Cricket Keeper

[kalidog]

I have the small cricket keeper. Does anyone know what the maximum number of crickets I can keep in there might be?

 

[VenusAndSaturn]

Probably 1-4 crickets, not very many at all as cricket keepers are a waste of money entirely. They dont provide enough room for them, which often causes smell, quick deaths, and you having to go out and get crickets more than usual.

A proper "cricket keeper" would be a 60 or 90 quart tub with screen on the top of the lid. This would give them enough ventilation to not smell, and there would be fewer deaths because of the space. You could hold up to 2,000 or so crickets in this which would last you a month or more depending on the age of your beardie. 1-4 month olds eating around 30-60 bugs each day, 4-12 months old eating around 20-40 bugs a day or more, 12-20 months eating 15-20 bugs on a daily basis, and 20+ months eating 15-20 crickets every other day.

 

[kalidog]

Thanks for the info. For the screen top, could I put holes in the plastic tub top as well for ventilation? And, is there an online "store" that you recommend to buy big quantities of crickets?

 

[VenusAndSaturn]

I recommend flukersfarm for the crickets, just dont take the advice on beardies that they have on their website, they literally recommend a full grown beardie to stay in a 20 gallon last time i checked. Pretty much only good for feeder insects.

Though there is also amazon but i cant guarantee that crickets will be available on there 24/7.

And yes poking holes work as well as long as they are very large and theres many of them. The tub will increase humidity so thats why i suggested basically cutting out the inside portion of the lid and hot gluing mesh to it. However you could also just have no lid to it because most of the time crickets dont jump out as long as the hiding places like paper towel tubes or egg crates arent tall enough to reach the top and the tub is tall.

 

[kalidog]

Agreed. I like the screen/mesh idea much better. So how do you feed/water the crickets in the tub? By small dishes? What's the best gut load food for the crickets? The Fluker's orange cube complete diet or do you recommend some other means of food/water?

 

[VenusAndSaturn]

I used to use that formulated stuff but they died so quickly when i did, preferably you want them to eat what your beardie eats for greens. Basically throw in some collard greens, mustard greens, turnip greens, maybe some fruit here and there in one corner and that'll give them food and water basically. However you could always spray down the sides slightly if your worried about water.

 

[kalidog]

I prefer to feed the crickets the greens. Much easier on me. Thanks for all your help!