Dubias Dieing. Any suggestions?

I've recently bought some adult dubia roaches to start a colony of feeders in preparation for my bearded dragon next year. But I'm kind of new at this. I've found two of my adult roaches dead.

I initially bought 15 adult roaches: 10 females, 5 males. So far here is my setup for them.

They live in a large 20 gallon plastic tote with several egg crates. There is a heat mat under the tank connected to a thermostat for safety. On the warm side temps range from close to 90 degrees near the bottom, about 80 degrees in the middle and a little warmer than room temperature towards the top. Since it's been a bit cold lately, being winter and all, I've placed a towel over the warm end of the tote for a bit more insulation. There is a ventilation hole on the lid on the cool side of the tote about five inches long and two inches wide covered with a screen. Humidity is at around 60% or more. The tote is in my bathroom, so it's easy to keep the humidity high enough for them.

As for their food, I feed them fruits and veg. I feed them a variety of collard greens, apples, oranges, carrots, cantaloupe, romaine lettuce and cucumbers. I'm positive they get enough water from their food so I don't bother with water crystals. They don't seem to munch on the food as much as I thought they would but maybe that's because there aren't very many of them. They devour cucumbers though, I assume for the water.

I usually leave the food in their bin for about 24 hours. So far one of the females has had babies and I've seen about a dozen tiny nymphs in the bin.

I've had these roaches since Jan 28 and since then, two of my adult roaches have died. I found one adult female dead last week and one adult male dead today. I've also seen at least two tiny nymphs die. I have no clue why. The other adults seem to be moving around fast and fine, but I'm getting concerned.

Here are my guesses as to why they're dying:

Too humid.
Injured.
Pesticides from their food.
Mold.
Some chemical in my bathroom.
Not enough ventilation.

Today I plan on moving them to a new plastic bin with new egg flats in the hope that I can get rid of the problem. I also plan on not leaving food in their bin for more than 12 hours this time around. I also plan on moving them to my closet, where there is no smell of pine sol or any other cleaning agent.

My question, though, has anyone run into the same problem? My roaches aren't dying fast enough for me to conclude anything. Anybody have any suggestions for me? I want to avoid any future problems so any advice would be greatly appreciated.

It sounds like you have a pretty good setup. A small amount of dieoffs isn't unusual, especially with the adults. They are pretty tough and can handle cool temps and lower humidity, they just don't seem to breed as quickly in those conditions. You may want to increase the ventilation but it's hard to say for sure what's going on. Keep an eye out for any mold, and continue to replace the food regularly. They may not need a ton of food until the colony is really established so there may be a lot left over. Hopefully the little ones start to grow. If you see them start to die off more then you may want to remove them, clean the bin, and start them in a fresh setup.

CooperDragon":1o71su3s said:

It sounds like you have a pretty good setup. A small amount of dieoffs isn't unusual, especially with the adults. They are pretty tough and can handle cool temps and lower humidity, they just don't seem to breed as quickly in those conditions. You may want to increase the ventilation but it's hard to say for sure what's going on. Keep an eye out for any mold, and continue to replace the food regularly. They may not need a ton of food until the colony is really established so there may be a lot left over. Hopefully the little ones start to grow. If you see them start to die off more then you may want to remove them, clean the bin, and start them in a fresh setup.

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Is it common for one or two to die even though I've only had the roaches for less than a month? I noticed when I got the roaches that a few of them seemed to move slower than the others. The rest seem fine but I'm prepared to move them to a new tote the second I see another one die.

Yeah the adults will die off now and then. I get regular adult die offs in my colony but it is a small amount compared to the overall colony and I figure they just get old.

CooperDragon":340ohg6c said:

Yeah the adults will die off now and then. I get regular adult die offs in my colony but it is a small amount compared to the overall colony and I figure they just get old.

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Well, today I looked inside and there were no dead ones. Plus I saw that another female had babies. Hopefully no more of my adults die.

OK good, that sounds promising. The colony will be much less fragile one the next generation gets going and established. After a while you'll have more than you know what to do with =).

That's awesome you have baby roaches showing up!!! I wish mine would hurry up and knock boots ?

Could be old age if you got them as adults.
It's good your starting on a colony before getting the dragon. Eventually you'll have lots of them. My Dubia's breed and reproduce a lot less than my orange head roaches though. I got my Dubia's about 6 months before I got my orange heads. There are probably about 3000 of them while my orange heads probably have over 20,000
.

Rankins":3ud4q6jh said:

Could be old age if you got them as adults.
It's good your starting on a colony before getting the dragon. Eventually you'll have lots of them. My Dubia's breed and reproduce a lot less than my orange head roaches though. I got my Dubia's about 6 months before I got my orange heads. There are probably about 3000 of them while my orange heads probably have over 20,000
.

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I know about orange heads. Long before purchasing my dubias I weighed the pros and cons of my top 3 choices for feeder roaches, which are Dubia, Discoid, and orange heads. I decided on dubias because they're the easiest to sex out of the three and I don't need as many feeders as orange heads can produce. I'm only getting one dragon. Though I wouldn't mind having an orange head, a male ivory or a male giant cave roach as a pet. But my mom is already squeamish about the roaches I have now so I doubt I'll get to own any more. It took a bit of convincing to get her approval for the Dubias. God forbid if she sees a giant cave cockroach, no matter how shiny and silver it is.

If I wait until next year to get my dragon, I'll have enough female roaches to produce as many babies as I need for a young dragon. I also plan on buying feeder worms at least once a month. Next on my checklist is to find a suitable vet that's hopefully close by. I've searched for websites, supplies and supplements recommended by professional breeders. I plan on having some basic first-aid on hand. I even plan on getting a microscope to perform my own fecal tests at home.

I've also decided on getting the 40gal large-wide exo-terra vivarium. I know that 40 gal is bare minimum for an adult dragon and that 50-60gal is recommended but I can't fit one that large in my bedroom. There is no doubt in my mind that I need to put my dragons' enclosure in my bedroom because I have a bunch of very young nieces and nephews that I, frankly, don't trust with anything smaller than my moms' giant, tolerant, very patient oaf of a dog(he's a black English lab). One niece in particular is very rowdy at times. I'd rather my dragon be safer in a smaller enclosure placed in my bedroom than to risk its safety in a large one placed anywhere else. Plus my room is the warmest in the winter so that's a major bonus.

I've even decided on a name for my dragon. I decided on a gender-neutral name because it's sometimes tough to tell what gender they are when they're young. I won't reveal the name until I get the dragon though, because I might change my mind later anyway. Though my current choice will be tough to beat.

I've thought long and hard about everything I will need for at least two years now. The dubias are just the first step.

Sounds like you have thought things out really well. The orange heads are really prolific, much more so than Dubia's. That's my main reason I suggest them over Dubia's. They also are kind of pretty, and they are more plump. So you don't have to feed as many to the dragon.
I have ivory heads...they breed pretty slow and they are huge as nymphs. They are built like a tank...very cool roaches.
This is a nymph that is nearing adulthood.[ximg]85426 9701546914[/ximg]

Rankins":112m9734 said:

Sounds like you have thought things out really well. The orange heads are really prolific, much more so than Dubia's. That's my main reason I suggest them over Dubia's. They also are kind of pretty, and they are more plump. So you don't have to feed as many to the dragon.
I have ivory heads...they breed pretty slow and they are huge as nymphs. They are built like a tank...very cool roaches.
This is a nymph that is nearing adulthood.[ximg]85426 9701546914[/ximg]

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Awesome roach, dude!

Since I'm only getting one dragon, I decided that I don't need the more prolific ones. And if what you say is true that I wouldn't have to feed as many to my dragon then I will quickly have way more roaches than I'll know what to do with.(Though that fact seems inevitable no matter what species I choose) I'd rather go with the slower, easier to sex, less prolific option. They're both great feeders, no doubt.

I already considered the fact that if I bought orange heads that I could have plenty of roaches much sooner and therefore I could buy my dragon sooner. However, I like having more time than less time. I don't want to have a huge colony too soon. I've already planned to get my dragon early summer next year, so I don't need tens of thousands of roaches by then. I might be exaggerating there but you get my point.

And I do agree that orange heads are pretty. I even think the dubias are pretty. I like bugs in general and beetles of any kind are especially fascinating to me. Which is surprising because I actually used to live in a trailer house that was majorly infested with american and german cockroaches, so much so that you feel a lack of breath just from entering the house. One closet was so bad that it was very difficult to breathe just being near it. The reason they got so bad was because my grandmother, whom I took care of during her final years, would put out bread, veggies and other food for her parakeets to eat. She would also feed the barn cats outside and some of the kittens came inside to eat. She would leave cans of cat food on the floor and such, despite my protests that it would cause more problems with the roaches. She was stubborn, though, and in the end I had to sleep with my light on just to discourage the roaches from coming out and crawling on me while I slept. I'm rambling...sorry.

You're lucky to have ivory heads, I likely will never have one but I'm content with my dubias for now. I'll be super happy when I get my dragon next year.

I also have had roaches before. It was in two houses I had moved into, they were there when I moved it.
The loss of breath sounds worrysome though. I'm really allergic to some roaches, hissing roaches will send me to the ER.

The ivory heads are hard to find and are expensive. My colony is growing really slowly though.

If you end up with a bunch of roaches you could always sell them. I'm vending at a reptile exo to sell some mexican beaded lizards O hatched and a couple male Gila monsters. I'm taking roaches also. If I sell 5000 (the amount I'm taking) I will make $1500.

The reason the house had a stuffiness to it is because major pest roaches have allergens in their saliva, droppings and skin. The worst is when they shed body parts or die because their decaying body parts release a horrible smelling allergen that can cause asthmatic symptoms in people and in some cases they can cause permanent asthma. Headache, shortness of breath, difficulty breathing, congestion, sneezing, and watery eyes are all symptoms. Since the closet was so horrible, it was particularly bad in there. I kid you not, you open that closet and BAM! Instant headache. Stand in front of the open closet for a few seconds and you'll likely begin to cough.

When my grandmother passed away we cleaned out everything in that trailer house and fixed it up as well as we could. But it took quite a while to clean that closet because it was awful just being near it. The amount of poop and oothecas in there was mind boggling. I actually have a pic of some sticky traps I put just behind the gap underneath my door in an attempt to keep roaches out of my bedroom. Less than half an hour later, there were four big roaches on them.

One time I was fixing some dinner for myself in the kitchen and all of a sudden at least six or seven roaches came out and started fluttering around the room. I can't tell you how many times I had large roaches jump onto my head. I was working on my computer, doing some photo editing, and all of a sudden a big roach jumped from the top of my monitor onto my face, dead center on my nose. I woke up one day and saw a roach on my pillow not six inches from my face, just chilling there waving its antennae. I felt like I was in the sequel to Joe's Apartment. It was that bad.

The time when we had crazy ants is another story entirely but I think I've talked long enough.

Yeah, I can relate...the American cockroaches I had in a home in Mississippi were horrible. They would get into food items if it wasn't stored in plastic containers. Disgusting pest species...thankfully Dubia's, orange heads and ivory heads are not pest species...I wouldn't have them if they were.
I'm starting to wonder if my roach allergy may have been related to mites on the hissing roaches. Apparently they have a beneficial mite that lives on them. I haven't had an allergic reaction to any other roach...and none of them have mites.
But I am dreading cleaning out my roach bin. I need to do it really soon to package up 5000 roaches to take to the expo. I have a bunch of big sorting bins made up, but I haven't used them before. I'm hoping I can just dump the entire bin contents into the stacked sorting bins and not have to sift every thing out. Stirring up that much roach waste could be problematic. I won't do it in the house, and my garage is really cold...so hopefully it won't take long for them to sort themselves out. Last time I cleaned it I used a spaghetti drainer and it didn't work very well. I'll actually be glad to thin out the colony....it's getting to the point I will need to clean the bin every couple months. The frass builds up quick when the colony is huge. I figure my orange head colony eats over 1 lb of food per day....that's a lot of roach poop.
Crazy ants had to worse than roaches. Those things are nasty...much worse than fire ants.

Rankins":1vhvqccs said:

Yeah, I can relate...the American cockroaches I had in a home in Mississippi were horrible. They would get into food items if it wasn't stored in plastic containers. Disgusting pest species...thankfully Dubia's, orange heads and ivory heads are not pest species...I wouldn't have them if they were.
I'm starting to wonder if my roach allergy may have been related to mites on the hissing roaches. Apparently they have a beneficial mite that lives on them. I haven't had an allergic reaction to any other roach...and none of them have mites.
But I am dreading cleaning out my roach bin. I need to do it really soon to package up 5000 roaches to take to the expo. I have a bunch of big sorting bins made up, but I haven't used them before. I'm hoping I can just dump the entire bin contents into the stacked sorting bins and not have to sift every thing out. Stirring up that much roach waste could be problematic. I won't do it in the house, and my garage is really cold...so hopefully it won't take long for them to sort themselves out. Last time I cleaned it I used a spaghetti drainer and it didn't work very well. I'll actually be glad to thin out the colony....it's getting to the point I will need to clean the bin every couple months. The frass builds up quick when the colony is huge. I figure my orange head colony eats over 1 lb of food per day....that's a lot of roach poop.
Crazy ants had to worse than roaches. Those things are nasty...much worse than fire ants.

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Crazy ants don't sting, but holy hell were there tons of them. Since they have multiple queens, they're difficult to get rid of. They actually killed all fire ant colonies surrounding the house. Then they completely took over the floor of the house. Seriously, the entire floor was completely black with ants. I wish I had some pictures. A few minutes of vacuuming the ants filled up the vacuum, but they just kept coming right back. Not a minute later the ants covered every inch of the floor.

That year, the cockroach population also dwindled. That's probably why they stayed for so long. For a while I questioned whether or not I missed the fire ants and American cockroaches. Though when the crazy ants moved on and those two returned, I decided that I liked the crazy ants more. They walked all over my legs whenever I walked across the floor but at least they didn't sting. They also didn't climb into my bed. I once had a fire ant queen try to start a colony in my bed sheets.