Feeders outside

[Longhorn1234]

Hello everyone,

I have been thinking about breeding roaches but since I live in an apartment I'm very limited on space (especially since a chameleon cage would take a lot of space inside the apartment). I have a storage closet of decent size on the balcony and I think I can keep a few colonies in there if desired. I've been recording temperatures for the past month and it seems that on average the closet stays at 85°F which is perfect. I was thinking that if it gets hotter than that I can have a fan or something to cool down the closet. I only get direct sunlight from around 4 to 7 pm and since I live in Texas I know it can get very hot quickly, hence the fan. I was also thinking of using a magic door/mosquito net inside the closet door to prevent outside insects from getting into the colonies. I was also thinking of using mosquito net on the balcony to prevent outside insects from getting into the balcony itself, let's say I'm going for double the protection. I was wondering if you guys think this is a good idea or not. What else should I be worried about?

 

[NickTide]

Sounds like it should work. I think dubias could handle short periods above 100. If one day things get hotter than expected you can put a frozen two litre of water on top of the cage to lower temps down a few degrees.

I never have infestations of other bugs in their containers but my roaches are in a cool basement with heat tape under them so I have no idea about the bugs in your area. The apartment managers might have issue with you covering the balcony with mosquito netting though.

I wouldn't let anyone know about the bugs. People freak out and no matter what infestation they get two floors away, you will be blamed. I got into the habit of calling my dubias roaches just plain dubias or dubia feeders. Same with the orange heads. The local pet store started calling them the same to avoid the comments.

 

[Andee]

Dubia should do great, you can also get heatpads in case you have a temp drop during certain seasons, and attach it to a thermostat. It would turn off the heat pad after a certain temp is reached. I definitely agree with having some frozen ice packs and water bottles on hand, I have been using it for my reptiles as well lately since it's been getting to warm for my comfort even with their basking lights off.

 

[Longhorn1234]

@NickTide I'll keep that in mind, I definitely don't want to be blame for something like that. Although now that you mention that I remember that we pay a pest control fee, so we usually don't have bugs inside our apartments and hardly ever see bugs inside the complex (except for flying insects). I'll have to ask some questions about how they do pest control in here.

 

[Longhorn1234]

@Andee I've been thinking about a heat pad and thermostat for the winter. Luckily we have very mild winters here in Texas, but I know it will still be needed. It's great to hear that the storage closet could work, I only need to worry about pesticides. I know there have be to pesticides around the complex because we pay a pest control fee. I just don't know if they only spray outside or how they do it. Do you think this could be an issue even if pesticides are not spray directly into my balcony?

 

[NickTide]

@NickTide I'll keep that in mind, I definitely don't want to be blame for something like that. Although now that you mention that I remember that we pay a pest control fee, so we usually don't have bugs inside our apartments and hardly ever see bugs inside the complex (except for flying insects). I'll have to ask some questions about how they do pest control in here.

Hopefully you can get some notice before they spray. I've never lived in an apartment complex so I don't know how that works.

 

[Andee]

It depends on the exact type of pest control, they may use pet safe and general animal safe pest control? I get my guy to use only peppermint oil based and some other essential oil based ones. It only affects some species of insects, like ants and certain others. Bees and spiders etc aren't affected at all by it. And though it doesn't completely deplete the ant problem, it helps a lot and we'd rather keep it safe for our various animals than worry about killing off the pest species completely.

 

[Longhorn1234]

Hopefully you can get some notice before they spray. I've never lived in an apartment complex so I don't know how that works.

Yes, I'll try to find out as much as I can about that. Hopefully it all works out haha

 

[Longhorn1234]

It depends on the exact type of pest control, they may use pet safe and general animal safe pest control? I get my guy to use only peppermint oil based and some other essential oil based ones. It only affects some species of insects, like ants and certain others. Bees and spiders etc aren't affected at all by it. And though it doesn't completely deplete the ant problem, it helps a lot and we'd rather keep it safe for our various animals than worry about killing off the pest species completely.

That's very interesting. I'll ask my office manager for some information on what they use. I've been reading that most pesticides are sprayed on plants and then insects "absorb" the pesticide through their legs and goes into their nervous system. Do you know anything about this? I'm wondering if my roaches wouldn't get affected if they use a pesticide that works like that.

 

[Andee]

I am assuming it wouldn't affect them since they would touch it? but idk