My three little dudes.

[KanjiTora]

Purchased all three of them from Kammerflage Kreations over the last month.

Thanks to this forum and the community for helping me put together their homes. Just swapped out all of their UVB lighting today too. They now all have Arcadia T5 6% and Arcadia LED (for the live plants). I love how you can "link" all of Arcadia's lights together and only need one power source plugged in because of the linking system. Also, ReptileBasics.com sells the bulbs for $19.99 a pop versus Amazon selling them for nearly $40 per bulb.

Created a successful cricket habitat too, so now they aren't dying off quick anymore. I took an old aquarium that I had in the garage, filled it with soil, egg crates, shallow food/water bowls, and covered it with the typical screen cover. Throw some carrots, lettuce, and a water source, and I might have had 5 dead crickets out of 80. That was huge for me, because I was ending up buying crickets every other day. Now I can do one pickup a week.

My next challenge is the Mist King. I'm sure it's a lot easier than I'm making it out to be in my head. But I need to watch more YouTube videos on how exactly to do it for three enclosures. But for now, I mist them throughout the day since all of their enclosures are in my bedroom and I'm home all day long.

 

[jannb]

Very handsome boys! Congratulations! With 3 chameleons, I’d recommend buying from the cricket farm and getting 500 a month. It would be a lot cheaper.

 

[KanjiTora]

Very handsome boys! Congratulations! With 3 chameleons, I’d recommend buying from the cricket farm and getting 500 a month. It would be a lot cheaper.

I'll look into that now, thanks! What do you keep 500 crickets in!?

 

[MissSkittles]

Beautiful boys!
I use a big plastic bin for my crickets. Having really good ventilation is essential with so many, along with regular cleaning. I cut out decent sized holes in the sides and top and hot glued screening in for ventilation. I keep the bottom bare for easy cleaning and give them 2-3 egg crate pieces along with a TP or paper towel tube. The kind of crickets you get makes a big difference too. Banded crickets are superior to regular domestic…live longer, hardier, less smelly.

 

[KanjiTora]

Very handsome boys! Congratulations! With 3 chameleons, I’d recommend buying from the cricket farm and getting 500 a month. It would be a lot cheaper.

www.fivepointscricketfarm.com ??

500 crickets for ONLY $12.50 can't be accurate, can it?

 

[KanjiTora]

Beautiful boys!
I use a big plastic bin for my crickets. Having really good ventilation is essential with so many, along with regular cleaning. I cut out decent sized holes in the sides and top and hot glued screening in for ventilation. I keep the bottom bare for easy cleaning and give them 2-3 egg crate pieces along with a TP or paper towel tube. The kind of crickets you get makes a big difference too. Banded crickets are superior to regular domestic…live longer, hardier, less smelly.

I was going to go pick up a plastic bin from Home Depot and do what you just described, that way I can keep more crickets in there at once. How do you do regular cleaning with the crickets still in the bin? And what do you use to clean the bins with? Thank you.

 

[MissSkittles]

Unfortunately I’ve got domestic crickets, so between the dead and their frass, there’s a lot to clean even after a day or two. If I can’t clean around them, I move them to either a second bin or a temporary one. In the temporary/new bin, once I’ve moved as many as I can, I stack their egg crate pieces and put a paper plate on top. Then I carefully dump the contents of the old bin in the paper plate. The live crickets will hop out (some need to be moved) and then just dump the dead and frass. Depending on the extent of the dirt…sometimes just a spray with water is enough to wipe it out. Usually I use a very diluted cleaner like Fantastik or Nature’s Miracle. I have tried keeping them bioactively, like I keep my roach colony. The stupid crickets ate the clean up crew though. Oh…fyi: when you order a larger amount of crickets, you’ll often get some dermestid beetles in various stages of their life cycle. They help keep things clean.

 

[dinomom]

Unfortunately I’ve got domestic crickets, so between the dead and their frass, there’s a lot to clean even after a day or two. If I can’t clean around them, I move them to either a second bin or a temporary one. In the temporary/new bin, once I’ve moved as many as I can, I stack their egg crate pieces and put a paper plate on top. Then I carefully dump the contents of the old bin in the paper plate. The live crickets will hop out (some need to be moved) and then just dump the dead and frass. Depending on the extent of the dirt…sometimes just a spray with water is enough to wipe it out. Usually I use a very diluted cleaner like Fantastik or Nature’s Miracle. I have tried keeping them bioactively, like I keep my roach colony. The stupid crickets ate the clean up crew though. Oh…fyi: when you order a larger amount of crickets, you’ll often get some dermestid beetles in various stages of their life cycle. They help keep things clean.

 

[dinomom]

Same, I have 2 identical bins so I can swap out. I use a dingle layer of butcher paper on the bottom so the crud does not stick. And I recently experimented with no lid at all and they aren't escaping!