Discoids not using vertical egg crates..

14pokies

Arachnoprince
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Oct 25, 2014
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Usually The only interaction I have with my roaches is tossing in food and removing left overs ..Lately though I have been checking on them more often looking for nymphs..
What I'm noticing is that most just hang out on the bottom around the egg crates instead of crawling up into them.. The crates are packed in tight so they should feel secure using them..
I mist the side of the enclosure nightly and have alot of molts.. I'm not noticing any dead roaches but I'm also not getting many nymphs..
The temp in the enclosure is 88 and is achieved by usuing a red heating bulb.
When I was keeping B.dubia they filled almost every nook of the crates wich were kept vertical..

For the discoids should I try stacking them horizontally so that they use them more?
 

pannaking22

Arachnoemperor
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Can't hurt to mix it up a bit. What are you feeding them? Sometimes they just need a little dietary change to start giving birth. You may want to let the temp go down a few degrees too, perhaps around 82-85.
 

14pokies

Arachnoprince
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Can't hurt to mix it up a bit. What are you feeding them? Sometimes they just need a little dietary change to start giving birth. You may want to let the temp go down a few degrees too, perhaps around 82-85.
Thanks I will try dropping the temps a bit.. I was thinking that maybe they aren't climbing up into the crates because the heat is coming from over head.. I have a heat pad that I can attach to the bottom to see if that gets them to use the vertical space..

I feed them a dry mixture of crushed cat and dog food.. They get fresh fruit or vegetables every night.. Apples, oranges , grated carrot, pumpkin, squash and all kinds of green lettuce..
 

pannaking22

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I'd try attaching the heat pad to the side just so they have a bit of a gradient. Roaches tend to go down to escape heat, so they'd be running right into hotter conditions. I'd say their diet is perfect, so no issues there.
 

G. pulchra

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I keep all my roaches in my heated room at 77F to 79F, and they breed so fast I have to give them away. Maybe your temps are too high?
 

Introvertebrate

Arachnoprince
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Usually The only interaction I have with my roaches is tossing in food and removing left overs ..Lately though I have been checking on them more often looking for nymphs..
What I'm noticing is that most just hang out on the bottom around the egg crates instead of crawling up into them.. The crates are packed in tight so they should feel secure using them..
I mist the side of the enclosure nightly and have alot of molts.. I'm not noticing any dead roaches but I'm also not getting many nymphs..
The temp in the enclosure is 88 and is achieved by usuing a red heating bulb.
When I was keeping B.dubia they filled almost every nook of the crates wich were kept vertical..

For the discoids should I try stacking them horizontally so that they use them more?
Were you keeping your dubia the same way? 88 using a red bulb?
 

14pokies

Arachnoprince
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Were you keeping your dubia the same way? 88 using a red bulb?
Yea pretty much.. The only difference was that I kept my dubia in a clear bin.. I was told discoids are more sensitive to light and disturbances so I keep them in a black bin.
 

14pokies

Arachnoprince
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I keep all my roaches in my heated room at 77F to 79F, and they breed so fast I have to give them away. Maybe your temps are too high?
It's possible! I will drop the temps and see what happens.. Thanks..
 

14pokies

Arachnoprince
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I'd try attaching the heat pad to the side just so they have a bit of a gradient. Roaches tend to go down to escape heat, so they'd be running right into hotter conditions. I'd say their diet is perfect, so no issues there.
I will try the heat pad on the side and see how it goes! Thanks for the help..
 

Introvertebrate

Arachnoprince
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Yea pretty much.. The only difference was that I kept my dubia in a clear bin.. I was told discoids are more sensitive to light and disturbances so I keep them in a black bin.
Dubia like it between 85-95. I wouldn't think discoids would be any different.
 

Pipa

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I don't know if you have substrate or not ... I had a few inches of substrate with dead dried oak leaves in my discoid cages .. all the nymphs and most adults liked to burrow , others usually were underneath the egg crates upside down...
 

14pokies

Arachnoprince
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I don't know if you have substrate or not ... I had a few inches of substrate with dead dried oak leaves in my discoid cages .. all the nymphs and most adults liked to burrow , others usually were underneath the egg crates upside down...
No I don't and I REALLY don't want to use any! Lol! This colony was raised on substrate and when I received it I had to sift through about 5 inches of soil to find all the nymphs.. It was a pain in the :mooning:...

I was talking with the guy that I got this colony from today about the issues I'm having and he said the colony that this one was taken from is still exploding.. He keeps them on soil with eggcrates layed over top and he keeps his temps high 70's to 80.. So I'm thinking that I have them set up completely different than him and they are just taking a long time to adjust..

I'm not going to change anything for a month or two and then if it's still going slow I'll start tweaking things back to the way he was raising them.. Every page I visit from roach breeders/sellers says they keep and breed them the way I'm keeping mine so I'm going to ride it out untill it crashes or starts producing Lol!
 
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