Cockroach Lab Set-up

Materials List

• Tygon Tubing - bore size 3/4" - roughly 3 ft in length

• cockroaches - can be orderd from Carolina Biological Supply Company. Recommendation - Periplaneta (12 Adults = $19.75) Catalog number #L730. These cockroaches will be about 3-4 cm in length

• electric or duct tape
• cotton
• dried dogfood or some other edible fragment of food

Directions

• Set-up
  • Take the tubing and with a very small pin puncture holes (only a few are necessary). Two larger holes will need to be made for the infrared LED and the infrared photoresistor. Be sure and place these holes directly across from each other and in the middle of the tubing. Put the LED and photoresistor in place. Cut some short lengths of tape. Place the cockroach, food, and some wet cotton inside the tubing. Tape the race track closed.

• Cockroaches
  • If it seems unbearable to pay for cockroaches you may substitute your garden variety (the bigger the better) or you could try crickets. The crickets can sometimes be bought locally at petshops or bait shops. If you don't have the time to look around you can always order from Carolina Biological Supply Company (L 715) at 12 for $4.95. The cockroaches are easy to take care of and need very little attention. Spare cockroaches can be kept in a plastic container (not cardboard - they can eat their way through). Put a band of vaseline around the top of the container so they can't climb up the sides. As far as food goes, they eat anything. If you don't want them making a mess of the container you should soak cotton in water and place it in a petri dish in the bottom of the container. When a roach is in the tube only put a very small amount of food in the tubing and only a tiny piece of wet cotton is needed to sustain them while they are doing the experiment. Anchor the food in the tubing (stick a pin through the tubing from the outside) so that the cockroach won't move the food to the taped area of the tubing.

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