Is those okay for gutloading?
- Thread starter chameleonquestionsaddie
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chameleonquestionsaddie
Member
Also does anyone have advice for how/where I should keep my crickets. I go about every saturday to pet smart and buy like 70 small crickets. I keep them in this container with the gutloaded food. Then I just put them in the container to feed my chameleon with. By the end of the week a lot are dead. I’m kinda confused on where to keep them like are they fine in the garage? Also how do y’all transfer them into the feeding cup without them jumping everywhere?!! lol
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Antoinetteandco
Member
Antoinetteandco
Member
Here's a basic bug and gutloading run down. You want to only use chameleon safe foods as seen in the images to feed your crickets in a rotating schedule. You 'll want to keep your bin as clean as possible removing droppings and dead crickets often. Crickets in the wild are not in such crammed quarters. Chameleons are what they eat in a sense. So you want to take as best care as possible of your feeder insects. You can purchase an approatie sized cricket keeper based on how many crickets you plan on keeping at a time. Crickets get there water from the fresh foods that they eat. I will also send you a link to @Gingero videos
Antoinetteandco
Member
bbyoda
Chameleon Enthusiast
Hi! I avoid oats with crickets because, as you mentioned, crickets die off and poop and molt and that makes the oats gross and wastes them. Instead, I use a thick (3") layer of vermiculite as the bedding for my crickets. It helps with odor control since crickets are stinky. I put food on a plastic lid to keep it away from the bedding.
It looks like Antoinetteandco already posted the gutloading visual. Collard greens are good and you can put in apple or carrot scraps for some moisture. Some of the commercial gut loads can be mixed with water which provides a water source without drowning crickets, too.
The container you have looks like it has good airflow. I use a standard Home Depot bucket. I've cut out a circle in the top and replaced with screen by removing the o-ring in the lid's rim and replacing on top of the screen. I keep the crickets in the same room as my Chameleon. I'd be worried about them getting too cold or too hot and dying off in a garage.
If yours keep dying, it might be worth trying out crickets from a different vendor. I buy from Critter Depot (one of the forums sponsors). They have conditional live ship guarantees (based on weather conditions) and their crickets last a long time for me.
When it's feeding time, I scoop crickets out of my hand and into little plastic baggies with the right supplement in it. Then I carefully tip the baggy into the shooting gallery I have on my door screen. The crickets jump out of the baggy and if I'm careful the extra supplement dust stays in the bag.
It looks like Antoinetteandco already posted the gutloading visual. Collard greens are good and you can put in apple or carrot scraps for some moisture. Some of the commercial gut loads can be mixed with water which provides a water source without drowning crickets, too.
The container you have looks like it has good airflow. I use a standard Home Depot bucket. I've cut out a circle in the top and replaced with screen by removing the o-ring in the lid's rim and replacing on top of the screen. I keep the crickets in the same room as my Chameleon. I'd be worried about them getting too cold or too hot and dying off in a garage.
If yours keep dying, it might be worth trying out crickets from a different vendor. I buy from Critter Depot (one of the forums sponsors). They have conditional live ship guarantees (based on weather conditions) and their crickets last a long time for me.
When it's feeding time, I scoop crickets out of my hand and into little plastic baggies with the right supplement in it. Then I carefully tip the baggy into the shooting gallery I have on my door screen. The crickets jump out of the baggy and if I'm careful the extra supplement dust stays in the bag.
Hi there. Just to give you my 2 cents I used to buy my crickets from Pet Smart. They died and stunk. Now I get banded crickets from Josh’s Frogs. They always give 10% more for free in case any die. They have a live arrival guarantee. They do chirp a little. They seem to live a really long time. And true story, I’ve never had one die in my cricket keeper.
I give them fresh fruits and veggies every day. Apples, oranges, mangos, sweet potato, collard and mustard greens, green beans, cucumbers (for moisture as they aren’t nutritious), watercress, carrots, alfalfa, bok choy and dandelion leaves. Alternating. I don’t give them this much every day. I’ll give like five types at once. I also keep plastic soda bottle tops in the cage with Cricket Crack and Mazuri Better Bug Gut Loading Diet. I also put 3-4 cotton balls that are soaked with water in so they can drink. The cotton balls also get replaced every day.
I’m attaching a few pics. I keep my worms the same way. I got the worm cages from Walmart for cheap. I feed the worms the exact same food as the crickets. Including the crack and Mazuri.
I use old fashioned oats for the worm/roach cages. And I put that thing in with the roaches and they all hang out inside of it.
I change the oats if they get damp, when there’s a lot of frass (poop) in the bottom or about every two weeks. And daily when the food and bottle tops are out I give them a few gentle shakes back and forth to help keep the frass at the bottom. And I’ll clean out dead worms and exoskeletons. Any that have started to morph I put in a plastic bag and keep them in the freezer. If you throw them out in the trash or outside they can give diseases to local insects and worms.
I hope this helps.
Cheers!
I give them fresh fruits and veggies every day. Apples, oranges, mangos, sweet potato, collard and mustard greens, green beans, cucumbers (for moisture as they aren’t nutritious), watercress, carrots, alfalfa, bok choy and dandelion leaves. Alternating. I don’t give them this much every day. I’ll give like five types at once. I also keep plastic soda bottle tops in the cage with Cricket Crack and Mazuri Better Bug Gut Loading Diet. I also put 3-4 cotton balls that are soaked with water in so they can drink. The cotton balls also get replaced every day.
I’m attaching a few pics. I keep my worms the same way. I got the worm cages from Walmart for cheap. I feed the worms the exact same food as the crickets. Including the crack and Mazuri.
I use old fashioned oats for the worm/roach cages. And I put that thing in with the roaches and they all hang out inside of it.
I change the oats if they get damp, when there’s a lot of frass (poop) in the bottom or about every two weeks. And daily when the food and bottle tops are out I give them a few gentle shakes back and forth to help keep the frass at the bottom. And I’ll clean out dead worms and exoskeletons. Any that have started to morph I put in a plastic bag and keep them in the freezer. If you throw them out in the trash or outside they can give diseases to local insects and worms.
I hope this helps.
Cheers!
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MissSkittles
Chameleon Enthusiast
Those have to be the happiest little bug bins I’ve ever seen. ?
MissSkittles that’s what I’m hoping for. Helping them live their best lives. Lol.
CrisBruns
Established Member
I put vermiculite in the bottom of my cricket bin (which is a standard 60 something quart sterlite type container) and that seems to cut down on the smell. They like to hide so keep your egg cartons and put them in there. You can then just tap them off the bottom of the egg carton where they like to hide right into your cup (all while holding it inside your cricket bin). Not sure if you are trying to breed the crickets or not but Josh's frogs has a couple of how to videos. You can also use natural cellulose sponges to hold water for them if you're worried you might not get to every day. Dang MissSkittles--I wished my lunch box looked so good!
chameleonquestionsaddie
Member
Wow that looks so good! When you clean out the poop and stuff do you put the crickets in a separate container and then empty everything out. How do you move the crickets?(lol I mean do you pick them up with your hand?)
chameleonquestionsaddie
Member
Thanks for all the tips!
Hey there. Sorry for the delay.
I actually have two cricket bins. Basically one is clean and one is dirty. They get switched out (and fresh fruits and veggies) every day.
Yes, I grab the old food with my hands. Including the poop.
I have things for the crickets to hide in so I can transfer a lot of them from one enclosure to the other. I switch out and clean those things (where they hide) every two days.
For the crickets that get left behind I use a small fish net to gently wrangle them from one space to the other.
Again, sorry for the delay.
Here’s a couple pics of the cricket bins and fish net.
I hope this helps you!
Cheers!
