For the dubia know it alls!

[Twobeardieguy]

Is your dragon a baby?

Hello she had passed away.

 

[millerracing81]

I was asking pogo if his dragon was a baby. Feeding tiny dubia nymphs would be kind of a waste if the lizard wasn't tiny. But I imagine a baby beardie would love them.

On a related note: don't let your dragon eat th roaches off of your hand or arm. Leonidas soon came to the conclusion that any time a hand came into the cage it was eatin time! Now he eats them from a bowl. He's an absolute fiend for them. Not so much for crickets anymore.

 

[Twobeardieguy]

 

[SkeptiBee]

I ended up starting my own Dubia colony about two weeks ago and when I looked in the bin this morning it appears that one of my females has already given birth! I am totally stoked to see all these lil nymphs running around on the egg cartons! Honestly, I never thought I'd say this, but they look kind of adorable at that size!

I ended up grabbing a few of the larger nymphs today to sex, and when I finally nabbed a male he started regurgitating what looks like water. What's that all about? Will they vomit when stressed out? He was really trying hard to get away from me (and being really successful at it - dang even at young ages they are fast).

 

[Twobeardieguy]

bump!

 

[dociledragons]

I just bought 400 adult Dubias 6 weeks ago. I'm still getting 5-7 dead males/females a week. Is that normal? Other then dieing off from old age I can't figure out why they would be dieing. I have them in a 30 gal tote. A heating pad and egg creates on the one side and food on the other. I use grounded dog food and water gels. the temp is about 105 on the floor and 75-80 up top and 60% humidity.

Like I said unless they are dieing of old age. The dead ones look normal except there dead. No, missing legs, wings, body parts. Maybe to much calcium? I switched to grounded rabbit food and apples but, that doesn't have any affect.

 

[dociledragons]

What do all of you feed your Dubia???

 

[Twobeardieguy]

Hi I make all my chow in home and is all natural. I also replied to your pm.

 

[Sauzo]

I too had a really high death rate on my breeding colony when I first set it up. Seems some roaches just don't take the trip well. Took prolly around a month or so and then the die off quit. I didn't change anything and everything was right from the start. I did pick up around 50 adult females locally off Craigslist and they all were fine. Like I said, I believe some roaches just don't handle the long travel well. Also I don't think the protein thing in the chow did it. I feed mine Scratch and Peck organic soybean and corn free starter chick mash which is 21% protein and they love it. It's pretty cheap($32 for a 40lb bag) and will last forever as long as you don't get it wet. The breeders have been having babies all over and the feeders in my feeder bin have actually begun to outgrow the feeding size I need them so I've had to throw them back into the breeder bin and pick out the right size I need from the breeder bin.

Also can feed your breeders white bread. Mine love it and go completely crazy for it. The babies all run out and all over when I throw in 3 slices as well. Also I feed em grapes, brown parts of bananas, apple cores, left over beardie food, dandelion greens, collard greens, mustard greens, romaine and green leaf lettuce. Pretty much anything that is safe for you and your beardie they will eat. I try and limit the feeder bin to just stuff I want my beardie to get into her system.

 

[dociledragons]

I too had a really high death rate on my breeding colony when I first set it up. Seems some roaches just don't take the trip well. Took prolly around a month or so and then the die off quit. I didn't change anything and everything was right from the start. I did pick up around 50 adult females locally off Craigslist and they all were fine. Like I said, I believe some roaches just don't handle the long travel well. Also I don't think the protein thing in the chow did it. I feed mine Scratch and Peck organic soybean and corn free starter chick mash which is 21% protein and they love it. It's pretty cheap($32 for a 40lb bag) and will last forever as long as you don't get it wet. The breeders have been having babies all over and the feeders in my feeder bin have actually begun to outgrow the feeding size I need them so I've had to throw them back into the breeder bin and pick out the right size I need from the breeder bin.

Also can feed your breeders white bread. Mine love it and go completely crazy for it. The babies all run out and all over when I throw in 3 slices as well. Also I feed em grapes, brown parts of bananas, apple cores, left over beardie food, dandelion greens, collard greens, mustard greens, romaine and green leaf lettuce. Pretty much anything that is safe for you and your beardie they will eat. I try and limit the feeder bin to just stuff I want my beardie to get into her system.

It's been 6 weeks now and there still dieing. O'well maybe it's just old age.. I'll reduce the heating pad. I forgot to mention I also have a ceramic heating element set at half power (50W) b/c the room there in get 65ish at night. I keep the tote in the low 80's using the ceramic heating element. I'll see if I can find some organic chicken mesh to grind up.

 

[Sauzo]

Ceramic heaters and bulbs tend to dry out the air. As long as you aren't finding nymphs dead half molted though, you should be fine. As for the chick mash, don't even need to grind it. I just toss it on the floor of the bin in a corner and they eat away and also the little guys love to burrow in it and sleep. It doubles as substrate too. Just make sure it doesn't get all wet. And you should be able to find it at any feed store or farm store. Doesn't necessarily need to be organic but I would say corn free is nice since it seems a lot of stuff uses corn as one of the main ingredients and we all know corn really has no nutritional value and is more filler. Just make sure to get the starter chick mash which is the stuff for like up to 8 week old chicks since it should be finer but hey if you got a blender and wanna grind, more power to you. I'm just lazy and rather just scoop a couple handfuls out every few days and throw it in my breeder and feeder bins.

 

[Twobeardieguy]

Nope they will get enough light thru the bin sides so no need for any added light. And I do sell the dubias but only in the kits for the time being. Also be careful with mash because if your bin gets to moist it may bring unwanted guests.

 

[godzillathekilla]

very helpful tips thanks! I was wondering whats a good number of breeders for a noob and 1 dragon and maybe another in the future mine also loves roaches like crazy! but he is brumation which is good for starting a colony lol.hes eating half inch roaches at the moment.

 

[Sauzo]

General rule of thumb is you want 3x what your beardies eats a month to be produced in babies. So for example, if your beardie at 1000 roaches a month, you want to be making about 3000 babies a month. Each female produces about 20 babies a month. So you can pretty much figure out what you need. Me personally at the moment, my colony has about 150 females and i'm feeding 1 14 inch beardie but mine is in a mini brumation so she's not wrecking the roaches like usual but like I said, that formula above should give you an idea. It will allow you produce enough to feed your beardie as well as enough to replace old and dying breeders and allow wiggle room for random deaths since they are bugs after all.

 

[godzillathekilla]

ok thanks for the info I am going to look into it a lot more I have a tub and egg crates and food just missing the breeders lol