Feeding hatchlings

[VenusAndSaturn]

So the hatch date for my babies are growing closer and before I order their food I thought I'd make sure and ask here that everything checks out.

So far on my list is 2,000 1/4 crickets, 1,000 1/4 dubia roaches, and 5,000 small BSFL.
I'm hoping this will last me at least 2-3 months as the total came up to around 120.

Most likely only 1-3 of the eggs will hatch out, so I should be good on food with that amount but I want to double check in case I'm wrong.

 

[kingofnobbys]

So the hatch date for my babies are growing closer and before I order their food I thought I'd make sure and ask here that everything checks out.

So far on my list is 2,000 1/4 crickets, 1,000 1/4 dubia roaches, and 5,000 small BSFL.
I'm hoping this will last me at least 2-3 months as the total came up to around 120.

Most likely only 1-3 of the eggs will hatch out, so I should be good on food with that amount but I want to double check in case I'm wrong.

crickets grow fast … 1/4 size will be 1/3 size by end of week , and 2/3 size a week later.

What several breeders here (in Australia) do
1) let some of their silkworms become cocoons --> moths and harvest the eggs and refrigerate these until they are ready to hatch a batch of silkworms or they buy a few thousand silkworm eggs and arrange to hatch these a couple of weeks before the hatching beardies hatch …. the silkworms grow fast fast once they start getting over 5mm long and are perfect feeders ….
2) they farm their own houseflies and blowflies and use the maggots as hatchling feeders
3) they farm their own crickets and woodies (the species of roach favoured in Australia) .
and they had the insects hatching and growing in batches spaced out by a week or two so they always had a range of feeders of different sizes to suit their needs.

A retired guy who was breeding who lived a few streets away from my place until about 6 yrs ago had a few breeding pairs of beardies , and similar for rankins, and eastern water dragons , and Blotchy and Northern and Eastern BT skinks and some breeding pairs of some smaller insectivorous monitors , never bought any insects as he breed / farmed all his needs inhouse in his reptile shed.
He had snails, silkworms, house and blow flies, blacksoldier flies, crickets and woodies.
His "insect farm" was a bunch of 50L tubs and 20L tubs and 35L underbed tubs.

The ladies (breeders) I bought Puff and Rex , then Peppa and Toothless, from did similar.

His only costs were greens and veg , UV lighting , and bedding for the lizards. He grew most the veg and greens himself.

 

[VenusAndSaturn]

Just found a place that may be good to order silkworms from, I think I may just swap out crickets for the silkworms and then only feed crickets if I ever run out of my other feeders or if the feeders don't arrive before they hatch.

Thinking about buying 5,000 silkworm eggs which is cheaper than 5,000 crickets and probably a lot healthier.

 

[AHBD]

With only a few beardies hatching you won't need large amounts of bugs, esp. right away. As was mentioned, the 1/4" crix will grow very fast + be too large within a week or two. Just get a couple hundred at first [ maybe 250 ] as well as a few dozen of the other insects. See what they go for and how quickly you use them up.

 

[VenusAndSaturn]

Well too late for that, already bought them yesterday. Good thing I have a very vicious leopard gecko that'd probably love them. She tends to get bored with the same old feeders so she'll probably enjoy any excess amount of feeders that I have that she hasn't tried before. That and multiple other insect crazed reptiles... it'll be interesting to see what my tegu does with silkworms as she's not much of a fan with insects and it'd be a great addition to her diet if she does decide that she eats them.