need advice on setting up a cricket colony

[bhamgreg]

I jsut made an attempt at it and though i have a million babies almost all of my adults have died in less than a week.
I'm using top hot cricket feed and have cricket water in a lid as well as misting them once a day. Am i doing something wrong and if so whats the best way to set them up?

 

[Jmugleston]

The easiest way I 've found it get a cage (a large plastic tote works well). Mine is about 18 inches tall and about 30 inches long. I have a hinged plexiglass lid on it with a light. Fill the bottom with an inch or so of soil/peat/vermiculite/etc and there you go. Have the substrate damp, but not wet. Clean as needed. My adults live close to 2 weeks in this set-up and they produce like crazy. It can get spoiled fast so keep it as clean as possible. I don't use water dishes and I feed them dog food, mixed vegetables and fruits. In a nutshell, I set them up like my monitor lizards (only different substrate) and that seems to work.

 

[bhamgreg]

I'll have to avoid the dog food deal for now as they often contain pesticides and i dont know which do and which dont. I guess these guys jsut have a rly short life span. huh.

 

[brunoboy]

you might try using dry water crystals for them to drink.

 

[bhamgreg]

ya thats what im using right now. plus mistign the cage. they seem to like it more than the crystals.

 

[Radamanthys]

you want an advice?
change to roaches

 

[invertoholic]

well i have an experimental cricket colony one of two the first one is just plain old crickets mixed in with them are wild field crickets caught a few at a time and a few females traded from friends the second is the same with the same numbers of wild and store bought i have seen hybrid crickets in both tanks and many of the single species they came from of the "grays" they seem to have hybrid vigor and eat a lot more than either species in the tank i mist them both once a week as my home is kinda humid in that room from my other animals kept there i feed them repcal brand cricket foods with 3 tea spoons herp'a'vite mixed in i also give both tanks a table spoon of herp'a'vite mixed to mud consistency in a plastic lid as a dish once a month in tank two i have wild caught isopods that have set up their own colony and are doing great i started that tank with isopods for 2 reasons #1 i hated the smell and you can never clean the tank enough to eliminate that odor #2 i wanted to see if they could co habitat in the same tank and form a symbiotic species relationship so far after almost a yr of breeding i have found that isopods greatly reduce the original cricket smell they seem to all have and tank #1 will still reek i have introduced isopods to tank #1 since then and the smell is now almost as low as tank #2 plus i had more live hatchings with the isopods in the tank than with out helping to raise my numbers i hope this helps you out

 

[Vulgaris]

wow I have tried interbreeding wild field and domestic house crickets before and have had NO success apparently after doing a lot more research, i found that different species have different sounding chirps and females will only mate with strictly the chirp of their own species.

 

[invertoholic]

i think what occurred was that since i gave the females no choice as to whom to breed with they ended up doing what nature does best they grinned and bore it through lol kind alike how females of the human species may not find their mate to be the best yet reproduce with them just to have a child lol nah i really think what went on was they heard chirps from both and got confused about whom it was they were doing lmao i too have read those and if you listen closely you can tell a faint difference in chirps but i think they are under estimated on that i think after having watched them mate back and forth field cricket to german house cricket and vise versa i really believe if you have them so mixed they tend to confuse the sounds to the point they will interbreed by accident then the crickets resulting will breed freely with either strain as i have seen

btw anyone else keep iso's in thier crix tank? would like to hear feed back

 

[357wheelgunner]

How do you guys control the smell? I had a 1 gallon critter keeper with crickets in it and the closet its in stinks.

I'm getting some roaches next month....

 

[CT9A]

How do you guys control the smell? I had a 1 gallon critter keeper with crickets in it and the closet its in stinks.

I'm getting some roaches next month....

In order to control the smell, you have to clean the cage almost daily, depending on the amount of crickets you have.

During the spring-fall I order 1,00 crickets and have those as my main food source for 3/4 of the year. If you want them to thrive and have plenty of babies, your going to need to clean out the cage almost daily or every other day.

All you do is dump the crickets into another container. Just hold the container holding the crickets a few inches from the brand new clean buckets and they should start jumping in. I do this outside in my backyard so if there are any escapees that they will get killed by the toads that have overpopulated in my pond. After you have your crickets in the new container, shake of all the dead bodies, frass, etc out of the egg crates and put them in, with the food and water gels. Replace the egg crates at least once every 1 1/2 weeks to keep the eggcrates sterile. If you follow these rules you will have a flourishing colony in no time. All it takes is some hard work and dedication.

If you are the lazy type or doesn't want to deal with these almost daily cleanings, then I would suggest a roach colony.


Hope this helps

 

[bhamgreg]

thx for all the replies I may go with roaches one day but not right now. crickets are much cheaper to grow. my colony has a ton of babies and young adults now