Crickets

Dupontman2

New Member
I just started breeding crickets and oh my God, I have a million of them! I have 3 small bins I put in with the adult crickets, put them in for 1 day apiece and they all hatched within 3 days apart. Approximately 10 days. I hatched them under a 60 watt light at 93 degrees and I have a ton of them. Now to figure out how to get them all out of their hatching bins as they places dug in the potting soil. I put cardboard runners for them to get out but they seem content staying in their bin!!! I have all 3 bins in a bigger rubbermaid tub. Anybody have any suggestions on how to get them out?? I put food outside of there containers hoping that would draw them out and it did for the most part, but there are tons left in. HELP!!
 
I use toilet paper rolls cut in half in the bottom of the bin so the pinheads collect inside them. You can shake them out into a plastic cup with a little calcium powder prior to feeding off. As long as you have a water source and some dry food in the bottom of the main bin they will eventually leave the egg bin but it will take a little while. I used to use water crystals for pinheads but I avoid these and use a slice of apple or yellow squash for moisture. Its too risky to use water crystals because they can get stuck to the toilet paper rolls and be accidentally put into a feeder cup. If a hatchling gets one it will kill it.
In the picture you can see the pinheads starting to collect inside the paper rolls. Hope this helps!
 
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I had the same issue the other day about moving them. I'm still having trouble. They really do just want to stay in the aquarium I bred them in. They're getting bigger too now.
 
I've had the same dilema forever. I always try different ways of extracting them from the laying containers. For the most part, do like reptoman says and just add some papertowel rolls or egg crates into the laying containers. I have several containers that I use for egg rearing containers that are 15" long x 9" wide x 3" high. I use small plastic sandwich containers filled with peat moss with the center of the lid cut out and replaced with screen so that the adults can't dig up and eat the eggs.
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I let 2 of these stay in the adult bin for 3 days before I add a new set. When I remove them, I dump them out into the 15"x9"x3" container and spread the peat moss out as thin as I can. In addition to the papertowel rolls, I take some fine sandpaper and I sand the inner sides of each pan side to side so that there are minute scrathces from the bottom to the top. This allows the hatchling to have something to get a foothold on to climb out. The plastic is so smooth, they cant climb out without the scratched inner surface. DONT SAND THE OUTSIDE OF THE PAN! You want the outside of the pans to be smooth so that the ones that make it out cant get back up and into the egg pan. I also hot glue 4 20oz. water bottle lids underneath so that each pan sits up off the bottom of the 22 gallon tub I place it into.
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That way when/if I have to take the egg pan out, I'm not smashing tiny hatchling when I put it back down inside of the tub. I let it stay in there for at least a week, because over the course of that time, the eggs will continue to hatch out. When the hatching slows down or stops, I then remove the pan, clean it out, and start a new batch. Sorry, didn't mean to turn this into an small novel on cricket hatching. I know this is all seemingly really 'involved', but it seems to work for me. Even when I take the egg pan out, there are still a number of crickets still inside, but I just dump them with the spent peat moss. The few inside are nothing compared to the sometimes several thousand that make it out of the pan into the tub.
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