Dubia colony

[nahuelarg86]

So I bought dubias to start a colony, what I have is:

100 small (which I plan on using for first time feeders until the roaches give birth to more)
50 large (which I heard they become breeders after 1-3 weeks)
4 Breeders (which I've been told the begin to give birth after 1 week)

Does this sound Ok? Will I be having a working colony soon?
Thanks a lot!

 

[mozzy9511]

What kind of setup do you have?
Are you heating them, if so, what is the temp?

When we first started our colony we had 3 sets of adult breeders and 250 mixed.
We just got a heating pad on them last week, but they had their first set of babies about 2 weeks ago, after about 3.5 months of waiting!!
The more adult breeders you have, the faster your colony will start. Each mature female will only have 20 to 40 babies per month.
I wouldn't recommend feeding out of the 100 small, I would leave them to contribute to the colony and order some more specifically for feeders.
The more of them you have in the colony, the more comfortable they will be, most likely resulting in faster reproduction.
If you can it is best to just leave the colony undisturbed until you get it established.
After you have a thriving colony you can start feeding out of it and also feeding the adult males because you want about a 2:1 ratio females:males.

 

[nahuelarg86]

What kind of setup do you have?
Are you heating them, if so, what is the temp?

When we first started our colony we had 3 sets of adult breeders and 250 mixed.
We just got a heating pad on them last week, but they had their first set of babies about 2 weeks ago, after about 3.5 months of waiting!!
The more adult breeders you have, the faster your colony will start. Each mature female will only have 20 to 40 babies per month.
I wouldn't recommend feeding out of the 100 small, I would leave them to contribute to the colony and order some more specifically for feeders.
The more of them you have in the colony, the more comfortable they will be, most likely resulting in faster reproduction.
If you can it is best to just leave the colony undisturbed until you get it established.
After you have a thriving colony you can start feeding out of it and also feeding the adult males because you want about a 2:1 ratio females:males.

I have a 18 gallon plastic tub. I have a heating pad under half of it. I don't know the temp yet, I have to go and measure it. I thought that would be enough with 50 large which in some weeks will become adults, hmm that makes me think. I'm feeding crickets from the pet store right now and is costing me a fortune. Buying the roaches wasn't cheap either that's why I want to feed from the colony ASAP.
How do you know when the colony is established? Do you count them or what?

 

[AJD]

Im buying a 100 mixed lot with a breeding pair from "theroachman."
I have a baby, and a sub adult right now. Do you think that they will make a big enough colony to supply for them? Neither of them eat a lot. How big of a bin should I use to breed them?

 

[Pixall]

mmkay. First off, Dubia = dragon candy. Unless you can afford to buy 1000 smalls a couple times a month, DO NOT FEED DUBIA TO YOUR DRAGONS TILL YOUR COLONY IS ESTABLISHED. I made that mistake and now my youngest dragon refuses to eat crickets. Mmkay? Mmkay. Arabella is not growing NEARLY as fast as I would like.

Now that that is out of the way, it IS possible to start a colony with a verrrrryyyyy small amount of starting stock. However, it will take EONS to have a thriving colony. I started with 60 total in early October. Not all of them are adults. I try to keep about 7 males in my colony and the rest females, but with most of my subadults molting into males, it is getting rather aggravating. I have around 20 adult females, and 8 or 9 males ATM. The rest are subadults. I get babies out of them decently often, but not fast enough to slate my dragons' demonic roach thirst(lol). I tried putting aside around 100 smalls to grow out, but my dragon goes through roaches so quick I nearly always end up feeding out of the bin before I can order new smalls. In short; if you start small, just let them do their thing. Give them food, water gel, heat and darkness. Once a month(ish) clean and sort(for a head count only, unless you have too many males and they are getting beaten up, PUT THEM ALL BACK. Cannot stress this enough, roaches like lots of company. ). Make sure they have food and water with a quick peek in about once a week. I give mine oranges whenever I remember to. Oranges are roach Viagra. Just make sure you take out the fruit before it molds. Mold is very dangerous for roaches.

They like it warm. Mine are over a repti-therm UTH. DO NOT DO THIS. Repti-therm + plastic tote = baaaaaaaaaad. LOL I only do this because of the way I have them set up, and I am a stay at home slave ATM. A safe option is a human heating pad on low. It can run 24/7 with no problems. Make sure you do NOT get the "old and child safe" kind with an auto shut off. You want the roachies at around 85-90*F. This temperature should heat up the water gel to the point that it keeps them niiice and humid.

They will breed as low as 75*F, but not nearly as well OR fast.

And darkness is crucial. everything else can be 100% perfect but if they get too much light, they WILL NOT BREED in my experience. Mine had 12 hours of dark and 12 hours of partial light a day and were not producing at all. I switched them to a black tote in the closet, and BOOM. Roach babies.

Sorry, I am a tad goofy at the moment, too. Hope I helped a bit.

 

[mozzy9511]

I have a 18 gallon plastic tub. I have a heating pad under half of it. I don't know the temp yet, I have to go and measure it. I thought that would be enough with 50 large which in some weeks will become adults, hmm that makes me think. I'm feeding crickets from the pet store right now and is costing me a fortune. Buying the roaches wasn't cheap either that's why I want to feed from the colony ASAP.
How do you know when the colony is established? Do you count them or what?

We have ours in about a tub that size and we do have a repti-therm UTH on ours without any problems so far, but the tub we have is a thicker plastic than most of them.
Pixall has some good information. Like I said, the more you have to start, the faster you will get the colony going.
For food I use ground up dog food (or cat food), fish flakes, and some cricket gut loader from the pet store (which I only use because I have it), I also put fresh oranges in there every few days, like she said, and they love them! My tank stays about 90 degrees or a little more.

Buying crickets from the petstore will definitely cost you a fortune!! You can order them online for much cheaper, if you get them from flukers.com its about $25 for 1000 shipped.
There are also other alternatives to crickets like Turkistan roaches, which we also have a colony of, and my beardies love.
If you are interested in starting a colony of those, they breed much faster than the dubias, they are just a bit more like a roach lol

And I consider an "established" colony one where you have enough to feed out of them without having to wait for more nymphs.

 

[mozzy9511]

Im buying a 100 mixed lot with a breeding pair from "theroachman."
I have a baby, and a sub adult right now. Do you think that they will make a big enough colony to supply for them? Neither of them eat a lot. How big of a bin should I use to breed them?

I can't say for sure if this will be enough, since I don't know how many your beardies eat per day. What I can tell you is each adult female will produce between 20 and 40 babies a month, so from there you can do the math on how many adult females you would need to keep a supply.
I would suggest not using any of these for feeders until you have a thriving colony.
I have mine in about an 18 gallon tub

 

[BeardedAaliyah]

I love seeing all these posts. I cannot wait to start my own colony.