roach feeding response?

[dtknow]

Has anyone noticed differences in roach feeding response intensity?

I had some fun giving my colony of lobster roaches(with some lateralis and B. dubia mixed in) bottom feeder tablets. One roach would grab it run...and usually run right into a crowd that would start wrestling for it and ultimately result in a huge rolling dogpile.

The lateralis, on the other hand...are so spooky I hardly see them eat. They will grab a small piece of kibble and take off with it.

When I had only dubia they would squabble over food also, but nowhere near as intense as the lobsters.

 

[Bulldog08]

Here are my B. dubia eating some apples and there is a banana under there somewhere. They are pigs. My A. tesselata just kind of graze, take a few nibbles and move away.

 

[dtknow]

LOL...yep I've seen them mob food like that. I've also seen dubia tug a war around bits of kibble. With those small pieces of food they can use their wide pronotums to block off a competitor.

The lobsters, on the other hand, simple grab and tug, and end up rolling all over the place with 10 or so roaches going for a piece of food smaller than a dime.

 

[OldHag]

I love watching the food fights!! B. giganteous are hilarious! They go crazy when you sprinkle water all over too! Pushing and shoving to get to the dropplets of water (even though they have a bowl of water crystals) They will actually GRAB one another and throw eachother off of the branches in their cages.

I have some hemiblaberide sp. (Horseshoe crab roach) that get into raging battles.. over nothing! Well, fighting over females. Ill go downstairs and hear a gosh awful racket and there will be a pair of males absolutly ROLLING around the cage in a fearsome fight!

 

[Digby Rigby]

Fighting over food

If your goal is to produce lots of babies you dont want them fighting over food. You want them to have a continual supplyfor maximum production. If they ar fighting over food it means they arent getting enough and that will impact production.

Digby Rigby
balboa28279@mypacks.net

 

[Rich65]

I agree with Digby, provide more food.
I actually grind the dog kibble in a coffee style grinder and keep a large deli lid full and then add the carrot or apple or banana every night. And I keep water crystals available at all times. My roach colony populations have exploded in numbers!!!!!