Dubia colony questions

[Mrphuzz]

I am working on my first colony. My primary purpose is to feed my one dragon, but also have fun raising a colony and see where things go from there. No babies yet, and I haven't disturbed them enough to try to find any pregnant females. Anyway... I have an 18 gallon opaque bin with about 25 breeding females and 7 breeding males and 500 nymphs. I have ventilation holes in the lid on each end so as to have a cool side and a hotter side. The hotter side is heated with a 250W basking bulb about a foot above the bin. The temperature is kept at about 90F with a thermostat, so the bulb turns on and off as needed. I have a hygrometer sitting at the bottom of the bin that reads around 18% humidity. I have a jar with water and holes poked in the lid on the hot side. On the cool side I have some peanut butter jar type lids for food and water. The sides of the lids are roughed with sand paper to ensure the little guys can get up in there. The bin is in the garage, as the wife isn't keen on have a roach motel in the house. I have some roach chow (from roach king, I think) and water crystals and I feed them random veggies, such as sweet peppers and apples and kale and collard greens. I swap the stuff out every day, maybe every other. I have egg flats on edge with a bit of cardboard in between them so they don't fit inside each other and squish the little guys.

1. How does this sound in general?

2a. I know the humidity is lower than ideal. I find in my house humidity is around 26%. I can bring them inside and my wife can deal with it, but still, 26% is low. From what I understand, 60% is ideal. But then, I wonder, doesn't that lead to a concern of mold in such a humid environment?

2b. I was thinking about getting a hygrostat (thermostat type device that reacts to humidity instead of temperature) and a USB powered portable humidifier, keeping the humidity to 50%-60%. Is this overkill, or a good idea?

3. I don't think die off is too bad. I see lots of shells from molting (does this indicate adequate hubimity?), but I also see a few dead youngters here and there, like 1 or 2 per day. However, my big concern happened this morning when I found a breeding age female dead on the bottom of the bin.

Anyway, I would love to hear some thoughts from people who know about this stuff more than I do!

Thanks!

 

[CooperDragon]

I've found that they are pretty tough and can handle a lot of different conditions including less than optimal and varying humidity and temperatures. I haven't used any automation and haven't had an issue. My colony is in the basement which is humid in summer and very dry and cool all winter. I would offer plenty of veges for them to eat. They seem to especially like squash, pumpkin, bread and orange slices. A little bit of die off is normal from what I've seen but shouldn't be widespread.

 

[cjack99]

Hi MrPhuzz;

Your set up will work fine to get you going. You will go through the growing pains and eventually find what works for you. Don't get all wrapped up in science, don't over think it. Doobies have been around for millions of years, they aren't going anywhere.

I started with a similar plan, and junked it twice in getting to my current colony. Major mistakes I made were water, Doobie housing, and food. However, never did the Doobies die, they are pretty tough.

Key points are clean good food, water available, and a clean environment. The latter is the hardest.

My colony is now over 4 years old, I started with 40 doobies. I've given bunches away to my Son, and actually it's time to give more away, I think I've got at least 500 now and still only 1 Beardie. BTW, my 6 year old Beardie seems to be happy on 2 or maybe 3 Dubias a day. Plus some greens, all she wants. She doesn't eat every day, sometimes she takes a day off. She lets me know shes hungry, she sits in the feeding tray and looks, well,,, hungry.

The colony is in the garage, they can handle the heat, I do provide heat for them in winter. The heat lamps are those 100 watt blacked out type, they hang above the colony about 8" above, normally only need 1, when it's really cold, I turn on the other one.

I now use 3 large Walmart plastic containers not the biggest, but almost. They measure roughly 18" wide, 30" long, and 13" high. No top, it's pointless. I made screened cut outs on each side and each end for plenty of air. Only 1 is active, the other 2 are for spares, because, flies happen, and you will eventually have to move your colony, might as well be ready.

I started with egg cartons for housing, quickly found them to be worthless. Why? Dubias eat them. Dubias eat almost anything. What happens with your nice egg carton apartments is the babies all gang into the ends of each egg cup, adults crowd them, they munch away, the cartons become moist, begin to collapse, the bottom of your container gets moist. If you use one of those water sources that you fill up and then they gravity feed to keep the ring wet that gets polluted, flys swarm in, lay eggs, pretty soon it smells like a swamp, then you realize you have to move the Doobies, but the egg cartons collapse, and it will take you 6 hours to move 200 doobies to a new container. Plan on it. So, what I now use for housing is 2, 3 tier metal secretary in/out trays. Amazon, $13 to $20. These are made of metal, the supports are tubular, the trays slide in the slots. 3 tier will give you 3 levels for your Doobies, keep the floor of the container dry. Doobies will go down to the floor, but if you feed them in the trays, and supply water in the trays, then only the big mammas will go to the bottom, mostly. Then when you need to swap containers, which you will, I guarantee it: it will take you a few minutes to take the container out into the open air (this blows the flys away), position the spare container by the current one, pick up each tray, lift it carefully up and set it down in the new container, doobies and all, same for the second tray. Now it will take you from 30 minutes to an hour to get the Doobies on the bottom and move them over. I'm talking a magnitude difference. Doobies don't eat the steal supports, nor do they eat the wire mesh the trays are made of. For water, I use those general foods coffee containers, cut down to about 1" high, using water crystals, I give them 2 per each secretary in/out tray, so that's 4 per doobie container. The chicken waterer I was using was happily tossed in the trash. The GF coffee container, when it gets smelly, out it goes, no muss no fuss.

For food,,,,,, Doobies will eat anything, BUT, a happy Doobie bug makes a Happy Bearded Dragon. Food for thought. Mine get only shredded carrots from me. And ONLY what they will eat in a day / night. I tried the dried food mixture, worthless, less than worthless. I tried all sorts of fruit, yeah, they love it, but it slops on the bottom, flies also love it, the floor gets moist, and it all goes to another container cleaning. Shredded Carrots, they like them, they eat them, and the Beardie is happy. Now my wife, oh well. She firmly believes Doobies, while being a food for a Beardie, deserve a good life while they have it. Sooooooo, she gives them peas almost daily, they LOVE peas! And they love bananas. So she spices life up for them a bit. She also makes little ladders so they can climb up the trays. Trust me, they don't really need the ladders, they can climb. But they can't fly, and they can't climb the Walmart container sides, and they can't jump. So they stay put.

I will never see Doobies as a "roach". They aren't really. Someone should study them, they are actually a very fascinating life form. Anyway, that's the story on my colony, and what I've learned about keeping them.

cheers
cjack