Termite-ancestry
Guides
Cryptocercidae
brown-hooded cockroaches, wood roaches
Cryptocercidae is a family of wingless, subsocial cockroaches comprising the single genus Cryptocercus. These insects are obligate inhabitants of decaying wood in temperate montane forests across eastern Asia and North America. They exhibit extended parental care and share wood-digesting gut symbionts with termites, supporting the hypothesis of termite evolution from within cockroaches. The family is notable for its limited dispersal ability and sensitivity to forest succession patterns.