In a city with trillions of American cockroaches, the Houston Museum of Natural Science has agreed to pay a quarter per bug — up to 1,000 — as it seeks to populate a new insect exhibit alongside its Cockrell Butterfly Center.
Nancy Greig, the museum’s curator of entomology, insists the public payday for roaches isn’t just a marketing ploy.
“Absolutely, this wasn’t devised as a joke,” Greig said. “We needed more roaches for the exhibit, so I sent this message out to everyone in the museum asking people to bring them in. Well, someone decided to tell the press, and all hell has broken loose.
“But we really do need cockroaches.”
You’d think that one mating pair and the fullness of time would be sufficient, but what the heck. SciGuy has more.