my dubia colony

[ChamsRawesome]

I was wondering if there is more than 1to5 ratio of male adult dubia do they eat the young or somethin? What's the problem with having too many males?

 

[ridgebax1]

I was not aware that there was a problem with too many males. I thought it was because they were not necessarily needed in excess to maintain the colony so these would be the ones to feed off. Keeping mostly females is what you want to get things going. I have never gone through my colony to remove extra males and have not noticed a problem BUT I don't like to look at them much as they creep me out.

 

[Seiryu]

I tend to keep 1:3 or 1:4 male to female. The males die off much earlier than females do. I tend to keep around 1,000 adult females in a tub and put in 330 males to start. Adding in a few fresh males every month or so.

The big reason for keeping it at that is that the males will eventually pick on each other (biting wings to name one thing) and occasionally killing each other if there aren't enough females to go around. They can be a little territorial, but not as bad as some roach species. If they are fighting, they aren't breeding !

Most peoples colonies aren't that big though, so there usually isn't much worry.

 

[ChamsRawesome]

Oh, awesome you guys and thanx for the replies

 

[Cap10Squirty]

I keep a 1:7 to 1:8 ratio and it seems to work just as well. Some have reported 1:10 with great success. The less males the less resources that are consumed by the colony, and also you might be able to give your females a break every now and then