American Cockroach House - Butterfly Creek 2011

American Cockroach House - Butterfly Creek 2011

The last area of Butterfly Creek is Bugs About. This is basically a collection of insects and spiders terrariums, but was really good, and of a very high standard with awesome species. First was an excellent, large (around 2m tall) house-shaped exhibit for American Cockroaches.

See Butterfly Creek Review here: http://www.zoochat.com/17/butterfly-creek-review-240146/

From a North American perspective, it is always funny seeing when our household pests (cockroaches) or common animals wandering our neighborhoods (Virginia opossums, raccoons) are exotic wildlife to someone else. I imagine that Aussies feel the same way when the rest of the world goes crazy about the kangaroos hopping around their suburbs and the lorikeets landing in their backyard bird feeders.

Does New Zealand have native cockroaches? I'm sure that they are much cooler than ours.

I was very excited when I saw a kea at the Woodland Park Zoo in Seattle. Would this elicit a yawn or snicker from most New Zealanders?

DavidBrown said:

From a North American perspective, it is always funny seeing when our household pests (cockroaches) or common animals wandering our neighborhoods (Virginia opossums, raccoons) are exotic wildlife to someone else. I imagine that Aussies feel the same way when the rest of the world goes crazy about the kangaroos hopping around their suburbs and the lorikeets landing in their backyard bird feeders.

Does New Zealand have native cockroaches? I'm sure that they are much cooler than ours.

I was very excited when I saw a kea at the Woodland Park Zoo in Seattle. Would this elicit a yawn or snicker from most New Zealanders?

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I don't think a kea would be boring to the majority of NZer's, and for a zoo enthusiast, seeing how other countries display your species is extremely interesting. However, some of the more common NZ natives (e.g. Paradise Shelduck) may elicit a snigger if being viewed in awe at an overseas zoo.

Butterfly Creek does, in fact, also display the Gisborne Cockroach, an Australian native introduced to NZ. The exhibit for this species is much smaller, if more naturalistic, as you can see in the attached photo. The Gisborne Cockroach is much flatter than the American. I think genuine NZ cockroaches are smaller and less flat than the others, and typically live in native forest, rather than near human settlement.

zooboy28 said:

I think genuine NZ cockroaches are smaller and less flat than the others, and typically live in native forest, rather than near human settlement.

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I would rather see cockroaches in their native forest than near human settlement (especially mine). Thanks for the info and picture.