dubia encouragement

[jducky18]

The past three weeks have been absolutely nuts for me (I've barely had time to feed my dragon, much less try to take care of the colony I started) and so I haven't opened the bin in a little over two weeks. I finally opened it today to give them some food and water, and I found some tiny black wormy-things. I didn't want to take a closer look. But anyway, the point of this post, I am going to buy some buckets in the next couple days to separate my feeders for the first time (I started the colony back in November) and I would love some encouragement for separating them. The adults still terrify me and when I opened the bin this morning it looked like my first set of nymphs were almost full grown adults. Which also means that there are an unknown number of large creepy roaches crawling around in that bin.

In theory I know that you take one bucket and you drill a bunch of holes in it and then just sort the feeders from the breeders that way, but I'm so scared to actually do it. Aside from touching them (absolutely not) anyone have a way to help me get through this process?

 

[AmStaffPit]

Not sure what to tell you since they do not bother me. But you are correct, use a bucket or two or more, depending on how many different sizes you want to sort out but make sure the bottom bucket has no holes. My colony is only a couple months old so I am not feeding from it yet. My wife felt the way you do about touching raoches and having three daughters, I am a firm believer of confronting ones fears. I took a couple of weeks for my oldest (16) and my wife, but they are fine with them now. I started by having them hold the babies and worked their way to the big ones. My wife is still not fond of the adults dubia but at least she doesnt freak out when I am holding one and it gets away from me. She will actually grab it and put it back in the bin, although it is done in lightening speed. In other words, if you plan to sort and feed, you will have to touch at some point.

 

[Wetbee]

Im a girl..ok a 58 yr old one.. but still pretty darned bug phobic. I spent a few hrs drilling holes in buckets and if there were the slightest burrs on them, it didnt work, and I was shaking/twisting them so much, It could not be good for the buggies.
....I decided to take each egg crate and knock it into a clear big tote. I had a small bucket that I spooned out the xtra males and 3/4 grown nymphs into. the babies and females and a few males i poured into the new tote all ready with clean egg crates. No touching. Another egg crate into the clear tote..fish out the males w/ a bigish spoon...big nymphs..rest go into new clean tote..when i was done w/ egg crates..the old 'dirty' bin was left with obvious escapees, and babies. I dumped the "feeders" into that with the old dirty egg crates. The 'family' bin, I fed and put under the heat. I use a 100 CHE hung over the same sized hole cut out of the lid. I taped on nylong netting and leave it alone except for times when I feed my beardies. The feeder bin is in front of the coal stove so its warm enough, and I feed them same as the family bin.
....When I do. I take an old dirty egg crate, knock it into the clear tote..spoon out the nymphs that molt into females, and the too small nymphs and babies..and put them in the family bin. then I bring a beardie out and plunk him or her into the bin w/ the extra males/big old nymphs (beardies are 2 yrs old) this prevents them from escaping their vivs and I can control how many they eat.
any extras go back into the 'dirty' bin.
... When I run out of feeders. I will dump the old dry food and frass into the compost and repeat.
I squeal like a girl when I rarely get one on me...but the spoon technique works well..and Science is kinda neat.... from a slight distance...LOLOL
...Connie