Dubia Roaches

[lexiegirl]

Hi everyone,

I just thought I would share my story with my dubia roaches I currently have. I ordered about 100 roaches back in August/September and began feeding my beardies a few everyday. Well, I was going to try to start my own colony, but I knew I couldn't because they were not allowed inside and the weather was about to get cold, so I fed off as many as I could but still had adults that were too large to feed my beardies. Eventually, between the cold weather (they stayed in a 30 gallon aquarium in a shed with no heat) and getting busy with school and going back to feeding my beardies crickets, I forgot about the dubias. Well, they went 5 months without food and water (the roaches) and stayed in the shed through the coldest winter ever in my area, which we had numerous nights in the teens plus 6" of snow, etc. Well, my dad said something about them since they are in his shed and I couldn't believe it. Most of the roaches were STILL ALIVE!!!!! :shock: I was stunned because I had always heard they couldn't survive the cold weather or outside of a certain humidity range, etc. So now I have a partial colony that I hadn't even attempted to start. Now, my mom has all the more reason to refuse to allow them in the house. But on the positivie side I have a feeder other than crickets or worms to give my beardies

Lexie

 

[Gail]

I tried to freeze my dubia colony this winter, after 2 days on the porch I gave up. I was surprised by how cold hardy they really are, I bet a night of below zero would kill the little buggers off though.
You should get some heat on them and start feeding them.

 

[OWCham]

Lexie,
If you use a heat rock under one end of the aquarium they will probably have enough heat to breed.
The humidity in the shed is much higher than in the house thats why they survived. If they were molting though they probably would not survive the molt though because they won't be hydrated enough to fill out the exoskeleton or they can't get out of the old one.
Your mom will not find these guys infesting your house. These thing do not have the imunity to any residual pesticide at all.
My daughter' s dog can't resist cat food and when the do was left open she dumped the roach bin she could get to more than once. Yes, you do see a few here and there for a few days but they are slow and easy to scoop up . plus they don't fol things up like domestic roaches.

 

[Claudiusx]

I kept part of my colony at around 30-40 degrees for 2 months and I had just a slight increase in deaths as opposed to normal conditions. Only difference was there was no breeding at all. Ended up with a colony of only adults.

-Brandon