You have to ask yourself a few questions before you decide to start a cricket colony. First thing to consider is, what size and how many chameleons are you planning on feeding? If you are just an average keeper and have 1, 2 or even just 3 chameleons, it is probably much more practical to just buy your crickets. I used to breed my own crickets, and when I say breed my own crickets, I'm not talking about putting some soil in the bottom of a 10 gallon aquarium and tossing in some adults and hatching a batch of pinheads. Sure, that works, but in order to have a continuous supply, you need dedication and most importantly: SPACE, SPACE and MORE SPACE!!!! I had a storage building that was 144 sq. feet and I used every square inch of it and then some. And even then, the number of crickets I had that reached adulthood and were ready to breed to continue the cycle was modest. My definition of 'colony' is a self sustained breeding operation, meaning you start a batch of egg laying containers at least once a week (I did it every 3 days) so that it is on a schedule, and a certain percentage of them are used as feeders with a good percentage that is set aside to continue the breeding. If you don't set aside enough to be designated as breeders, you'll have a 'crash' and will have to just start over and buy some more breeders. You wont have adult crickets for about about 8-12 weeks depending on the temperature they are kept at. So for 8-12 weeks, you'll need to start a fresh batch of eggs by buying a large number of adult breeders until your very first batch has achieved adulthood. At this point, you will be breeding crickets that you hatched weeks before, and you have a fresh batch reach adulthood once a week. You'll quickly find that it will take up a considerable amount of space, supplies and most importantly, time.
If your goal is to have small crickets for a small chameleon, breeding is something you might want to consider. But keep in mind, you'll still have to buy a fresh batch of adult breeders at least once a week to continue a steady supply of pinheads or whatever size you're shooting for. This process requires only a fraction of the tubs, materials etc. that you will need as opposed to a full scale 'colony'. I'm sorry if I sound pessimistic, but I think there are a lot of misconceptions about how easy sustaining a cricket colony is. Throwing some soil into a tub and adding adults is simple, but rearing them to adulthood and continuing that process is a whole different ball game. I plan on doing a video series on my process in the near future to help people get a visual idea of what they would be up against should they like to tackle this project. I'm in the process of bulding a 200 sq. ft. building solely for the purpose of rearing my own feeders once again. I see a lot of threads on here with people asking advice and questions on crickets breeding, and I'd really like to offer some help and insight into it. I hope I didn't come off as a jerk or discouraging, it's just that it really is a lot of work. I look forward to finishing my video to share with all the great people on this forum.
