dubia and green banana Roach turn over time

[nightanole]

I was thinking of raising roaches for my oustalet's and one beardy, after dealing with 1k of crickets for a month.

I tried raising solder fly's without much luck. Ordered 100, fed 50 to them to see if they would eat them. Left the rest to turn to flies. I didnt know that would take 3 months from when i first got them to hatch into fly's. I never had more then 1 fly at a time, and only 10 flys total. By that time the food was all rotted and over run by fruit flys and i just gave up, id be another month or more before id see my first worm, if even 2 flys found each other


So next up would be to try roaches that wont take over the house. I narrowed the search to green banana (hey i could pass it off as a non roach to the family) or Dubia.

Does anyone have a time line on breeding these? I got lots of info on how to raise them, but no turn over time. Im trying to figure out the roach to new roach of same size time.

All i can find on dubia is that they live hatch 30-40 a month per roach, and it takes a month for mated roaches to produce the first clutch. I dont know how long it takes to grow a baby to a 3/4" meal.

Same with the green banana ones. all i get is they live for 1-2 years.

 

[ReptileLover0423]

Dubia roaches grow considerably slow. You can speed their growth rate up and breeding rate by keeping a heating pad under the bin or tote. In my roach breeding and keeping experience, from a newborn to 3/4" would take about 6 weeks maybe more and maybe less depending on temperature. All in all I would recommend dubia to anyone as a staple feeder over crickets. They don't smell, bite, climb, jump, or make noise. Plus they're way more nutritional. I have a fairly large colony going and it has saved me so much money. Hope this helps.

 

[ZuggieTheCham]

i breed green banana roaches i have loads of them and babies!!
they are easy u leave them too it just spray once a day and i chuck fruit in there every couple of days, i have them in a plastic tank with a mesh top, a heat pad underneath,
don't have the heat mat under the whole of the tank just 3/4 of it so they have a little patch that is cool for them to go to, i have a few fake leaves and some plastic houses with a rock in each and cut doors out ill upload a pic oh and soil on the bottom so the babies can burrow oh and another tip, put a thin layer of vasaline or olive oil all the way around your tank that way they cannot climb up so no escapes lol

like i said they are easy, good for your Cham and chams go crazy for them!! Zuggie would do just about anything for a banana roach lol!!
hope some of this helps

 

[Texas Ranger]

I would say get both dubias a meaty and bananas are fast growers and breeders. Dubias take a little while to get to 3l4 of a in. But you can use the green bananas as a alternative. Dubias live a year and green bananas live 6 months ....

 

[blackened]

I would say get both dubias a meaty and bananas are fast growers and breeders. Dubias take a little while to get to 3l4 of a in. But you can use the green bananas as a alternative. Dubias live a year and green bananas live 6 months ....

Our female veiled, about 8-10 months, didn't like the starter pack of 1/2" dubias we got her. Just waiting on some green banana roaches now

A little concerned now I know they are fast breeders

 

[nightanole]

Any suppliers of the greenies? So far all ive found are "pet" ones and 2 bucks a roach. I was hoping to try some of the giant morph greens (2x-3x the meat 1.25"),

roachcrossing has 20 giant green morph for $30 +shipping.

theroachguy has 120 dubia for $32 shipped.

buydubiaroaches has 100 for $25 shipped.

Id buy from one of you guys if you are selling.


PS: what do you recommend for a "tub" heater since without it, it will only be 70-75f inside. I could just throw an extra heat rock in it. Or i could get one of the stick to the bottom ReptiTherm for $15.

 

[Alexl]

Green banana roaches are great feeders. You need a little colony to start (I began with about 30 adults some years ago), otherwise you need to wait some months to get a good breeding colony. If you got less than five chameleons too feed, the banana roaches breed even without any heating (only room temperature). But they grow best at about 25°C (~ 75-80 F). Banana roaches love humid ground, at least 10 inches with pieces of bark inside. And they need a little space to fly around. That's it. The trick is to establish a good breeding colony, then you needn't care about the time roaches take from baby to adult .

The only thing to be careful about them: They're really fast... and the adults can fly (so, always have a mesh on the top of your tank). But you'll always find them at night, they're searching the lights. If not... they'll die within a day.

That's one of my banana roach bins.

 

[reptoman]

PS: what do you recommend for a "tub" heater since without it, it will only be 70-75f inside. I could just throw an extra heat rock in it. Or i could get one of the stick to the bottom ReptiTherm for $15.

11" flexwatt heat tape works great and is pretty cheap. If you plan to have a couple of colonies you could get 4 feet and a temp controller and just put your totes on top. You should be able to fit 3 totes across that much heat tape. I got mine a bigapple herp supply.

 

[blackened]

and the adults can fly

The adults what now?

 

[nightanole]

The adults what now?

adult greenies can fly. kinda like grass hoppers.

 

[ZuggieTheCham]

They dont fly as such just flutter down if they fall wont reali just take off like a fly lol