breeding crix/mealworms

[da_illest]

I've never really paid much attention to this forum but i've been reading thru it and it's very interesting....

i'm currently breeding crickets and mealworms and have had success with both so far... i've noticed that a lot of you guys don't like crix cause they're smelly, loud and all that.. well i keep my 4 by 3 foot tub with adults in the furnace room so i never hear or smell them so it doesn't bother me.. recently i've hatched pinheads and it's really not hard at all... i find a lot of what the net says on how to breed not true really.. i left a tub of moist peat with gravid adults (2 females to every male and about 14 females) in a 1 gallon rubbermaid tub for two days.. i then took out the crix and misted the dirt at the room temp that they where in which is 70 to 80 degrees.. at one point i made the peat wet, at another it dried.. so i gave up but was too lazy to throw the dirt out.. one day about two weeks later i noticed hundreds of pinheads running around... this was 5-6 days ago i think, and their still hatching! i have like 400 pinheads in 4 different 1 foot by 1 foot plastic containers with egg cartons, flukers crix food, and damp paper towel which i dampen everyday..

i only have 6 t's and a frog who all eat crix but i found myself constantly buying crix for $1.50 per dozen.. so now i'm all set for LONG TIME!!

i have about 200 mealworms 40-50 of which are beetles and laying eggs as we speak!
Anyways moral of the story is, don't give because your crix didn't hatch when they where supposed to.. they'll come eventually!

 

[Navaros]

Why buy a dozen for 1.50 when you can buy a box of 1,000 for 12-15 dollars? IMO, from the time of hatching to the time where the crickets are actually a usable size for most stuff, they just aren't worth breeding.

 

[spyderguy1983]

I have also found that it often takes quite a few weeks for pinheads to hatch. I also have let the soil dry out and still had success, contrary to much of what I have read. Crickets are very easy to breed and I recomend anyone who has a lot of pets to feed to breed them. I keep mine in large rubbermaid containers in my T room and dont have any trouble with smell as long as I keep the containers relatively clean.

 

[Brando]

I would think it would be more fun to breed your own food for your T than to go buy them from the "evil" pet stores hehehe. I am going to try and breed some crickets starting this week. Any other suggestions besides whats been posted, food or setup?

 

[Dark Raptor]

Yes, breeding your own feeders is much cheaper than buying it in shops. Some of them (large roaches) can be also very attractive terraristic animals.

I've got these species:
crix (2 sepcies - Acheta domesticus and Gryllodes sigillatus - earlier I had 5 species)
mealworm (Tenebrio molitor)
bean beetle (Acanthoscelides obtectus)
superworm (Zophobas morio)
roaches (Nauphoeta cinerea, Blaberus giganteus, Gromphadorhina portentosa)

I spend some money on electricity (heating, light ect.), but I get much more money from selling surplus feeders. This helps me extend my invertebrate collection. I don't need to buy special food, they eat almost everything that is hasn't been used in our kitchen (fruits, vegetables, meat).

If you have good ventilation, you don't need to worry about smelling crix, except for Gryllus bimaculatus. This one is terribly loud and smelly.

 

[galeogirl]

I used to breed crickets, lobster roaches, and mealworms back when I was feeding lots of herps and inverts, but for the 10 ts I have at the moment, I'd spend more time taking care of feeders than pets.

Getting to the petstore for feeders can be a pain, though, too.

 

[death1]

eeesh

I've got about 15 L. geometricus and was buying 3 dozen per week. And I mean I feed these things to the bursting point. When I'd have a few left I pop them in a little container with some peat. Nothing yet but I'm working on it.

 

[Brando]

Well i started my cricket breeding yesterday, i went out and got 25 crickets for free from petco(some promo they had going). Then i put them in a big tupper ware container with a bowl of food, water, some papertowel rolls, and a container with some moist ecoearth. Then i put the container in my closet and man did they start chirping. Man these buggers are loud, they chirpped all day and night, my cat was going crazy trying to figure out what it was. I will probably check in on them in a day or two and switch them out into another container and check for eggs.

Do i need to provide a heat or light source? It usually stays pretty warm in my room and the closet doesn't have an air vent so its probably warmer in there.

 

[ScorpDude]

The warmer they are the faster they reproduce, grow, eat, etc etc

no light is needed.