Hissers or Dubia

[vindicatedornot]

I've been feeding my cham nothing but crickets since I've had him, with an occasional mealworm as a treat. (no more than 1 per week, usually less) But he hasn't seemed to care about his lack of variety. None the less he's getting some variety. I want him to feel more natural. My boyfriends ex-teacher has about 30+ pet madagascar hissing roaches and offered to give him a couple females and males. Would it take forever for them to build up a colony? And I know they climb.. this sounds not so good. The dubia's i have read do not climb, but I'd have to order some. I'm thinking it'd probably be a lot easier to order a higher quantity for dubia and start a colony rather than wait for the hissers to breed and flourish. Would it be a major pain to breed both?

thanks in advance, and yeah i used the search.. i'm just looking for some pros and cons here.

-Andrea

 

[Ryan Jarosek]

I keep 5 different kinds of roaches. Most are just pets.

With that being said, IMO by far the best feeder roach are the dubia. Fastest breeders , they grow fast and are easy to keep.

Hissers are easy to , but are not as good of feeders and grow much slower.

I would still do both. Hissers are awesome and make great pets.

 

[sandrachameleon]

I find hissers to make excellent pets and excellent feeders (not adults, those are too large imho), they are relatively slow too. I've found turkish roaches to be fast breeders and fast in general - good for cup feeding, but too fast for release/hunt/free-range feeding. Dubia are known to be a good option. Why not provide as many options as possible?

 

[vindicatedornot]

Could you explain how hissers arn't as good of feeders as dubia? I was thinking they were better since chameleons are from madagascar.. And yeah I've decided to keep both. For now the hissers are in a larger kind of the plastic reptile box cage things. With the palstic vents and tiny unusable door on the lid. heat pad on the way. There is only 4 of them, will they breed in such a small environment? (it looks like about 5-7 gallons) Or do i need a tub for them to feel safer? I plan on moving them into a tub eventually, but for now will they do anything? And I'm going to make a large tub for the dubias I'm going to order soon. How many should I order for the colony to grow well?

thanks,
-Andrea

 

[Ryan Jarosek]

Could you explain how hissers arn't as good of feeders as dubia? I was thinking they were better since chameleons are from madagascar.. And yeah I've decided to keep both. For now the hissers are in a larger kind of the plastic reptile box cage things. With the palstic vents and tiny unusable door on the lid. heat pad on the way. There is only 4 of them, will they breed in such a small environment? (it looks like about 5-7 gallons) Or do i need a tub for them to feel safer? I plan on moving them into a tub eventually, but for now will they do anything? And I'm going to make a large tub for the dubias I'm going to order soon. How many should I order for the colony to grow well?

thanks,
-Andrea

I should have been more clear. I agree with Sandra about the hissers. It is the size as adults and hardness that I was talking about. Young ones would make good feeders. I keep them as pets so its a little harder for me to treat them as food.

I use a 60 qt tub for a larger colony. A small 5-7 gal would be fine to start them off. When they colony grows you can move them to a larger one.

How many reptiles are you feeding with them? If it is only one and you wanted to get a jump start 50 dubia of mixed sizes would start you off nicely. You could start feeding right away.

 

[Eric Adrignola]

hissers are slower breeders, they smell more, they climb glass and can escape. The adults tend to be too hard and too big for most chameleons, and they climb glass and can escape. The biggest issue, with any roach, is their ability to encROACH on your home. Hissers can escape, dubia almost never.

 

[vindicatedornot]

I should have been more clear. I agree with Sandra about the hissers. It is the size as adults and hardness that I was talking about. Young ones would make good feeders. I keep them as pets so its a little harder for me to treat them as food.

I use a 60 qt tub for a larger colony. A small 5-7 gal would be fine to start them off. When they colony grows you can move them to a larger one.

How many reptiles are you feeding with them? If it is only one and you wanted to get a jump start 50 dubia of mixed sizes would start you off nicely. You could start feeding right away.

yeah it's just one little guy. My almost 6 month old panther. and yeah i wanted to order a mixed size batch. 50 sounds good though, i was not wanting to buy more than 100. even that sounded like a bit much. And ok thanks for the info about the little tank. I'll watch them and move them soon. i dont think they would ever find each other to mate in some huge container lol. Also, thank for clearing that up about the shells of the hissers. I was going to feed him the nymphs anyways.

-Andrea

 

[vindicatedornot]

hissers are slower breeders, they smell more, they climb glass and can escape. The adults tend to be too hard and too big for most chameleons, and they climb glass and can escape. The biggest issue, with any roach, is their ability to encROACH on your home. Hissers can escape, dubia almost never.

Well, I'm keeping them in the garage which isn't attached to the house, so If anything, its all good.

 

[Pure]

I thought that I read that if an escape happens turning the AC down to 65 will kill both species. No?