Keeping feeders alive

Heya how do you guys keep your feeders and how long do the followingnormally live
- crickets
- woodies
- silkworms


Thanks
Guys! X

I used to order crickets 1000 at a time which would last about a month. They had a 20g bin with a mesh top and lived in cardboard tubes. They ate veg scraps. They needed frequent cleaning (a couple of times per week at least) and were noisy/stinky. I haven't kept woodies but moved to roaches and keep a colony in a similar tank with mesh top and cardboard tubes. They also eat veg scraps and occasional fruit. Silk worms do best in a shallow tub with some mulberry leaves or mulberry chow that needs to be replaced regularly. They don't tend to live as long but are a popular treat so are usually eaten quickly.

Okay thanks! Do the roaches smell & what do you do when you clean out the tubs?

Could I just keep them in the containers I buy them in?

The roaches don't have much smell. Especially not compared to crickets. They don't need much cleaning but the food should be refreshed regularly. It's best to keep them in a tote bin or tank with a mesh top for ventilation. They like cardboard tubes or egg crates for housing and will compost most kitchen veg scraps like pros. Here is some info about dubia carehttps://www.southtexasdragons.com/dubia-roaches.html I'm not sure that you can get them in Australia, but you may be able to find something similar.

I raise mostly my own silkworms from eggs (I harvested from my own silkworms), I use 4.5 ClearVue tub which has a lid I punched holes in using a soldering iron.
I use mainly fresh mulberry leaves to feed them - I buy the leaves from people on GumTree.

Superworms - I keep 50 - 100 in a 4.5L ClearVue tub (with a lid I made holes in as above) with about 1L of wheatbran or a mix of wheatbran and oat bran + some carrot chunks and the whites from buk choi to give moisture.

Mealworms - I keep these in a 1.5L ClearVue tub about 1/3 full of wheatbran , I add carrot to provide moisture and they also get stale adult beardie pellets from the crickets.

Crickets , I keep these in old cleaned Piscus cricket tubs (pays to hang onto these , very handy to keep all sorts of things in) , I buy the crickets 500 - 1000 at time , was 1000 per 2 - 3 weeks til recently when my boy unexpected and suddenly died (organ failure due to a birth defect ?).
I put maybe 80 cricket into each tub with maybe 10 RepCal Adult Beardie Pellets (dry from the bottle) and add a chunk of carrot to give them a source of moisture.
I can keep them crickets happy and alive for about 3 -4 weeks. If you are buying in bulk, buy one or two sizes smaller than you need and they will grow and not all die off of old age before you get to use them.
So in my case as all my pet lizards are adults , I buy 2/3 size or medium size crickets in my bulk orders.

BSF lavae, not used very often , all my lizards are too big except my water skink who doesn't seem to like them - she's too well fed and too fussy. Leave them in the bedding and simply fish out the lavae as needed by hand.

Futurebeardiemummy":csaz5czc said:

Okay thanks! Do the roaches smell & what do you do when you clean out the tubs?

Could I just keep them in the containers I buy them in?

Click to expand...

If buying in bulk by mailorder , the crickets will arrive in a mailing tube or in a bag in box. I use old cricket tubs to keep my crickets in long term.

I find it's a good idea to keep them in smaller tubs than in a big tub all together because if some arrive sick , you wont loose all the consignment in a mass die off , you might loose 2 - 3 tubs of the 10 -12 tubs - this happens sometimes.