# Best way to kill off excess feeders (roaches)



## Xaranx (Oct 14, 2008)

I'm looking for a quick, clean, efficient way to kill off my extra roaches.  Freezer is an option, but my gf freaks over a big jar of roaches sitting next to the ice cream.  And no I won't sell them because people are selling them for far cheaper than I would sell them for already.


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## spydrhunter1 (Oct 14, 2008)

Definitely the freezer..put the jar inside a plastic grocery bag to hide the act from the girlfriend.


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## arachnocat (Oct 14, 2008)

You could give some away. I'm sure there are people in your area who could use em. Otherwise, freezing is probably best.


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## clam1991 (Oct 14, 2008)

sell or find a friend who has a bearded dragon


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## Shagrath666 (Oct 14, 2008)

draw a big bullseye on some random building (or of someone you hate) and get a slingshot, and go nuts! make a game out of it!!;P  j/k 

ether alcohol works rather well, and then they dont have to go into the freezer next to the chunky monkey. just take a few cotton balls and put a generous amount of those in the jar and wham, no more roaches.


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## CT9A (Oct 14, 2008)

Get some reptiles, give them away or sell them to your local petshop, are in my opinion a better way to get rid of them. As far as for killing them. Id go with freezing or alcohol. As for discarding them, some people burn them to ashes.


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## dtknow (Oct 14, 2008)

Wait I don't get it. You'd rather kill these roaches then sell them for real cheap or give them away??


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## 7mary3 (Oct 14, 2008)

Yeah, I don't understand that. Dude, if you're gonna just kill 'em, send them to me. I'll pay you for the shipping. That's like throwing a stake down the garbage disposal in front of a starving man.


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## equuskat (Oct 14, 2008)

Yeah, doesn't make sense to me, either...:? 

Get yourself some hungry reptiles and amphibians...I snagged a Cuban Tree Frog tonight who has a JOB eating lots of roaches.  lol


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## CT9A (Oct 14, 2008)

If you dont mind, what kind of species are you raising? I would understand if it one of the less desirable species.


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## dtknow (Oct 15, 2008)

GP CT9A

If they are lobsters I can understand freezing them off since they can be slow sellers. But again I'm sure someone with an insatiable need for feeders could take em!


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## ZoSoLp510 (Oct 15, 2008)

That's easy! The best way to dispose of extra feeders it to get a few more animals that'll take care of them


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## Xaranx (Oct 18, 2008)

It is dubia's I'm raising, and it isn't that cheap to sell them off when you have none of the required packing materials, and would have to buy them in bulk just to get started.  And also when there are far more reputable people than I selling 100-150 for 20 bucks, it just isn't worth the trouble and time to do it.  If I had containers to ship them in already it would be a different story.


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## DITB (Oct 18, 2008)

how does someone get "extra" roaches in a feeder dubia colony?!?!?!
share your secrets!


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## testdasi (Oct 19, 2008)

Give your roaches out for free, dude. There are definitely more than 1 person in your area in need of some food for their inverts/reptiles. I think you are probably the only person with "extra" dubia and actually want to kill them.

Btw, packing dubia is very easy. You just need a container and some egg crate pieces/toilet roles. Throw the toilet roles into your current colony, wait for them to fill up, put the roles with roaches in the container with some dog food. That's it. It's easier than packing T's.


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## Xaranx (Oct 19, 2008)

DITB said:


> how does someone get "extra" roaches in a feeder dubia colony?!?!?!
> share your secrets!


The main reason I have too many is because most of my collection of scorps aren't big enough for adult dubias, and if they are, it's such a big meal they are full for 2 weeks at least.  So I have way too many breeders in there.  Lobsters are the perfect size feeder for me but I don't want any climbing species, or anything that could potentially infest my house (so no latteralis either, I live in the south).  I plan to try selectively breeding them a little smaller, gonna pull out the small ones I see and set them up in a different colony.   



> I think you are probably the only person with "extra" dubia and actually want to kill them.


I highly doubt that  

I ended up burning all the adult males (which is what this thread was for, all the extra males running around were fighting each other and wasting my food) and split what I had left with a friend who lost his colony to an eviction.


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## OldHag (Oct 19, 2008)

I have a dubia colony that is completely out of control!! I have so many its scary! I gave away a bunch a few weeks ago. The rest of what I feel are "Too Many" (usually the males.. it sucks to be a male in my house! ) I give to my chickens and duck! One chicken can eat hundreds in one setting!! Its beautiful! So.. get ONE chicken 

If its packing material your worried about and someone wants them bad enough they would probably send YOU a box to put the roaches in then pay you to send them back!


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## Xaranx (Oct 19, 2008)

OldHag said:


> I have a dubia colony that is completely out of control!! I have so many its scary! I gave away a bunch a few weeks ago. The rest of what I feel are "Too Many" (usually the males.. it sucks to be a male in my house! ) I give to my chickens and duck! One chicken can eat hundreds in one setting!! Its beautiful! So.. get ONE chicken
> 
> If its packing material your worried about and someone wants them bad enough they would probably send YOU a box to put the roaches in then pay you to send them back!


I'd totally be down for giving them away to people who send me the packing materials and pay for shipping, I'll probably do that in a couple months when my colony rebounds.  The chickens is an excellent idea, my neighbor has some, not sure how he would feel about the roaches though  

Anyone ever used them for fishing?


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## Galapoheros (Oct 19, 2008)

If the thought of getting one or two box turtles has crossed your mind recently, that will take care of extras too.  It's funny to watch them chase them down.


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## Mister Internet (Oct 19, 2008)

Xaranx said:


> Anyone ever used them for fishing?


You're not the only one... I've done mass kills in the past when I could find no buyers and the colony was starting to self-destruct from overpopulation.  The people yelling at you are just armchair quarterbacks, it's not just as easy as snap your fingers and find someone who will take roaches off your hands.  

So yeah, I actually tried using the nymphs for fishing once because I'm an avid fisherman... I took two dozen and ended up throwing 23 in the lake a half hour later.  The fish hate them.  Not sure why, but I'm guessing the defensive odor translates into a nasty taste in water or something?  That, or they just smell too foreign to fish for them to be interested.  I had panfish sucking the nymph in and spitting it back out, if that tells you anything... the same fish that will surface to eat your spit if you spit on the water near them


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## kingfarvito (Oct 20, 2008)

can I see colony pictures? I think im doing something wrong XD


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## Galapoheros (Oct 20, 2008)

I didn't have any luck fishing with them either, I thought it was a great idea at first but, only a couple of nibbles.  The doobs I have were mailed to me just because the other person was overloaded and said, "here ya go".  But I remembered and sent them some stuff later.  You could send them to people that want them and ask if they could send you a freebie later if they get babies from a T or something, anything that has a lot of babies.


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## Xaranx (Oct 20, 2008)

> can I see colony pictures? I think im doing something wrong XD


Here a pic from when I first set it up












The breeders have a private area to breed and do roach things and the tubes I empty into a plastic tub to feed out of.  The ones on the bottom usually have ~100 in them.  I keep a heat mat under the cork tile setup so they can move and thermoregulate, peak of 90 at the bottom.  Water crystals from www.watersorb.com, dog food/oatmeal mix as a staple with an apple or something once a week or so.    

You don't have to go that fancy, just get some egg craters and some tp rolls and toss them together they will be just as happy.  I'm probably gonna go that route myself next time I clean it out, makes it easier to cull undesirable specimens such as males or old females.  Here's a pic of my old setup with egg crates.








> You're not the only one... I've done mass kills in the past when I could find no buyers and the colony was starting to self-destruct from overpopulation. The people yelling at you are just armchair quarterbacks, it's not just as easy as snap your fingers and find someone who will take roaches off your hands.


I hear ya, anyone who has kept roaches for a year or more will understand heh.  At least the thread wasn't a complete waste, got some good ideas.


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## Snake_Eyes (Oct 20, 2008)

DITB said:


> how does someone get "extra" roaches in a feeder dubia colony?!?!?!
> share your secrets!


In my case I have 3 tarantulas and 1 centipede to feed. I've already sold off over 2,000 to the LPS.


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## syndicate (Oct 20, 2008)

packing roaches is easy.just put some of the roaches and an pieces of eggcrate into a delicup,toss that in a box packed well and your done ;]


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## elportoed (Oct 24, 2008)

how about trade?  I can use a few hundred to add to my colony.

http://www.arachnoboards.com/ab/showthread.php?t=138236


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## Xaranx (Oct 25, 2008)

elportoed said:


> how about trade?  I can use a few hundred to add to my colony.
> 
> http://www.arachnoboards.com/ab/showthread.php?t=138236


I'll pm you about this.


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## BestRoach (Oct 26, 2008)

I try and remove excess males from my dubia colony on a regulary basis, and the fastest way I have found to kill them is a quick trip down the garbage disposal with really hot water.

While I can see issues occuring if smaller roaches are dumped (escapes), larger males typically don't survive this method. I have not suffered any consequances since I started doing this, and have noticed no smell from the disposal. I feel terribly guilty afterwords, but for proper breeding it must be done.



If anyone finds themselves dumping adult females or mixed nymphs, please send me a private message. I will buy any and all dubia if the price is right...and will even send you the shipping supplies if necessary.


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## bhamgreg (Oct 27, 2008)

clam1991 said:


> sell or find a friend who has a bearded dragon


yup beardies love roaches.


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## brunoboy (Nov 8, 2008)

I've got an extra bin full of male b.dubias----I try to keep my colony at 1 male for every female.  Anybody want a bunch of males??


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## bhamgreg (Nov 8, 2008)

sure mail them to me i need more feeders LOL.


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## kupo969 (Nov 8, 2008)

Best way to kill off extra feeders? Get a Pyxie frog ;P ;P ;P


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## bhamgreg (Nov 8, 2008)

he siad kill off extra feeders not the whoel colony LOL


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## kupo969 (Nov 8, 2008)

bhamgreg said:


> he siad kill off extra feeders not the whoel colony LOL


LOL good point!

I would just keep them. The way I see it, it's better that you have extra rather than lacking of.


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## hinterwelle (Nov 11, 2008)

I do experiments with rogue lobsters that i find hiding out in other colonies.  I haven't had a colony of lobsters for over a year now but I'm still finding them.  All it takes is for a couple of babies to get overlooked somewhere and then it starts all over again.  But yeah, I pull their heads off and time them to see how long it takes their bodies to stop crawling.  It sounds mean, but its quite interesting.  Much like a chicken can run a short distance without its head, so can lobster roaches.  Actually, they last quite long like that. 20-30 minutes and some even longer.  Sometimes the antenna will still move on the head while the body crawls away.  Weird stuff.  And for the fishermen out there, fish don't like lobster roaches either.  I've caught one perch using a slide bobber, and i've had the hook cleaned off once while catfishing (there where like 6 roaches on one hook) but other than that, no action.


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## arrowhd (Nov 11, 2008)

I too have experienced the over population problem with B. dubia.  I just traded or sold some off.  I suppose freezing would work also.


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## Austin S. (Nov 12, 2008)

Haha if anything sell or trade them. Hell I could even use them.

I have 4 beardies all adults, 2 pacman frogs and enough tarantulas lol. I just ran out of my adult dubia's as well, now I'm waiting for the babies to grow up but its takin forever! I'll even trade some things for a good number of adults to get everything going if you'd want.


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## Just1nKas3 (Apr 30, 2019)

Bump - anyone in the California South Bay area need 40-50ish male dubia feeders? I could throw in some females & nymphs as well if desired. I just have too many and don't want to kill them...


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## Galapoheros (Apr 30, 2019)

Just1nKas3 said:


> Bump - anyone in the California South Bay area need 40-50ish male dubia feeders? I could throw in some females & nymphs as well if desired. I just have too many and don't want to kill them...


My local exotic pet store takes them, if you have one around you could call and ask if they want them.  I'm having a hard time getting my started again, don't know why.  I'd always get too many also but it's not going that direction for some reason.


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