These cockroaches live in sandy soils and dunes in the southwestern United States, Florida and Mexico.

[2] The head has a pair of long, slender antennae, two large compound eyes and two protuberant ocelli.

The labrum is broad, and the frons and the hinder part of the clypeus are fused and form a bulge in a manner unusual for cockroaches.

The main means of distinguishing between the different species is close examination of the male genitalia.

[2] Females and nymphs live underground, "swimming" through the sandy substrate and residing in the burrows of small mammals with which they cohabit.