Dubia Colony Question

NosyBe15

NosyBe15

Member
Hey Everyone.

Ive searched and searched before I started this but couldnt quite find the answers im looking for.

So recently I gave in to Dubai. The main reason i havent is that A. I cant STAND roaches.. Funny because I have no issues with any other feeder at all. But just hate roaches..... Ok so I got over that because today I found a little pet shop in burbank that sold them. So I bought a colony. (2male, 2 female large breeders) and like 20 medium for feeding and 20 small from growning and feeding...

My main question is what is the best way to keep them going. I bought 2 smaller size storage tubs, Id say about 1 gallon maybe two. I did read that they need to stay warm and since my living room gets down to 70 at night, I bought a small hermet crab heater that sits in one corner of each tub (underneath it).

I am going to be gut loading with Cricket Crack.. But what do i Need to do for the moisture? I chopped up a sponge in 2 small pieces and put one in each tub. along with the cricket crack for food. I have 2 egg crates in each tub and I covered the tubs with a lid with 3 holes in the top for vent.

What else should I do or am I missing? How do they drink?
 
A good place to look is you tube especially the roach hut's videos.

You need a large dark plastic bin. Cut a section out of the top and cover it with screen for ventilation. Most people use egg flats stacked vertically on one side of the bin and on the other side is where they put food and water. I use water crystals for hydration. You can get the kind used for plants, they are cheaper than the ones marketed for bugs. I feed them the same gut load as I use for my crickets, you should also give them fresh greens and vegetables a couple times a week.

Dubias are a tropical roach so their habitat has to be warm in order for them to breed. They need it to be about 90F. Some people use flex watt heat tape around the bin, I use a ceramic heat emitter suspended over the top of the bin. The only problem with this CHE is the water crystals dry out pretty quickly, I need to add water every couple days.

They are not hard to keep and they don't smell, they are creepy to look at though. My son will just reach in and pick them up (so will my granddaughter):eek::eek: I just can't at least not the adults. I can pick up the babies cause they don't look roachy. When I have to do anything with the adults, I have to wear latex glove just in case they touch me:eek:
 
You don't need the temp to be 90+ for them to breed, tho I'm sure it would increase the breeding.

I bought about a dozen roached 2 years ago to feed to my Leachie, but it never ate them. Always turned it's nose up. So the roaches stayed in their Kritter Keeper...I kept them fed while wondering what to do with them. Then one day I go to feed them and there are babies running around. I never had a heating mat or anything like that on them.

As of today, I have thousands of roaches (thankfully I have a cham now to feed them to, but he isn't in love with them either. Hmph!) in a 110q Stereiite container. No heat pad/tape or anything. The warmest they ever get is 80 degrees, but usually it's less.
 
They produce faster with heat rather than without is all. If you really want them to produce use heat. But 2 males and 2 females is not the right ratio and likely the males will either chew on each other's wings or kill each other/ stress the females out too much to lay eggs. The correct ratio is 3 females to one adult male. I use oranges and greens for a wet gutload and the holes will need to be fairly large for that small of a container with that many roaches. Otherwise the heat and fumes produced in the container will kill off your roaches.
 
I live in a fairly cold climate and have kept dubias in my closet in a tall tupperware container with egg cartons and other pieces of cardboard. I keep them gutloaded veggies and fruits with some repashy and water crystals. My room temp is between 70-80*F and mine have still been breeding.

My cham didnt eat his first one for 6 months but he seems to really like them now.
 
Wow. Thank you all for such good information. I really appreciate it. Looks like I have to go get a few more adult females.
 
This is my Dubia roach bin, don't know the size, just, BIG!!

I have it on a heating mat, which is plugged into a 'in-line' lamp dimmer
(you can see it on the wall), and I adjust the temp using the temp gun to 90F.

This seems to be the magic temp for them to breed.

Staples are Bug Burger and Cricket crack, but fill in with fresh veggies and fruits.
Looks like today's menu is, zucchini, carrots and sweet potatoes (steamed).
 

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Wow oh wow. Thanks everyone for such good information. So what I am getting is that I need to have fresh fruit for them to get there moisture. I am a super busy single 30 year old so I'll see if I fit that into my routine. Normally for my crickets I use cricket crack and the flukers orange cubs.

Anyone have a better choice (other then that). And yes I know fresh fruits are the best, but I'll have to have someone as a back up for when I work my 15 hour work days??
 
i took the tag off so so I dont know that exact sizw... But I measured it..7high, 10wide, and 17long.

Think thats big enough?

and I have 2 one for the adults and one for the others.
 
Ok so we arent too far apart. THink my two would work?

When I talked to the small pet shop, they told me that if the adults are left alone in there own encloser, it makes them think they need to make more babies, and reproduce anymore... He could of been BSing me. Anyone else hear of that?

Or else I got suckered into buying 2 bigs... No biggie there were only a few bucks.

What about humidity? I live in so cal so its not that high.
 
It will probably be OK to start with. I don't separate them just cause the less I have to look at them the better I like it. I don't do anything special to increase humidity and they seem to do ok. I don't know if dubias are capable of any rational thought though! But who knows. I tried keeping some babies separate to see if they would grow better but they didn't so I dumped them back in the big bin.
 
NosyBe15 said:
Ok so we arent too far apart. THink my two would work?

When I talked to the small pet shop, they told me that if the adults are left alone in there own encloser, it makes them think they need to make more babies, and reproduce anymore... He could of been BSing me. Anyone else hear of that?

Or else I got suckered into buying 2 bigs... No biggie there were only a few bucks.

What about humidity? I live in so cal so its not that high.
Click to expand...

Haha, that made me chuckle a bit! Whether you remove the babies or not, keeping them at optimum temps/humidity and good food/water will make them produce the same as if there were no babies.

Your bins are big enough. It's about 5 gallons from those measurements. You could easily house a colony of 1,000-1,500 mixed sizes in a 5 gallon tub.

For moisture, you can buy plain water crystals and keep them available at all times. Stay away from the calcium fortified water crystals as calcium can actually make the roaches have a harder time molting and result in deaths.

For humidity, you'll want to cut a big enough hole for ventilation in the lid, but not too big where all the humidity leaves. You can lightly mist the walls of the enclosure a couple of times a day. Don't make the bottom wet.

As for how many you have, 2 adult pairs and 20 smaller dubia is a really small "colony". I don't recommend anyone start with less than 30 or so adults with some various sizes mixed in. Your best bet would be to buy some 1"+ nymphs (cheaper) and let them grow into adults.
 
When I talked to the small pet shop, they told me that if the adults are left alone in there own encloser, it makes them think they need to make more babies, and reproduce anymore... He could of been BSing me. Anyone else hear of that?

Or else I got suckered into buying 2 bigs... No biggie there were only a few bucks.

What about humidity? I live in so cal so its not that high.
Reply With Quote
Click to expand...

Yah- I think the pet shop guy was talking nonsense. In my experience the more roaches you have in there together, the better they do. You want to start with as many as possible and only remove babies if you want to feed them to your lizards. Otherwise babies and adults do better together.

Part of this is probably the humidity issue you are worried about. Research has shown that roaches "clump" up together and breathe on each other in order to control their humidity. Respiration results in increased humidity. It is why when you go into a roach tub you will find zounds of them all packed in together in tight spaces and almost none in other spaces even though both spaces may have the same environmental conditions.

This is one animal that prefers lots of company. I always start new colonies with as many adults as I can (thousands).

The other factor in humidity is just moisture in the food. I never use stuff like moisture crystals and sponges- they are totally unnecessary. Just feed a constant supply of fresh fruits and veggies and they will be able to get plenty of moisture and control their own humidity too. The sponges just invite bacteria, the crystals are just unnecessary and cost money. I've kept really large colonies of roaches for over 10 years and I never used anything but fresh veggies. A year ago last summer I was feeding out 7-10,000 roaches every day from my colonies. If I can make that many roaches without crystals or sponges, you should be fine too.

EDIT- make sure you don't overfeed the fruits and veggies though too or you will get mold. Only add enough that they disappear after a day or two. Wait for them to be consumed or dry up before adding more.

EDIT EDIT- oh yeah and here too I use no lids on my roach tubs. They can crawl into cardboard tubes and egg flats and breathe all over each other and not dry out. You shouldn't need to control ventilation. Limiting ventilation can invite constant ambient moisture which will invite bacteria and mold.

Oh and heat- Actually after 10+ years this is my first year using heat tape instead of ambient temperature. If you don't have a heat source- at room temp they will survive and breed but in the winter when it is cooler they will breed much less and in the summer when it is warmer more.
 
Last edited:
fluxlizard said:
Yah- I think the pet shop guy was talking nonsense. In my experience the more roaches you have in there together, the better they do. You want to start with as many as possible and only remove babies if you want to feed them to your lizards. Otherwise babies and adults do better together.

Part of this is probably the humidity issue you are worried about. Research has shown that roaches "clump" up together and breathe on each other in order to control their humidity. Respiration results in increased humidity. It is why when you go into a roach tub you will find zounds of them all packed in together in tight spaces and almost none in other spaces even though both spaces may have the same environmental conditions.

This is one animal that prefers lots of company. I always start new colonies with as many adults as I can (thousands).

The other factor in humidity is just moisture in the food. I never use stuff like moisture crystals and sponges- they are totally unnecessary. Just feed a constant supply of fresh fruits and veggies and they will be able to get plenty of moisture and control their own humidity too. The sponges just invite bacteria, the crystals are just unnecessary and cost money. I've kept really large colonies of roaches for over 10 years and I never used anything but fresh veggies. A year ago last summer I was feeding out 7-10,000 roaches every day from my colonies. If I can make that many roaches without crystals or sponges, you should be fine too.

EDIT- make sure you don't overfeed the fruits and veggies though too or you will get mold. Only add enough that they disappear after a day or two. Wait for them to be consumed or dry up before adding more.

EDIT EDIT- oh yeah and here too I use no lids on my roach tubs. They can crawl into cardboard tubes and egg flats and breathe all over each other and not dry out. You shouldn't need to control ventilation. Limiting ventilation can invite constant ambient moisture which will invite bacteria and mold.

Oh and heat- Actually after 10+ years this is my first year using heat tape instead of ambient temperature. If you don't have a heat source- at room temp they will survive and breed but in the winter when it is cooler they will breed much less and in the summer when it is warmer more.
Click to expand...


I cant thank you enough for all this information.. I am going to combine to two bins now and use my second one for someting else.... thanks again everyone!!!!! I really appreciate it.. Clarence does too... He loved his first one. ate it from my hand in seconds!
 
Thanks a ton everyone!!

I really appreciate all the great info. I really do. So I have my whole colony in the same bin now. With 2 egg crates stacked on eachother and the Cricket crack on the other side... I will be going out to get the water cristals later on, as I had a few drinks today and thats a no no when it comes to driving. BUt for now I will give them a flukers orange cube until i can get some tomorrow.

Clarence really loved his Dubai... Now lets see if my mean *** female will like them... I am so excited that now I have dubia and crickets...


do the Dubai still need to be dusted with Calcium no d3?
 
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