B. craniifer are ovoviviparous cockroaches and mate once at a time. The act of mating begins with the female emitting a sex pheromone, which stimulates loco-motor activity in the male to approach the female. While the female emits the sex pheromones from pygidial glands, which are located posteriorly on the abdomen, she will also assume a calling posture. The male touches the female with his antennae to assess her as a sexual partner. The male raises his wings and wingsheaths vertically and rotates 180 degrees. The female turns and moves towards the males' abdominal tergites, where an aphrodisiac sex pheromone made exclusively by males is emitted through secretions. A close relationship is known to exist between the release of these pheromonal signals from specific glands and the corresponding behaviours of female calling posture and male wing raising. The female licks these secretions while the male slides backwards underneath the female and hooks the edge of the subgenital plate with his phallomere. The female allows insertion by the male into the genital atrium by turning 180 degrees and opening the abdominal cavity. The spermatophore is made by the male inside the females' genital atrium, which is rejected by her multiple days later due to the secretions of her spermathecal glands. Several days later, an ootheca is laid and placed by the female into her brood sac. The gestation period for B. craniifer lasts 55 to 65 days. After this period, the ootheca is ejected and the larvae free themselves from the embryonic covering. During the preoviposition period and during gestation sexual receptivity of females is inhibited. Both sexes have fully developed wings, but can be distinguished in that the females have a much larger subgenital plate than the males. While sexual dimorphism of the antennae is often seen in other cockroach species, such as Periplaneta americana, no antennal sexual dimorphism is apparent in B. craniifer. Citations External links Black and white photograph of top view of B. craniifer nymph, from Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collection Cockroaches Insects described in 1838