it would indeed die.\n\nWe often use boiling water to kill insects before identification, because the boiling water kills them very quickly, but without deforming or discolouring the insect.
193153
It is called regeneration. Worms can do it because they have more than one heart. If you separate the worm a part with a heart in it will keep living.\n\n-Trey
580128
Cockroaches sometimes bite humans, but not often. Their bite by itself will not cause disease, but if the cockroach came into contact with disease-causing organisms before biting then a disease may be transmitted. The bite marks should appear as small, scabby areas. Sometimes sleeping infants are bitten around the mouth by cockroaches that are attracted to spilled milk or food in that area.
1024985
that's good question and i don't know. Maybe because of legal stuff. Like, if you can't speak or write or otherwise communicate, then yous assets and rights and stuff gets handed over to someone who's responsible for you. But since cockroaches can't communicate, any of them, then we kind of silently give responsibility for them to ourselves, collectively, and so we can do whatever we want.\n\nThat's just for cockroaches, though. I know some animals (dolphins, dogs, etc.) that can communicate with us, but people still kill and sometimes eat them. \n\nIt's because you humans think you're better than everything else.
614116
In some areas, cockroaches are able to live outdoors, and make their way into human habitation from there.  Of the 4000 or so species of cockroach worldwide, only about a dozen are household pests.  Most of them live quiet lives on the forest floor and never bother anyone.\n\nThose few species that do become pests, though, are pretty major pests.  In areas where they cannot live outside, they get into homes by being carried in with contaminated foodstuffs, or even egg cases (ootheca) carried in on clothing or in the cracks of shoes.  Sometimes adults will hitch a ride from one building to another.\n\nAt one time the BioSciences building at the University of Alberta was infested with cockroaches.  After one lab, I picked up my backpack and a bunch of cockroaches ran out of the back pocket (where I had foolishly left an open bag of chips).  I left my backpack outside that night.
1046568
No, cockroaches have exoskeleton - meaning that the bones of theirs are on the outside.