Blatta lateralis climbing glass/plastic?

[Laura519]

I am continuing to study my lovely parthenogeneically-produced Blatta lateralis to see if they, too, become adults and reproduce (ok fine--they are all being awfully, scary slow at molting). My mother came in today with a cockroach in a glass (it is a testament to the love she has for me that it was still living AND that she froze it for me instead of smushing it). Now, it looked rather like one of mine but was light-enough that I kind of wondered if it might have been an American nymph, except the bug guy who comes once a year came two weeks ago said there were no traces of cockroaches.

Long story short, there is a possibility that the roaches could escape through a small gap in the top of the bin IF they can climb vertical plastic. I have never had a problem with this before when running the experiment proper, but I was missing a roach from one of the bins (and thought it dead and eaten by peers before Mom found the one). Does anyone have cases of this happening? If anyone has cases of this happening, is there an airtight plastic bin out there I can purchase before college? And if not, would a seal of vasaline around the edge work? Do you ever have to refresh the vasaline?

Thanks.

 

[Ozymandias]

i mean thay shouldn't but i do have to admit while the reason the escape for me is because my fault when getting some to feed to my reptiles. thay still get into some of my other roach colonies and i have no clue how, though to be fair once thay get into the colonies thay tend to stay there.

 

[Oderus]

I've found lower instars and adult males of B. lateralis can climb plastic to some degree if I leave even the slightest mineral residue from my hard water after cleaning. Once I saw what was happening I countered this using the packing tape trick at the top corners of my boxes, and since doing that I've only lost those that give me the slip when working with them.