Little buggers keep escaping?!

[MdngtRain]

Do you all have any tips to keep crix from escaping? I've gone so far as to move them outside onto the patio, and watch the cham eat all of them before I turn my back, but I keep finding crix all over the house... and both my wife & the roomie are sick of seeing the little things all over, esp. when they make it to the kitchen (ick!). Are these just ones I missed from the last escape, or are they comming inside somehow?

 

[Cherron]

Haha.. I hate crickets! If you have been being way more careful, they may just be left over from their last escape. I had a cricket explosion in my apartment a few months ago. My son (he's 4) knocked over the cricket container that had about 1000 crickets in it. I managaed to scoop up about half. The others took me weeks to get. Your best bet is to take a shop vac and vacuum EVERYWHERE. Behind your fridge, behind your stove, washer/dryer, water heater, couches, bed, TVs. These are all places I found crickets grouped up, having a ball in my apartment. Under my computer tower there was a power cord that had a box in the middle of the cord.. if that makes any sense.. and it was warm there. One day I dropped something behind my computer and pulled it out to find about 10 crickets huddled on that box. Sheesh.

After a good vacuuming, catch the rest with glue boards. I buy the ones at wal-mart that are made for mice. Add a little food and put where ever you seem to see the crickets the most. Good luck man. I am so over crickets. They annoy me like nothing else on earth

 

[Marc10edora]

I keep all my cricket keepers and gut load containers inside a very large plastic bin. That way if any jumps out during transfers and putting them in feeder cups, they will still be in the large container.

 

[chrisandpugs]

Other solutions to prevent escapees!

Hi!
Depending upon the size of your cricket container and sink, I put my small plastic cricket container in my sink whenever I open the top lid for transfers or for gut-loading. Just remember to put a mesh sink drainage block so that escapee won't go down the sink drain.....I often forget and they crawl right into the drain!
Another solution to prevent crickets from crawling the walls of your container is to put wide adhesive shipper or wrapping tape around the sides of your inner container.

Christine

 

[MdngtRain]

Thanks for all the replies! I found another 4 crickets running around the place (tho 2 met untimley deaths at the paws of my dogs...). I swear I didn't think I had purchased so many crix last time (I think i've found a dozen or so, and fed 3 dozen). My wife is OCD with cleaning, so we don't have much just hanging around the apartment, that should help in vacuming up the crix... and I think the dogs will take care of any stragglers (I think they think they are cats sometimes). I just have to get better housing for them. They are currently in a critter keeper, which allows for escape. I actually caught one climbing out yesterday, but a bird got him (on the patio). I think I will als go back to using silkworms more often, and try some of the other feeders I've seen mentioned. I think I would be killed by not only those I live with, but also the complex manager if I brought roaches into the place, but we'll see... maybe I can house them outside & make sure I get the "non colonizing" type...
Thanks again!!
~C

 

[FL Chams]

Go to
www.armstrongcrickets.com

They sell a couple different size cricket containers to store crickets in with screen lids. I use these and house around 15 Thousand Crickets a week. It works very well and they're tubs so they're very easy to clean. Hope this helps!

http://www.armstrongcrickets.com/Merchant2/merchant.mv?Screen=CTGY&Store_Code=ACF&Category_Code=PK

 

[jbfromsc80]

nice cricket bin, couldn't they be made out of a large rubermaid, with the lid cut out and screen put in its place for ventalation?

Would like to see pics of yours mike to see the fuctionality of the lid, and the approximate size. thanks!!