Are there Flying Roaches in Maine (Portland, Old Town: daycare, house, live)

[Glittergurl]

Are there flying roaches aka palmetto bugs aka water bugs or anything similar (Palos Verdes beetles, June bugs,Circadas) in Portland Maine or nearby areas. I am referring to the huge roaches like you find in Florida, Texas, South Carolina and the tropics; they often come in the summers only in cold areas. Sadly, I am a huge roach phobic, particularly flying roaches. I actually feel very embarrassed that I am so terrified but thus is the nature of phobias--irrational fear. I am planning to relocate and checking out various states. I am in Northern California. Thank you in advance for your help.

[lawmom]

There are June bugs here, but I have never seen BIG A**ED ROACHES until I moved to southern NM last year. Holy cow, they came out at night especially, some flying and some not, HUGE ugly things!!!

Sorry, I'm not helping you, am I? I'm glad to be back in Maine where they are not.

Edited to add: I was wondering the other day if we have cicadas here. Every summer I hear a certain noise on the really hot days. And last week there was the weirdest, ugliest thing on my back steps. I've never seen one before. I suppose I should go do some googling.

[mainebrokerman]

i've never heard of flying roaches before, but i have seen japanese beetles, very small compared to roaches, and they usually avoid people

[OutDoorNut]

Originally Posted by Glittergurl

Are there flying roaches aka palmetto bugs aka water bugs or anything similar (Palos Verdes beetles, June bugs,Circadas) in Portland Maine or nearby areas. I am referring to the huge roaches like you find in Florida, Texas, South Carolina and the tropics; they often come in the summers only in cold areas. Sadly, I am a huge roach phobic, particularly flying roaches. I actually feel very embarrassed that I am so terrified but thus is the nature of phobias--irrational fear. I am planning to relocate and checking out various states. I am in Northern California. Thank you in advance for your help.

In Maine and all of the Northeast, I'd be more concerned about getting lyme disease from deer ticks.

[Maine Writer]

Originally Posted by lawmom

Edited to add: I was wondering the other day if we have cicadas here. Every summer I hear a certain noise on the really hot days. And last week there was the weirdest, ugliest thing on my back steps. I've never seen one before. I suppose I should go do some googling.

Yes we do. I saw one a few days ago. A little boy brought a praying mantis to show 'n tell at his daycare in Old Town two weeks ago.

[lawmom]

Praying manti (?) are cool!

[Glittergurl]

thank you all kindly for your replies. I very seriously phobic and appreciate your willingness to answer such a seemingly silly question. It is very important to me. Maine is on the the potential relocate list. sinere thanks!

[Zarathu]

I USED to have noral crawling roaches in my first rented house almost 40 year ago that were four inches long. You had to spray the RAID foam directly on top of them to take them out.

God forbid if the buggers could fly. Cr@p! They ate their way through the rubber seal into my refrigerator. I had to keep my silver ware under water.


Wiki: Cockroaches are among the hardiest insects on the planet. Some species are capable of remaining active for a month without food and are able to survive on limited resources like the glue from the back of postage stamps.[20] Some can go without air for 45 minutes. In one experiment, cockroaches were able to recover from being submerged underwater for half an hour.[21]


Ootheca of Periplaneta americana; Florianópolis, SC, Brazil.
It is popularly suggested that cockroaches will "inherit the earth" if humanity destroys itself in a nuclear war. Cockroaches do indeed have a much higher radiation resistance than vertebrates, with the lethal dose perhaps 6 to 15 times that for humans. However, they are not exceptionally radiation-resistant compared to other insects, such as the fruit fly.[22]

The cockroach's ability to withstand radiation better than human beings can be explained through the cell cycle. Cells are most vulnerable to the effects of radiation when they are dividing. A cockroach's cells divide only once each time it molts, which is weekly at most in a juvenile roach. Since not all cockroaches would be molting at the same time, many would be unaffected by an acute burst of radiation, but lingering radioactive fallout would still be harmful.[23]


I know pre-historic roaches too. did they fly?

[Northern Maine Land Man]

I have never seen a roach in Maine. We have no ticks where I live. We are just too far north. A few roaches arrived back in the 1970s in the Loring AFB area with military families from down south, but they died out within a couple of years.

[Zymer]

Originally Posted by mainebrokerman

i've never heard of flying roaches before, but i have seen japanese beetles, very small compared to roaches, and they usually avoid people

Yeah, I got to know them when I lived in Texas. Wake up at night, turn a light on and the walls would ripple, thousands of them scattering. Maybe I embellish just a tad but it was something to see. Got used to them after a while. Got used to shaking out my boots too, just in case something nasty and poisonous had crawled in. Glad we don't have many critters like that here.


Cicadas...run on a 7 year cycle I think. Sound like a loud whining hum on very warm days.