The Sexual Rituals of Insatiable Insects

by Sharon Kayne

I think it’s safe to say that there’s nothing more universally reviled than the cockroach. The little German roaches that look like long-grain wild rice are bad enough. But consider those big, black sewer roaches that look like pitted dates. Not only do they live in our sewers, on a subsistence of waste and filth, but those suckers can fly. I’m pretty sure that if I could fly, I wouldn’t make my digs in a drain under the toilet.

I heard a curiously interesting and really revolting fact about those big, nasty roaches recently: They can live for a week without their heads. You can cut one’s head off and it will wander around on your kitchen floor, bumping into baseboards and garbage cans, for a whole week before it dies of starvation. What’s worse, a friend pointed out the other day, is that they can still breed all that time.

Which leads me to the obvious, but unspeakable question: what sort of twisted, unfeeling roach would want to do the nasty with a headless mate?

I suspect modern science will never answer that question. In fact, I suspect that modern science is not even studying it. But it reminds me of another little-known insect fact that I find just as fascinating and perplexing: A female praying mantis will bite off (and consume) the head of a male praying mantis in order to get it to mate with her.

Now you’re probably wondering why the fairer sex of any species would have to go to such lengths to get a guy into the sack. Males are generally easily sold on having sex, and they’re not as picky about their partners as females are. But the male praying mantis will sometimes waffle—and with good reason—because the female of his kind is both larger and hungrier than he is. So a male mantis who’s not enthusiastic about the offer of a free fling will sometimes lose his head over sex, but not in the good way. Naturally, the female eats the rest of his body afterwards. I suppose it’s a sort of pre-emptive child support.

While ruminating over this unsavory scenario, I couldn’t help but wonder what sort of girl talk this mating ritual leads to when the praying ladies gather for girls’ night out. I can just see them sitting at a tiny bar, sipping mantis-size margaritas, discussing the guys in their lives when one of them confesses, “I bit his head off.”

“Eeeeeuuu!” the other shrieks, “I hate it when I have to do that.”

“Me too,” the first one continues, “but at least when you do, you don’t have to listen to them mutter ‘oh, baby, baby.’”

The second mantis would nod her head in sisterly empathy and ask, “So did you...?”

“Of course,” would be the reply.

Followed closely by a shy, “So … how was he?”

“Not bad,” the first one would say. “But I like them a little on the meatier side. That reminds me, do you wanna order appetizers?”

Of course, praying mantises don’t really have such complex and sophisticated social interactions. Their evolutionary inferiority is obvious. After all, they think nothing of eating in bed. I’ve been known to eat in bed, I must admit—but I draw the line at eating my lover’s head in bed.

Still, it might be nice to have the upper hand with men the way those sassy mantis gals do. I’m sure I wouldn’t actually use that kind of power to bite off my sweetheart’s head. But it’d be nice to know I could. And I’d never have to ask him twice to take out the garbage.

This classic Citizen Kayne column was originally published the week of Sept. 6-13, 2001, in Crosswinds Weekly, an alternative newspaper based in Albuquerque, NM.

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