Trying to breed crickets, need help

So I recently started trying to breed crickets and I've got everything set up, vermiculite as the substrate, and I used organic top soil that strangely has mulch and sand in it too in two sandwich containers, food, water, egg crate pieces scattered around and a 50 watt heat bulb about 12 inches above the floor of the container which should provide about 75 degrees. I keep finding dead crickets and no eggs...this project has been going for about a week now and still nothing. I dont understand whats wrong...

Hi Susan,....there's an article at the top of this page. By the way, it needs to be around 80 for the eggs [ if any were layed ] to hatch.

I've already read that. Twice. It only explains the setup. There is no info for things that go wrong. Did you even read the full post??

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Can you post a pic of the set up, including close ups ? To do so, load pics to photobucket, then copy/paste the img/url here. Or use the info on this link. https://www.beardeddragon.org/useruploads/

Are you sure that nothing is too wet in there or any mold at all in there on food ? Wetness + mold will kill the crix. They may also die if there isn't enough ventilation. Do you have a lid on the enclosure ? And have you been keeping crix before without them dying ? Just want to rule out that you haven't received sick crix .

the camera on my phone is dead so pics are a no go, unfortunately. But basically I have a big rubbermaid tub with about 75% of the top cut out and aluminum screen glued to the top. eggcrate stuff scattered around and some cardboard tubes, two sandwhich containers with top soil purchased from the local hardware store. A 50 watt heat lamp keeping the temp around 85 degrees, and I spray water all in the tub everyday but not enough that things are soaked. I caught a male and female mating the other day but she never laid any eggs. They arent dying as much now so I may have gotten a bad batch before. I am questioning the top soil though cause it seems to have a lot of mulch in it but all the hardware store sells is stuff with mulch and sand in it.

It may have been a bad batch of crix if they pretty much all died. It might be too much spraying too, their enclosure should be dry except for the egg trays. And back when I bred them many of the females seemed to be full of eggs and would start laying as soon as they crawled on to the soil/sand mix I used and I never saw them actually mate, they were mated already as adults. Soil/mulch should be O.K . too.

Hmmm okay, I thought in the videos I watched they sprayed the whole tub everyday...I will switch to just the soil. However, I did find what looked like an egg here and there today. It wasnt much, but I did read they can lay them up to an inch from the surface and I usually find they've been digging in the soil. I transfered my sandwich containers to the nursery tub today so I guess i'll see in about a week. The ones that have survived and the new ones are a lot more active then before, both in movement and noise. I appreciate the info and I'll be in touch if I find anything else odd. One more question though, is chlorine really that bad for them? I've been using water that sits out for a couple days and bottled water but im sure crickets in the wild are exposed to "treated water"...

I never had any problem using tap water. And yes, the only part of the set up that should be sprayed lightly to keep it moist is the egg laying tubs.