How to feed off dubia to keep the colony going

Jen0413

Jen0413

New Member
We recently bought an established dubia colony and they are doing all the roachy things they are supposed to. Making babies, eating their gutload, growing, all the great bug stuff and Espio loves them! Also, it doesn't take nearly as many roaches to fill him up as it did crickets. Always a plus.

I want to make sure I keep the colony going though. I've been trying to feed him mostly the medium sized roaches and one or two of the grown male roaches. Espio is only 7 months old, so while he can handle a full grown roach it takes him a little more work. I want to make sure I don't accidentally feed off my colony before they make more baby roaches. Is it OK to be feeding the occasional male roach? Is it alright to be feeding mainly the mid sized roaches?? I was thinking I shouldn't feed the females because they make the babies, right?

Thanks for your help! Who knew I'd be this concerned about roaches!! :p
~Jen
 
I think you are doing fine. How many adult female roaches do you have (approximate of course). As long as you keep about 1 male for every 5 females, they will continue to produce just fine for you. I have nearly 300 female and close to 100 males and they produce more roaches than I could dream of feeding my 3 panthers. I do however have 52 eggs incubating that will be getting small nymphs within only a few weeks of hatching.

Just be sure not to feed ALL of the medium sized roaches or you will have none left to grow up and take over the breeding process for you.
 
I also just noticed that you are in Fort Collins. If you are ever down in The Denver area or Aurora, you can come by and I would be glad to give you some more adults. Like I said, I have way more than I need, but I don't like them and don't even sort them except to clean the bin every few months, I just feed whatever is in the cardboard tubes come feeding time, minus the females and some of the male adults.
 
Dagreek said:
Where can I buy a colony?
Click to expand...

I would start by looking on places like craigslist. You can sometimes find someone selling an entire colony. Otherwise there are lots of places online, including several site sponsors, that sell them. You can start fairly small and just make sure they have heat, food, and water. Then leave them alone for several months and before you know it you will have a large colony. Or you can spend a lot more money and buy a lot of adults and some nymphs and get your colony started quickly.
 
I actually just found someone on Craigslist and he gave me 500 or so roaches 25 female and 25 male. There aren't many medium sized or small but i take it there will be plenty in a week or so. My question is how do you split them up into different sizes?
 
Dagreek said:
I actually just found someone on Craigslist and he gave me 500 or so roaches 25 female and 25 male. There aren't many medium sized or small but i take it there will be plenty in a week or so. My question is how do you split them up into different sizes?
Click to expand...

You don't have to split them up. All of your roaches can stay in the same space.

I let my eggs, babies, smalls, mid sized, large and adults all stay in the same huge plastic bin with chicken egg cartons in it for them to climb all over and whatnot.

Just keep the food on one side of the bin and the cartons on the other, otherwise you'll have one hell of a time cleaning...
 
Doesn't it take you 15+ minutes to find medium sized ones out of all the orhers and then put them in 4 feeder cups.
 
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