Spock is eating like a madman, please tell me this is ok

[nukeswife]

Hello all,
Spock seems to be getting more active lately. I'm amazed at how much he's eating. I posted in my Beardie Tales post that he's routinely eating his salads, which he wasn't before. This morning he ate about 8 pieces of collard each is about the size of a nickel as well as some shredded zucchini but the amount of roaches he's eating is astounding. We feed him dubias twice a day. The space between his eyes is just about 1/2" now and our roaches range from 1/4-1/2" In his fifteen minute feeding times he'll easily eat 50-60 of them. As soon as he sees us coming with the critter keeper (we use this to transport them from their main bucket) he jumps off his basking log and starts pacing the tank until we dump them in.

I bought 35 adults to try to start a colony, so I hope we start getting some babies soon, cause this little dude can sure eat!

 

[Soulwind]

Yep, little ones are pigs. They'll eat you out of house and home.

It will slow down a bit once he hits about a year old, and then slow down
some more to normal adult levels at about 18 months or so.

The actual quantity will also drop as you are able to give him bigger and bigger
nymphs. The large nymphs are very filling (as long as he's big enough of course).

35 adults? Is that 35 adult females or is that including males? Either way,
expect to be waiting a minimum of 3-5 months before you start feeding from the colony, and then you'll have to be careful not to strip out too many babies.

For a single dragon, you'll want a continuous set of about 50 breeding females.
50 females will give you approximately 1000 babies a month. Some of which
must be allowed to grow up, so you'll only be able to feed off about 900 a month, which gives you about 30 a day. And it will take them around 2 months after birth to reach the right size for feeding, longer as he gets older and eats bigger ones (it takes about 5-6 months to go from birth to full adulthood).

 

[nukeswife]

Thanks for chiming in. My colony is 35 roaches total, 25 females/10 males. I know I'll need more, but wanted to make sure I knew what I was doing and didn't want to buy a huge amount right off the bat and have them all die off.

 

[Soulwind]

Just as a little tip: You can usually buy several hundred large or extra-large nymphs for the same price as just a few adult females.

Large/Extra-Large are typically less than a month from the final adult molt anyway.

They typically aren't sexed, so you can't ensure an exact count, but if you get a couple hundred, you should end up with more than enough females and it can help jump start things a little faster/cheaper than buying that many adult females.

 

[nukeswife]

Thanks for the tip. I got my colony from West Coast Roaches, so I'll see what they have or maybe I'll check a few other places.

 

[Sauzo]

Best prices I have found are http://www.dubideli.com/Home_Page.php. Best quality has been http://buydubiaroaches.com/. Dubi deli is good on quality too but for some reason, with buydubia I never have had a dead one where as dubi deli I usually have a about 20 die from transport. Maybe its the deli containers they use to ship them /shrug

 

[nukeswife]

The best prices I've found have been from west coast roaches (which is actually in NC) but have to say that it can take a while for them to get the order ready to ship. The batch I got from Dubi Deli came in a bag not a deli container and were great but take longer to get here since they are on the opposite coast from me. I just ordered some from theroachguy.com last night so we'll see how that goes. East Coast feeders will be at an expo here on Sunday but they was $10 for 100 small and that seems a bit much considering I just bought a grab of 1000 smalls from West Coast Roaches for $51.99 including the heat pack just to be safe.

 

[nukeswife]

I just think until my colony gets up and running I'll have to order a bunch every 2-3 weeks and if some get to big for Spock to eat I'll just toss them in my breeder bin instead and let them grow

 

[Harley]

Keep an eye out for JDroaches in this sites for sale section. His roaches are what my dragons lived on for like 6 months till my colony was producing. He sells 1000 for like 25 shipped. He doesn't sell year round but when he does buy as many as you can. A small dragon will eat over 100 smalls a day when they are good and hungry.