Trying to establish dubia colony

[dannysxu]

I'm planning on breeding dubias for my bearded dragon and I just placed an order for 100 females and 25 males from dubi deli, I think they're reputable yes? I figure I'm looking at around 2.5 K a month in regards to nymphs. Is that right and how long do you guys think it would take me to have an established colony? Thanks guys!

 

[william488]

I bought their 100f 25m deal, it came very well packed, no dead and some babies running around in the bag too when I got them. The first night they were extreamly hungry, they ate tuns of goodies, some big pieces of greens, 1/4 peach, and 5 baby carrots along with some roach chow and some cerial. this was all eaten by time I got up the next day. No dead yet, they seem very active and running around. I am now just getting their temps right, its been hard, I need to get a human heat pad for under their tank, I have been using a under tank heater to keep them worm, having to experiment on how much to have under it to keep them at right temp. As for how long for you to establish a good running colony, I personally am unsure, as I am new to this too. good luck.

 

[wykd]

The sunbeam heat pad set @ 6 and left on 24/7 and completely under one end of a (1/2) container keeps the temp in my bins @ 88-93, which is perfect. I run those heat pads under 3 colonies with no issue in 2 yrs. Granted with those if the power goes out you have to go down and turn them on and up to 6. But I have had issues with heat tape and prefer these over the tape at the moment.

When trying to establish a colony you need to let it grow and not feed off of it for at least 3 months for it to thrive. I like to keep 3 bins going at all time. a small, med, large sized bin.

small bin 5gal - 25 females 5 males 1/2 an egg crate - this is nothing but a breeding bin, you can go larger if you want to, but this space and dubia count seem to work good for pumping out extra small nymphs.
med bin 18gal - i put the extra small nymhs in here to grow from the small bin as they are moving about and let them grow to 1 inch
large bin 35gal - i put the large (1 inch over) in here and pull out the adults to cycle into the small bin. ie you can use the adults to grow that breeding bin and produce more little etc...

Doing it this way allows me to feed my 4 dragons and 2 chameleons with ease and never worry about feeders. I have no problem sifting thru to get the size feeder i need and as the colonies get bigger just add more egg crates/space as needed. Within no time you could be selling dubia online or to the local pet stores!

Even if you didnt go that route you need to keep 2 bins/colonies going at a time. one in feeding mode and one and breeding mode. You feed off one colony as the other colony grows and then switch after a cpl months and let the feeder become the breeder. Otherwise unless your colony is huge with 20k dubia in a bin you could put a dent in the colony and crash it.

I almost forgot - oranges to feed your dubias... oranges = fluids and food for dubias. plus oranges seem to stimulate breeding in the colonies. I go thru 1 bag of oranges a week, and thats all i provide my dubia

 

[dannysxu]

wykd no ones told me that before!
What you told me makes a lot of sense. I'm trying to put what you said and work it for my situation. Currently I have a 1000 dubias all fluctuating between being near an inch or an inch. I'll be using those now as feeders in one bin. The other bin I'll be having 100 fm and 25m that are hopefully pumping out around 2.5k a month. So what I'm supposed to do is put those 2.5 k in another bin and wait for them to grow, which I understand takes two to three months. By the time they grow up I'll be having another 2.5 k. The new adult Dubias that I'll have will be used for even more breeding and at this point is when I can start taking out from the colony?
Also is it necessary to have heating pads on even the bins that have nymphs and are too young to be breeding? Can I just have a heating mat on the bin full of adults that are breeding?

Thanks ahead man, you've been a huge help!

 

[wykd]

You could run the pad on just he breeders but i like to keep them on all, because the room they are in is a storage room in my basement which stays very cool low 60's all yr round. So have to keep the heat/humidity up to get full molting and growth.


yes, i clean/sift my bins every quarter.

I will clean out the poop in my feeder bin (the large dubia) and drop adults over to the breeding bin in a 5/1 ratio. Then using a 5 gal bucket with holes of 1inch diam drilled in the bottom i sift thru the poop in the grow bin for the larger nymphs and move them to my feeder bin and clean out the poop. Dubias not large enuff stay in the grow bin. I then sift the breeding bin with bucket that has small pencil sized sized hole in it. This will get the small/medium dubias out and allow me to put in the grow bin. I leave the extra small in the breeding bin until the next quarter.

This allows me to feed small reptiles from the breeding bin and juveniles from he grow bin and adults from the feeder bin, because all 3 bins are growing. This can be a challenge at the start and suggest a good # for breeding up front and a 2k supply of feeder dubias that will be what you feed off. I find some ppl like JohnD sell in in bulk and free shipping etc... which works out nicely. No offense to the websites but i never paid shipping for a feeder!