Need Help Breeding.

[OahuJacksons]

Hey guys I have my Chams and right now they are feeding off of flys and 1-2 mealworms a day. I wanted to know how and what's the best way to breed my mealworms and crickets? I don't have crickets right now but will get some soon, please help me out so I can get them on a diet mahalo.
-OahuJacksons.

 

[fluxlizard]

Mealworms are easy. Let some pupate and come out as beetles and then put those beetles in a flat storage tub (I think I'm using 12 qt storage tubs but I'd have to go look at the label to confirm for sure). Put an inch or so of substrate.If you check around you can find recipes for dry cricket or roach food here on the forums and that is a great way to go. You can also use oatmeal or wheat bran but the worms will not be nearly as nutritious as if you use a "gutload" as for crickets or roaches. I grind the ingredients in a coffee grinder to the consistency of flour. This is unnecessary if you only need a few dozen worms at a time, but if you feed hundreds at a time like I do, it makes collecting the worms easier as you can sift them with a wire strainer from the substrate. On top of this I put a paper towel- this is mainly for the beetles which have a hard time flipping themselves in the flour substrate if they happen to find themselves upside down. They also like to cling to it, and I change them into a new tub each week to make more eggs, so it makes collecting and moving them easier. Also the worms tend to "surface" on top of the substrate beneath the paper towel, so it makes collecting them easier if you only need a few at a time- just lift the paper towel and pick them off the surface of the substrate. I have many beetles and each tub this size can hold many thousands of worms very easily (I started once with 10,000 worms in a tub this size- maybe even more can live in one). If you are only feeding a couple of chameleons you can just keep everything in the same tub, maybe switching the beetles as you find them to a new tub a couple of times a year so you can eventually feed one tub out and clean it and then rotate again. If you are feeding many lizards, or want to sell the worms to other chameleon keepers, you can rotate the beetles each week as I do. Soon you will have 18 tubs give or take a few, filled with all sizes and many thousands of mealworms that can be fed to anything from hatchling to adult chameleons. When one tub is fed or sold out you can clean it and set it up again for the beetles the next week and just keep rotating through. The tubs are best kept at about 80 degrees. I use a 12" heat tape on a thermostatic controller (herpstat by spyder robotics) on a long shelf for my tubs.

Crickets are easy too. Get large clear smooth sided storage tubs that they cannot climb out- the largest you can find. For me this is 30 gallons. Put your crickets in there. I rough the walls and floor of the tub up with course sandpaper so the crickets can have traction on the floor and climb up the walls about 3/4 of the way- gives them more surface area and makes collecting them easy to feed. Start with 500 or 1000 adult crickets. They need heat also- Somewhere in the mid 80s works best for me. The more heat the faster they grow (and age) but the faster they dehydrate also. I set my heat tape for 87 degrees on my cricket shelves and that has worked best for me- you may need to experiment a little. To reproduce them, take a shallow food storage container (sandwich box kind of thing- mine are maybe 10" long and about half as wide and a couple of inches deep), fill with damp substrate- I use vermiculite and add water 4x the weight of the vermiculite. You can use other damp substrates- some simply use dirt or sand and I've had crickets breed in mulch before also. Put this in the box with the crickets at a location where the crickets can easily get in and out of it. In 24 hours it will be loaded with eggs. Remove the container, put the lid on it, and place it in an incubator at 84 degrees. About a week and a half later you will have zillions of little pinhead crickets in the container. Move them to the same sort of box you have the adults in. The trick with pinheads is giving them plenty of moisture in a way they can get at it. In hawaii you probably can find lots of rotting fruit that will work well- not moldy, just soft, very ripe fruit would be the thing. You can make more pinheads every day this way.

Honestly, if I were in a tropical climate though, and only needed to feed a few chameleons, I'd probably make a large terrariums outdoors. I'd take galvanized steel roofing and make a frame about 3'x3' that sunk into the ground about 18-24" and continued above ground about 18" to keep things like rodents out, and then on top of this base I'd make a cage out of rubber coated hardware cloth that was about 4 or 5' high on top of that base. The hardware cloth would allow insects into the cage. Then I'd plant flowering bushes in the cages to attract local insects such as bees and flies.

Lastly, don't forget these guys. They are good food for chameleons:
http://naturalfarminghawaii.net/2013/03/dr-jeff-tomberlin-on-black-soldier-flies/

 

[OahuJacksons]

Honestly, if I were in a tropical climate though, and only needed to feed a few chameleons, I'd probably make a large terrariums outdoors. I'd take galvanized steel roofing and make a frame about 3'x3' that sunk into the ground about 18-24" and continued above ground about 18" to keep things like rodents out, and then on top of this base I'd make a cage out of rubber coated hardware cloth that was about 4 or 5' high on top of that base. The hardware cloth would allow insects into the cage. Then I'd plant flowering bushes in the cages to attract local insects such as bees.

thank u sooo much man. U know for the mealworms, can I keep them together? Even when there's beetles? I watched some videos on youtube that said the worms eat the pupa and the beetles eat the worm or something like that.

 

[Devokid]

You should also get some roaches. There are usually a bunch that you can find under some rocks in your yard. I wouldn't feed the ones that you catch as many people try to kill them with pesticides, but they are super easy to raise, nutritious, and jacksons seem to love them. They love snails as well, but make sure you don't feed them any endangered snails, as that is why the authorities want them gone.

 

[OahuJacksons]

You should also get some roaches. There are usually a bunch that you can find under some rocks in your yard. I wouldn't feed the ones that you catch as many people try to kill them with pesticides, but they are super easy to raise, nutritious, and jacksons seem to love them. They love snails as well, but make sure you don't feed them any endangered snails, as that is why the authorities want them gone.

So the best bet is to find wild roaches, breed them then feed um??? Oh and do u know any homemade traps for krickets??? That would help a lot alos.

 

[fluxlizard]

thank u sooo much man. U know for the mealworms, can I keep them together? Even when there's beetles? I watched some videos on youtube that said the worms eat the pupa and the beetles eat the worm or something like that.

Yes you can. If you are only feeding 3 lizards, you may have some losses to the worms, but not enough to make a huge difference, as long as you keep them fed. If you want to maximize production, then yes, you probably want to remove them. But if you are only trying to have enough for 3 lizards, you probably not need to do that. If you do want to do that, just rotate your beetles into a new bin each week like I do. I had a mealworm colony as a kid that lasted about 10 years that I always kept the beetles in with the worms in a single tub.

If you are catching wild crickets to breed- my instructions will still work but you might have a different incubation time. I tried our local wild crickets here and incubation was several weeks this fall! This is probably because I am in a temperate climate however- the eggs were probably doing a diapause like they might in nature to "overwinter". Your wild crickets are probably going to be closer to the 10 days.

 

[OahuJacksons]

Yes you can. If you are only feeding 3 lizards, you may have some losses to the worms, but not enough to make a huge difference, as long as you keep them fed. If you want to maximize production, then yes, you probably want to remove them. But if you are only trying to have enough for 3 lizards, you probably not need to do that. If you do want to do that, just rotate your beetles into a new bin each week like I do. I had a mealworm colony as a kid that lasted about 10 years that I always kept the beetles in with the worms in a single tub.

If you are catching wild crickets to breed- my instructions will still work but you might have a different incubation time. I tried our local wild crickets here and incubation was several weeks this fall! This is probably because I am in a temperate climate however- the eggs were probably doing a diapause like they might in nature to "overwinter". Your wild crickets are probably going to be closer to the 10 days.

Thank u guys a lot I really appreciat your guys feed back now Im thinking of starting a mealworm colony. One last thing. If I catch wild crickets just for breeding and they have dessieses, The dessieses won't transfer to the pinheads right??

 

[fluxlizard]

Thank u guys a lot I really appreciat your guys feed back now Im thinking of starting a mealworm colony. One last thing. If I catch wild crickets just for breeding and they have dessieses, The dessieses won't transfer to the pinheads right??

Shouldn't be a problem, IMO.