Odorless Breeding of Crickets

[JeromeTabuzo]

Here is a secret to an odorless cricket farm.
Things you will need:
-container
-Scotch tape
-soil / compost
-Crickets
-Food for crickets
-half softdrink bottle
1.Buy a tank or container where you can contain the crickets , and a lid which can contain moisture (a few drilled homes might do)
2.Get moist soil or compost
3.Fill the tank atleast 1-2 inches of soil (this are the ones that prevent a foul odor as they decay the dead crickets , frass and etc.)
4.Then add a bowl for food to avoid molds
5.Then add a suitable hiding place or cut a softdrink bottle into half and place on half in the container
6.Place a tape around the tank or container to prevent escaping of pinhead crickets which you are gonna have
7.Buy your crickets , i suggest buying only females for they are likely pregnant
8.Then place food in the bowl and change if it rots
9.Then add your crickets.
10.Wait for 2 weeks to see the baby crickets
11.Remove the female crickets after one week , then transfer to another container to breed.
12.Mist the tank everday.
heres my setup:

theres a tape around the container , my phone wasnt able to capture it.
Any feedbacks , comments and questions will be appreciated

Happy Odorless Cricket Breeding!!!

 

[Galapoheros]

I kind of do it like that, I cover the bottom with soil like that. The only smell I get sometimes is an ammonia smell when frass builds up faster than it breaks down as they grow and eat more. I use egg crates for hiding but I think curled bark would better and would help keep the ammonia smell down a lot. The cardboard egg crates absorb moisture when it's wet and can smell bad even with no crickets or roaches! Since it's just me here, I don't worry about it haha.

 

[JeromeTabuzo]

I kind of do it like that, I cover the bottom with soil like that. The only smell I get sometimes is an ammonia smell when frass builds up faster than it breaks down as they grow and eat more. I use egg crates for hiding but I think curled bark would better and would help keep the ammonia smell down a lot. The cardboard egg crates absorb moisture when it's wet and can smell bad even with no crickets or roaches! Since it's just me here, I don't worry about it haha.

use a half softdrink bottle instead of a card board egg crate to avoid smelling

 

[Galapoheros]

They tend to grasp to things while molting though, plastic is too slippery. Do you know what species of cricket you have?

 

[JeromeTabuzo]

They tend to grasp to things while molting though, plastic is too slippery. Do you know what species of cricket you have?

Field crickets

 

[viper69]

What makes this an odorless setup ??

 

[JeromeTabuzo]

What makes this an odorless setup ??

The soil decomposes the frass and etc, which avoids stinky smell , a dish to avoid molds , and a plastic bottle instead of a egg carton , as egg cartons go moist and moldy. , when you try to smell the setup it doesnt smell that bad.

 

[Introvertebrate]

Nice work jeromeetabuzo. I just wanted to warn you that any second now, someone will hop on here and tell you to switch to roaches. Pretty much any cricket thread gets turned in that direction. :biggrin:

 

[Spepper]

I like this idea. If I ever need enough crickets that just breeding them would be way better than buying them for my needs I hope I'll remember this. It sounds like it would work great! :clap:

 

[Galapoheros]

Did you catch the parent crickets yourself?

 

[Tenodera]

When I bred Gryllus field crickets I also used soil and they did exceptionally well.
Right now I'm not convinced this would be an automatic fix for Acheta house cricket breeders. Because so many of them die and rot no matter what you do for them...

 

[Introvertebrate]

I've seen people remove the egg/soil container, and put it in a second enclosure specifically for raising the baby crickets. In his case, the original enclosure is for the babies, and he puts the adults in a second enclosure after they've laid eggs.

 

[Galapoheros]

When I bred Gryllus field crickets I also used soil and they did exceptionally well.
Right now I'm not convinced this would be an automatic fix for Acheta house cricket breeders. Because so many of them die and rot no matter what you do for them...

Yip!, sure agree there. I raise Gryllus now, I gave the house cricket too many chances. It went well one Summer but that's it. The Gryllus are bigger and better, including the "crazy reds" imo, the young pedes take them down with no problem over here.

 

[JeromeTabuzo]

Did you catch the parent crickets yourself?

nope i bought like 6 females from a store and placed them in the container and after two weeks they had that amount of babies.

---------- Post added 12-19-2013 at 03:05 PM ----------

Yip!, sure agree there. I raise Gryllus now, I gave the house cricket too many chances. It went well one Summer but that's it. The Gryllus are bigger and better, including the "crazy reds" imo, the young pedes take them down with no problem over here.

have u tried feeding lots of fish food for them? , this is what i do and none of my field crickets die.

---------- Post added 12-19-2013 at 03:06 PM ----------

Nice work jeromeetabuzo. I just wanted to warn you that any second now, someone will hop on here and tell you to switch to roaches. Pretty much any cricket thread gets turned in that direction. :biggrin:

For me crickets are easier to breed , they mature faster and give birth faster. I breed my crickets to feed my jumping spiders. I also own roaches , but it takes so long to give birth.

 

[Introvertebrate]

For me crickets are easier to breed , they mature faster and give birth faster. I breed my crickets to feed my jumping spiders. I also own roaches , but it takes so long to give birth.

Yup. People complain about a cricket's short lifespan, but feeders with short life cycles have their advantages. It only takes 2 weeks to get a culture up and running.

 

[JeromeTabuzo]

Yup. People complain about a cricket's short lifespan, but feeders with short life cycles have their advantages. It only takes 2 weeks to get a culture up and running.

Agreed. It would also have an advantage if we have many critters to feed.

 

[Galapoheros]

It's the "house cricket"(Acheta domesticus) that often dies when people try to raise them, the field cricket(Gryllus) is much more hardy. And when Gryllus do die, the others often eat it so it doesn't stay there, rot and smell. But I wonder if Acheta domesticus is called a "field cricket" over there. If you have a Acheta domesticus babies, you will probably have problems later. And if you don't have about 100 things to feed, you may end up cooking a bunch of them haha, they also make a lot of noise when adults. I feed the ones over here fish food(two diff kinds), greens, organic dog food and other things, no they don't die. It's Acheta domesticus that is kind of a problem with smells and dying, not so much Gryllus. Do you have pictures of the adults?

 

[JeromeTabuzo]

Ok so here's the pic of the adults:

 

[Galapoheros]

Oh yeah, that's a field cricket for sure, what are you going to feed them to?

 

[JeromeTabuzo]

Oh yeah, that's a field cricket for sure, what are you going to feed them to?

pinheads goes to my jumping spiders , and male adults will be fed to my fire belly toads , and the females are kept to breed. Extras are gonna be sold.
ive been feeding my crickets dog food , fish food , potatoes.