Do you crush the roach heads when feeding?

[pinkfoot]

Do you kill the roach, or just disable it when you feed roaches to your pets?

Perhaps it depends on the species involved? Either way, I've just started feeding roaches rather than crix, so I'd appreciate any info in this regard.

 

[sick4x4]

nope...instinct pretty much takes care of it for me..lol, i used both lobsters and dubias

 

[Mister Internet]

nah, I've not found their mouthparts really outfitted for "biting" in the sense you're referring to... I have trimmed their legs with scissors to prevent burrowing sometimes, but that's it...

 

[cacoseraph]

yeah

i prekill/mangle just about everything i feed out unless iwant to watch some hunting. i mostly use N. cinerea lobster roaches and though they don't wingbite as bad as some other species they *do* still do it.

also, they are quite clever at hiding and are glasswalkers so i usually do a vulcan neck pinch on them as i tweeze them from the feeder bucket to the living creatures cage


plus, wheni prekill/mangle and the roach disappears i am more comfortable assuming it was eaten. i have ended up with roaches living in the real pet's cage for many months and not knowing about it until after the fact.


also, since i feed hissers out i DEFINITELY prekill them! with larger hissers i will actually stake them out, outside the cage to limit the chance of a pet takign a kick from the big defensive/digging spines they pack!

 

[pinkfoot]

Interesting responses ~ thank you!

I wasn't too concerned about the roaches biting the diners, but certainly leg spines are a concern with some species, and it's really important in our climate that we have no escapes as infestation is a real possibility.

Anyone else care to share their methods?

 

[Choobaine]

I generally like to fire live food in and watch the fun, but then if it's roaches I used to feed little 'uns. I cut the feet off any climbing invert because all my predators don't do such a good job climbing.

 

[Xaranx]

I use dubia, and I do tend to crush since I feed off a lot of juvies (I breed lots of scorpions) and its annoying when they dig in the second they hit the substrate, I like to make sure my juvies are eating, and know when they aren't. In communal enclosures I don't bother, I just throw in more feeders than I need.

 

[squamata99]

I do crush heads or "necks" of my lobster roaches but not because of biting. The lobsters have a defensive act that they do with their abdomens. This freaks out the tarantulas and they don't want anything to do with the roach afterwards. I think they secrete a substance that deters them also. It does the same to centipedes as well. If the T manages to attack the lobster really fast it doesn't get a chance to use this defense, but usually the slow stalking up the prey will make the roach rear up it's abdomen.- especially when the T puts one of its feet on the roach. This is why I crush lobsters before feeding. Orange spotteded roaches just stay super still for a long time sometime's. I like dwarf cave roaches they feed well- but I still use all 3 plus king mealworms that I breed here.
-Rene-

 

[Galapoheros]

I may pinch the legs off crickets. And with dubias, sometimes I do give their head a pinch since they are fast to play dead or hide. If I think something I have isn't real hungry, I'll drop it in being confident it will find it later. But if I def want to see them eat at the moment, with a little head pinch, it seems to kill the instinct to play dead so they move a lot more giving their location away ...basically what caco said is what I do too. Kinda cool to drop head-on mature male doobs in, run around and get chased though.

 

[KyuZo]

sometime i offer them live and sometime i offer them dead, it's all depends on how big the roach is. I offered my centipede cut up roaches sometime.

 

[bluefrogtat2]

alive

i feed all alive,they can overpower them if given the proper size
andy

 

[pinkfoot]

Man, I wish I'd drilled smaller holes in the tanks of my Tarantulas..!:8o

I've tried feeding live and also with heads crushed and it is obviously faster and easier to avoid crushing, but some tanks have holes that force me to 'crush' or perhaps have the prey escape.:?

No matter, NOW I know...

 

[cacoseraph]

I've tried feeding live and also with heads crushed and it is obviously faster and easier to avoid crushing, but some tanks have holes that force me to 'crush' or perhaps have the prey escape.:?

i just crush them as i lift them with my tweezers. it takes an additional er .25s per roach fed out =P

as long as i grabbed the head or anywhere on the place an vert would have a backbone it disables enough for me

 

[Qvarnold]

I crush the heads on my dubias when feeding them to arboreals. To my terrestrials I don't really have to do anything to disable them, my T's are pretty fast to do it themselves.

 

[DITB]

i crush the heads when feeding to small lizards

 

[simon780]

I freeze them to death. I also tried cutting their legs off, but the fluids give me mold and smell within 24 hrs.