Ewwww!! Speckled Feeder Roaches

[Sdaji]

No no, the yucky stuff is on the inside!
If you want yummy insects, crickets and grasshoppers are pretty good. Mealworms are not bad (but a bit too rich to eat too many of them). Earwigs are nice, bees are really good (like crickets but sweet!), earth worms taste suprisingly similar to beef. Dragonflies are aweful (or perhaps I just don't know how to cook them). Live baby scorpions are really really yummy, but you feel to guilty to do it more than once! :cry:
Spiders are really good!!! (Sorry Nome!!)
Moths are nice, beetles are good, but too crunchy, same as cicadas.
Termites are okay, but only if you cook them properly. Many caterpillars are really, really good.

Well, looks like I've completely blown any chance of picking up any girls from this site
:lol:

 

[soulweaver]

woodies are cool, theres lots of things you can do to scare the crap out of them.....blow in the tub so they all scatter, flick the tub when there half way up the wall..........but after all this is done put a can of TOD in full view, helps keep them in line

 

[Sdaji]

I was thinking about getting a few kgs of roaches and dumping them in the middle of a McDonald's 'food' joint.
One of those fantasies I'll never act out.
Giving them away to herps and the VHS auction was probably better for all concerned

 

[instar]

Question for Mags please. I havent noticed any babys among my roaches yet, i spose they will get around to it but, when there are, whats the reason for separating babies? grow them up in a separate tub? How do you do it?(separate) I used your idea for cleaning the muck, holes drilled in a bucket and floun painted round the top, i just seive them with it, works really well!
how often do you clean em out? what do eggs/cases look like? i dont wanna chuck eggs out. help appreciated, cheers.

 

[Sdaji]

The eggs hatch immediately on leaving the mother, she then shelters the babies for an hour or so, it's quite sweet No need to worry about eggs.

 

[instar]

Thankx Sdaji, ive also noticed some are a greyish speckly color and some are white, whats going on here?

 

[Magpie]

Main reason for not breeding is not enough roaches or temps too low. The female extrudes an egg sack, which then goes under her wings or into a body cavity or something. The babies come out approx 30 days later I think, fully formed. Only reason to seperate is to get the size roaches you need into one tub.

 

[instar]

Thanks mags, temps are at 30c give or take a degree, but i have no idea what im looking for. so egg sacks arnt left loose on the bottom? I have 400grams at 55 days old, these are mature and should breed readily? by the way that Floun stuff works great! P.s frogs are eating full grown ones so i guess ill have to top up breeding stock till they start breeding.

 

[Magpie]

Do they have wings?
You won't get any babies untill 60 odd days after they develop wings.
White are freshly moulted, speckly are recently moutled.
If they are still moulting, they aren't fully grown yet.
I clean when they get smelly or there is about 1-2cm of crud on the bottom.

 

[instar]

Yeah quite a few have wings but not all. Ive been cleaning every 2-3 days, they get whiffy quick. lol thanks for info re colors. Thought i might be in luck with some rare albino cockys! :lol: dont they eat well too! a zuchini i put in there 2 days ago is almost gone! been giving them dry dog food too, always a carrot or something for moisture. might try an orange.
not bothering much with their diet as such, since ill dust them anyway. do they eat greens?

 

[Magpie]

Orange makes them smell even more.
Avoid cruciferous plants such as cabbage, brocoli and kale as these can cause hypothyroidism.
Avoid oxylates such as spinach and beets as these interfere with calcium absorbtion.
They do like lettuce though.

 

[rodentrancher]

We don't get too much odour in our big old cocky fridge. Hundreds and hundreds of the little crawly buggas! Ewww!! We feed ours carrots. They go through about 8 carrots every 2 days. Also give them the dry cat food dusted with calcium powder and skim milk powder. Got some heater cord in the old fridge for warmth. That works a treat! Vaseline around the inside and they can't get out.

 

[instar]

you ought to try some floun from the herp shop, chez, works great but much less messy than vaseline, and you dont have to explain embarressing jars of vaso around the place, lol :lol:

 

[OuZo]

actually im interested how you guys separate the diff sizes! we have little gex which will only take the teensy baby roaches but atm we just have to pick them out of the tub! which isnt too bad cos we only need a few at a time. i was reading about crix a while ago where you can put the egg laying container (once full of eggs) into a separate tub so when they hatch they are separate from the adults but how do you guys do this with roaches when they dont really lay eggs!

 

[instar]

I'll be using Mags idea Zoe, bucket with fluon painted round the top and holes drilled in the bottom, seive them out! of course youll get all the crud too, but big roaches will stay in the bucket. You could "chill" the lot but not too long, (smaller ones will cark it quicker and just pick out the little ones?

 

[OuZo]

oohhhh i thought u said that was for cleaning lol. so baby roach sized holes then? :lol:

 

[instar]

why not?

 

[OuZo]

will try that!

 

[africancichlidau]

That's the way to do it

 

[soulweaver]

nah just pick em up with your hands, less stuffing abt.