I'm Getting Ripped Off, Help!

CreepTumorXD

Arachnoknight
Joined
Apr 22, 2016
Messages
181
Crickets.... House Crickets... are these things inbreed? I cant for the life of me breed them or keep them alive.. Half or more are dead before I can even use them.. what can I do? Im breeding Dubia's but My scorpions and such don't seem to want them. and they burrow.
 

pannaking22

Arachnoemperor
Old Timer
Joined
Nov 25, 2011
Messages
4,226
Lateralis are a good route to go if you don't want to bother with crickets. Don't smell as much, no noise, and they breed very readily. Move around a lot too so it gets the attention of just about any predator.
 

Ranitomeya

Arachnoknight
Old Timer
Joined
Oct 11, 2012
Messages
255
If you house large numbers of crickets together and do not maintain them well, you're bound to get massive die-offs from Acheta domesticus densovirus as crickets die from it and the healthy crickets feed on the dead and get infected.
 

Hisserdude

Arachnoking
Joined
Apr 18, 2015
Messages
2,453
Gotta be careful with lats though because they can infest a house
Only if the ambient humidity and temperature of the house meets their breeding requirements, which in some southern states, it does. Where I live in SW Idaho I don't think they'd be able to survive, way too arid. They are established in CA though, so it's a possibility that they could infest your house. They usually prefer to stay around your house than in it, but they do wander in frequently, kinda like most Periplaneta.
 

EulersK

Arachnonomicon
Staff member
Joined
Feb 22, 2013
Messages
3,292
Crickets.... House Crickets... are these things inbreed? I cant for the life of me breed them or keep them alive.. Half or more are dead before I can even use them.. what can I do? Im breeding Dubia's but My scorpions and such don't seem to want them. and they burrow.
Animals not taking dubias? Stop coddling your inverts, they'll take eventually! No animal will starve itself to death. If you offer nothing but dubias for long enough, they'll break down and eat eventually. I've had several adult tarantulas refuse dubias for months. They all eventually take, and after that, they never have issues with them again.

As for burrowing, you've got three options. Crush the head, tear off the first pair of legs, or only feed adult males. In any option, they're either incapable of burrowing or are uninterested in burrowing.
 

Ranitomeya

Arachnoknight
Old Timer
Joined
Oct 11, 2012
Messages
255
Only if the ambient humidity and temperature of the house meets their breeding requirements, which in some southern states, it does. Where I live in SW Idaho I don't think they'd be able to survive, way too arid. They are established in CA though, so it's a possibility that they could infest your house. They usually prefer to stay around your house than in it, but they do wander in frequently, kinda like most Periplaneta.
There were lateralis roaches outside my house long before I ever got into keeping feeder roaches. They don't usually come inside, but they will if there's food and water. Otherwise, they're pretty much an outdoor roach and not an indoor pest species.
 

symbol

Arachnopeon
Joined
Sep 4, 2016
Messages
41
You can also cut the heads off the dubias to prevent them from burrowing.

As far as the crickets go, I haven't tried breeding them yet, but I've had decent luck just putting them in a (ventilated) Really Useful Box with a small amount of substrate, egg carton sections, fruit and veg for water/nutrition, and the odd piece of cat kibble for a bit of added protein.
I've only lost one so far (out of ~2 dozen), but it's also only been two weeks. We'll see if they start dying off in greater numbers as time goes on.
 

Hisserdude

Arachnoking
Joined
Apr 18, 2015
Messages
2,453
There were lateralis roaches outside my house long before I ever got into keeping feeder roaches. They don't usually come inside, but they will if there's food and water. Otherwise, they're pretty much an outdoor roach and not an indoor pest species.
Yeah, they've been established in CA for quite some time now. Good thing that, for the most part, they stay outside.
 

CreepTumorXD

Arachnoknight
Joined
Apr 22, 2016
Messages
181
If you house large numbers of crickets together and do not maintain them well, you're bound to get massive die-offs from Acheta domesticus densovirus as crickets die from it and the healthy crickets feed on the dead and get infected.
How do I prevent this?
 

WeightedAbyss75

Arachnoangel
Joined
Feb 22, 2014
Messages
921
So they continue to live if they have no head? :0
Only for a while, I believe their brain is throughout their spine? They are some of the hardest to kill insects out there, so they can definitly live a few minutes or hours without a head ;) Very impressive to say the least
 

Ranitomeya

Arachnoknight
Old Timer
Joined
Oct 11, 2012
Messages
255
How do I prevent this?
The lab I work in shares space with another lab that uses crickets for experiments and has awful losses over time with Acheta domesticus when they're housed together, so the only way they've been able to get them to live the full duration of their experiments is to house every single cricket individually to prevent them from cannibalizing the dead and infecting themselves with the virus. If housed separately, the few that die from the virus don't get a chance to be eaten and become a vector for the spread of the virus. Obviously, this isn't feasible for us since we use them for feeders and need to keep so many of them, so the best thing possible is to provide them with a constant food source that they will prefer to eat over the bodies of their dead and dying cohorts and to remove the dead bodies and any crickets showing the beginnings of paralysis ASAP every day or multiple times a day.
 
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