Orange head roach (Eublaberus Prosticus)

[Snake_Eyes]

Thanks everyone, I'm still considering them.

I think they smell a bit like a skunk... I like it
Dubia are still better IMO.

I already have a colony of those.

 

[Snake_Eyes]

i've had orangeheads in my bedroom for like 2yrs or so now. smell's not that big of a deal. all mine burrow all thetime anyways. i gave them like 6-7" of semipacked coconut stuff. their cage smells mostly like the coconut stuff. they do have a bit of an odor when you go to feed them out and the get nervous, though.

I'm curious how do you go about retrieving the nymphs when cleaning the cage with substrate? I recently cleaned my dubia with no substrate (other than their frass) and it was a pain in the butt and took forever.

 

[cacoseraph]

I'm curious how do you go about retrieving the nymphs when cleaning the cage with substrate? I recently cleaned my dubia with no substrate (other than their frass) and it was a pain in the butt and took forever.

i haven't seen a need to clean the cage yet. at about 6 months into the colony i recaged them to a smaller container cuz i thought they weren't making the babies but found many small nymphs. i moved them back to their 8-10gallon plastic tote and they have been there ~18 months now. i have thrown a duck head, a mouse, some chicken legs, and all kinds of normal food in there and water the sub and it doesn't ever develop a smell or look like it needs attn. from time to time i turn up the substrate when i am pulling nymphs out for feeding and i have never found any evidence of nastiness forming beneath the sub, either

 

[dtknow]

Yeah...keeping them with substrate really decreases the smell. I have mine on a mix of coconut coir, peat, and aspen bedding.

Also I threw in a male dubia which had been half eaten by a tailess whipscorpion. They started from the half eaten abdomen and continued up as the dubia squirmed and twitched.

 

[Louise E. Rothstein]

How "tropical" are orange head roaches? My old house has such a
permissive thermostat that winter nights drop to the "60s".
Although my Panchlora colonies survive these thermal vicissitudes my
hissers aborted their babies...if they bred at all...which most did not.

I do not have hissers here now.
I am breeding mutant Panchloras in several strains.
I HAVE thought of bartering mutant Panchloras for orange heads...

but...

Could orange heads survive winter "60s" at night?

 

[Takumaku]

Could orange heads survive winter "60s" at night?

I have had my colony down to the around 65 with no ill effects. You got to remember there are two temperatures at play here when rearing roaches. The ambient temperature and the internal temperature (or core temperature of the colony). The ambient temperature is a moot point so long as the core temperature of the colony is maintained at/above 65. This is one of the reasons I suspect roaches breed faster when crowded.

If it gets much lower than this, just sit (if possible) the enclosure on the top of the fridge or stove or ...

 

[KyuZo]

If it gets much lower than this, just sit (if possible) the enclosure on the top of the fridge or stove or ...

how about in the oven? ;P :wall: :drool: :}

 

[Mina]

Just a not to anyone who has orange heads or is considering them. I was considering them before my dubias took off. I found out in my research that they need a lot of protein. I found at my local feed store that they have something called trout chow, that is 60% protein. Hope that helps someone.

 

[dtknow]

Yeah...mine still make babies at 60-70 degrees.

 

[Xaranx]

I think you can expect longer growth and incubation periods with the lower temps but nothing to worry about. They are roaches, they'll survive in the 60's.

 

[Rochelle]

of course they'll breed faster at higher temps....a ceramic heater set on the top of the cage - over the nesting/breeding area works like magic.
The fish food is an excellent idea. I feed mine koi pellets...cheaper by the weight...
The deep substrate keeps smell down and facillitates breeding. They only smell odd when you are culling to feed them to someting scary....
I'd probably smell bad suddenly...too!

 

[cacoseraph]

all my colonies get down to ~50*F (10*C) during winter and do fine. i'm pretty sure they stop makign the babies (except maybe N. cinerea, lobster roaches) but other than that they do fine. considering all my predators stop eating at around teh same temp the roaches stop producing it all kind of works out and i get a big giant pause for winter

i have N. cinerea, B. dubia, B. discoidalis, hissers, and B. lateralis