Cockroaches are skipping sugar to get more sex, populate

They’re not looking for sugar daddies!

German cockroaches are evolving to dislike sugar and female cockroaches are avoiding mating with their sugar-loving male peers, according to a study from North Carolina State University published in Nature in May. 

Dr. Ayako Wada-Katsumata and his team of entomology researchers found that the most effective mating pairs in the study were between female and male roaches who both avoided sugar and that the least productive pairing were between female roaches who avoided sugar and male roaches who ate sugar.

In order to get lucky in the bedroom, the sweet-toothed male roaches quit sugar in order to appease their female counterparts, the study found.  

This could pose health and housekeeping problems for humans.

Since pesticide products are made with glucose, a simple sugar, to mask its less sweet toxic ingredients, roaches’ diet and mating habits could lead to a new generation of pesticide resistant bugs, Salon reported. 

Pesticide products with glucose could thin the sugar-loving roach population even more by selectively killing off roaches who are attracted to its saccharine scent, leaving behind a group of sugar-free bugs ready to reproduce with one another.

German cockroaches, one of the most populous bugs in the world, are known to carry a host of dangerous bacteria that could make both humans and animals ill. A growing pesticide-resistant roach population could cause a public health crisis in the future. 

While some roaches are quitting sugar, one roach in NYC seems to have developed an unhealthy smoking habit and was spotted with a cigarette in hand earlier this year.