Spotted Mediterranean Cockroach

Subject:  confusion about this bug
Geographic location of the bug:  Gloucester, MA
Date: 06/29/2018
Time: 07:32 PM EDT
Your letter to the bugman:  Hi! Every summer we find these, especially on the porch (climbing around on people in the hammock!), and up in the bedrooms. They look a little like cockroaches except they don’t care about light and they prefer dry places and we never see them in the house when it’s under 65° outside, which doesn’t seem to match any cockroach I ever heard of.   Also they only seem to come in the one form and they are small, around half an inch long, and very fast.  No obvious stripes or markings, just a shiny brown. Any help would be appreciated!
How you want your letter signed:  Tara

Dear Tara,
This is indeed a Cockroach, and based on BugGuide images, we have identified it as a Spotted Mediterranean Cockroach, Ectobius pallidus.  According to BugGuide:  “earliest record in our area: MA 1948.”  According to a comment posted to a BugGuide posting:  “A species that prefers to live and breed outdoors rather than indoors, nothing to worry about! 🙂 Any individuals that make it indoors will soon perish from lack of appropriate food and water if they can’t find their way back outside.”