crickets

[limz_777]

what food to use to feed these guys?

 

[Stylopidae]

Some form of grain (or dog food/fish flakes...dog food is made with Barley, so I consider it a grain), some form of fruit. The occasional small child.

Cheerios and potatoes are what I used to feed them, but I never had any success with breeding them.

 

[REAL]

Same as above

I also feed them cheerios (cheap excessive brands around my home) and random vegatables/fruits found in my fridge. They're not very picky so it wont be hard.

What they really really like are oranges, some of them go nuts for them. It both hydrates them and feeds them and what many petstores do just to keep them alive so they can be sold.

You should also give them some protein in their diet, lowers their hunger for each other (as suggested above with dog food except I dont have a dog and I'm not going to buy a whole can to feed 25 crickets)

 

[RoachGirlRen]

They also make pre-made dry or liquid & food gutload combos. Not sure how fantastic they are, but if you're worried about filling your crix with enough moisture and calcium, they supposedly do the job. I've used Flukers cricket diets before with good success.

 

[limz_777]

flukers cricket diet? what does it consist of?

 

[vvx]

Probably chicken feed at 300 times the price.

 

[intrepidus6]

I give mine a gutload w/ calcium, a commercial dry cricket food, a cricket food product that I forget the name of... it's little orange cubes that are moist and smell like oranges, carrots, bread, any kind of fruit or vegetable I have around the house, and commercial aquatic turtle food.

 

[Mack&Cass]

I use a commercial cricket food with added vitamins and minerals. Unfortunately the vit and min requirements of the inverts we feed crickets to aren't well known so the debate continues whether its beneficial or not (or even detremental. The most important thing to give your crickets is water. Gel water is the easiest because they can't drown in it and it doesnt cause any mould growth

 

[RoachGirlRen]

flukers cricket diet? what does it consist of?

Just to write back, flukers should only really be fed 24 hours prior to feeding as it has too much calcium for daily feeding. I would suggest a better quality dry food and liquid gel for daily feeding.

 

[Choobaine]

I never saw a reason to, my dragon is healthy and happy. I just take a whole apple. Cut some very thin slices out of the sides, give the little slices to my dragon and pop the whole apple in with the crickets. They take advantage of the little cuts and eat right through it.

 

[ZooRex]

Yeah, well I've been known to go a bit crazy when it comes to gutloading. I use oatmeal sprinkled with Mineral, Vital, Bee Polen, Color Enhancing Fish Flakes, and NatureZone's Cricket Total Bites for moisture. ~ Rex

 

[REAL]

Someone's gonna come around one day and be like "Recent studies show that gutloading feeders is not anywhere as effective as we might believe"

I dunno, they do that a lot in medicine, now I don't know whats good and bad anymore...

 

[Louise E. Rothstein]

My crickets eat scrounged and dried bread discards,organic cabbage stem slices,organic egg "skin" from inside eggshells,occasional dried Panchlora
casualties,and occasional organic African violet lvs for emergency moisture.

 

[Vfox]

I don't feed my crickets, I buy 50 at a time, I give them water gel, and I feed them off to my scorps every 3-4 days. I rarely lose one to starvation, and now that I got a starter colony of dubia roaches, I won't have to buy those smelly little things anymore. Which is great because crickets are over rated, both as a feeder, and as a breedable food source.

 

[christin]

I just started breeding crickets, I have a roach colony--but I need pinheads. You can get chicken mash (unmedicated) in a huge bag for dirt cheap. Package and freeze what your not using right away (and what you have space for), and toss the rest. It's nearly the same thing as the expensive cricket feed, but dirt cheap.

I have very few dieoffs. mostly from old age. mine don't stink, I keep the bins clean, with lots of ventilation. and I like the chirping. I use the gel for the breeders out of convenience, but plain old water for the babies, changed daily.

Roaches are easier by far, but I don't like feeding them to my smaller T's. The nymps burrow. and I have 8 in vials that need pinheads or smalls--petstores near me only carry med. and large.

ps - frogot, along with the mash, I use bulk fish flakes for protein so they don't canabalize

 

[Choobaine]

I quite like the sound - Day 1 you notice the sound and can't sleep well, Day 2 - you can't sleep when they collectively stop chirping, Day 3 - you don't notice any more.

I have two colonies in one, my dermestids keep the tank all nice and free of ammonia and it doesn't have any smell. I like crickets.

 

[sintakz]

I'm starting to grow quite fond of the sound. I used to listen to ambient music at night when I was trying to get into gnostic states of mind, now I have my crickets. What better ambience then real nature?