feeders not doing their job?

[juggalo69]

I have a colony of B. lateralis that I just started feeding out of last month. I have noticed that some of my collection will not eat them, mainly my emperor scorp, my gbb, my pinktoe,and my Indian orimental. The rest of my collection seems to eat them just fine.
Two questions
One, why don't these species take to these roaches?
and two, how do I remove the uneaten roaches from these tanks? (my gbb,and pinktoe have killed them but not eaten them so those were easy, but the others are proving problamatic.) The little buggers are so fast and there are losts of places for them to hide.

 

[Bear Foot Inc]

I'd say get a better feeder roach... Try discoids or dubia. They breed fine and i've never found a spider that wont eat um. Also they are slow enough that its easy to catch them.
Good luck,
~Samuel

 

[Cirith Ungol]

emperor scorp, my gbb, my pinktoe

I have all of those and they are eating them fine. In true arachnid fasion they can't get enough of them. I have no arachnid that wouldn't take them.

I wonder if it's possibly what you are feeding your roaches, maybe that has an impact on the taste or smell of them. What's their diet? :?

 

[juggalo69]

I feed them dry cheerios, and a mix of oranges, apples, cucumber,and lettuce.

 

[Cirith Ungol]

Cheerios... never heard of that diet, but I guess it works. Try adding some dry dog food to their diet and try again, who knows, maybe that does the trick.

I don't feed cheerios but feed dog food, that would be the biggest difference between our colonies.

 

[juggalo69]

I tried this ground dog food mix that my local petstore sells specificly for crickets/roaches they didn't eat it. What brand of dogfood do you use?
How do you keep it from molding in a high humidity environment?

 

[cacoseraph]

amusingly enough, i had a mature male P. regalis who would ONLY eat mature male lateralis. i tried 4-5 other species of roaches, crix, wax worms... even female or immature lateralis... it was the weirdest dang thing.

 

[Cirith Ungol]

I tried this ground dog food mix that my local petstore sells specificly for crickets/roaches they didn't eat it. What brand of dogfood do you use?
How do you keep it from molding in a high humidity environment?

Seems we have our respective colonies set up differently so I guess I better talk about it all

I have mine dry but inside the box is also an ootheca incubator. The incubator is an ice cream box full of soil that's always kept moist, right next to a heat pad. I have the fortune of having springtails infest the colony. Eventhough I say "infest" I'm pretty happy with them because they clean out everything bad (mould, remains, whatever) but leave the oothecas and roaches alone.

There is a thread right now (feeders not doing their job) where I and cheshire go into the springtail topic a bit more if you're interested.

Anyway, what you could try to do is to use for example toilet paper rolls and build a little tower of four of them (put them in a square). The roaches will certainly take to sitting on that tower a lot. On top of that you could build some kind of platform with a rim and put the dog food up there. That way it wont be on the moist substrate but the roaches will always be able to reach it. Then ofcourse they can pull the food down on the ground so you might have to check on it once in a while.

I just use a cheap brand, low protein, dry dog food found at the local store.

 

[juggalo69]

ok let me break down my set-up
I have a critter keeper w/ about 2 in of substrate w/ a cut apart milk crate sitting on top, egg crate hides, a small dish for veggies and a lid for dry food.
Temp: anywhere from 65-85 humidity: anywhere from 60-90. Heat provided by 40 watt bulb.
Also I have noticed quite a few small (1/8-1/4 in) black beetles in with them, what are they?

 

[juggalo69]

Also, any ideas for removing the live roaches from my emp. tank before they breed?

 

[Cirith Ungol]

Haha, I'm completely out of it re feeders not doing their job. Sorry for any confusion:wall: (with this I mean the in-thread reference to this here thread) Time for me to sleep for a few days I guess


No idea about the beetles.

Picking out roaches, use forceps and just be as quick as you can.

Edit: Thread reference: This is the right one -
http://www.arachnoboards.com/ab/showthread.php?t=89692

The roaches themselves do great with low humidity. It's the egg hatching that's the problem. You could if you want just make a separate incubator for those but you'd have to check that every few days and also then put new eggs into them before they dry out in the colony.

 

[cacoseraph]

those little beetles are maybe flour beetles or something. i use them as another feeder for little things. the beetles make mini- or micro- "mealworms" depending on what you specifically have. the first instar of the beetles larva form is TINY.

 

[juggalo69]

those little beetles are maybe flour beetles or something. i use them as another feeder for little things. the beetles make mini- or micro- "mealworms" depending on what you specifically have. the first instar of the beetles larva form is TINY.

So are the beetles feeders or just the larva?
The beetles would be the perfect size for my slings and easier to catch.

 

[Dom]

The beauty of lateralis is they won't burrow. Sometimes I'll throw dubia in for some of my stuff and as soon as it hits the ground they start burrowing. Sometimes I don't realize they haven't been eaten until I see them wondering around a couple of weeks later. Often they've molted and are now larger than the scorp wants to tackle.
I've got a couple of things that don't really like lateralis but you can't realistically expect one feeder species to be universally accepted by your whole collection.

 

[cacoseraph]

So are the beetles feeders or just the larva?
The beetles would be the perfect size for my slings and easier to catch.

i feed both. but i always headsmash both before i feed them out, as they seem to be quick to eat any flesh (like a molting pet) they find.

it seems like some stuff doesn't like the beetles, but if the bugs are hungry (read: skinny) they all seem to eat them.

i really like being able to feed slings a variety of food. i know they can make it and breed on just crix (and presumably a single roach species) but i like to cover my bases. i was piss scared for months when i started feeding out the beetles though, as i didn't know if they would turn out to be poisonous or not. i have tons of vials marked with B or W (beetle or "worm"- larva form) to track if i had a big die off after feeding. it all seems to be good.

of course... i don't know what species(singular or plural) i have and i certainly don't know what you have... so you ultimately have to decide what is worth it to you. i am thrilled with my little beetles and love them to death.

ah... my beetles live in my live birthing roaches. i wonder if they might eat oothecae of the lateralis. something to think about.

 

[juggalo69]

from what I have observed the beetles are eating the cheerios, not the ooths that I have seen. And considering how many roach nymphs I have right now if a few do get eaten no harm no foul.