Silkworm and Dubia questions...

[samfish]

I bought some Silkworms and Dubia Roaches for the first time, and have a few questions:

Silkworms:
Each day, I am finding 3-4 silkworm dead, in their container, each day.
-I am keeping them in the same container I purchased them in, which is a deli-cup with ventilated lid, and a filter over the ventilation holes so they cant climb out
-I was keeping them at room temperature (76-78 degrees), and also tried warmer 85 degrees, but nothing changed
-I was feeding them premade chow I bought from the breeder, and also tried Fresh Mulberry Leaves, but it didnt help. They were eating the chow well, and ate the Mulberry Leaves too, but it didnt stop them from dying...
-I didnt notice any mold, excess humidity, etc... They seemed to move around well, and have an appetite for the chow and leaves,,, but then a few would just slow down and eventually die...

Anything I should do different for the silkworms? My chameleon really loves them...


Dubia Roaches: I love these already compared to crickets, much easier to care for, and more hardy... My questions are:
-If I toss them in the cage, they often land on their back, and cannot flip over to walk... (My chameleon still eats them, but is there a better way to put them in the cage?)
-They often end up hiding under something in the cage, so never get eaten... Is this normal???
-My chameleon eats them with cup feeding, but I also like free-ranging them- He usually was able to get 95% of free range crickets by end of the day, but only gets ~50% of the Dubia, and I find the rest hiding at the end of the day...

So, any tricks to keep the dubia from flipping on their back??? And is it normal for most of them to end up hiding if they are free-range?


Thanks!
-sam

 

[Andee]

I have not found a way to feed dubia other than cup feeding where they don't hide. They like to hide. Plain and simple.

Silkworms do not do well in cups. I never keep mine in cups. It promotes bacteria blooms and such. Which is horrible for the worms because they have no immune system to fight off infections and such.

 

[samfish]

How do you keep your silkworms, if not in cup? I will change my setup to whatever works best!

 

[Andee]

I usually keep my silkworm in a shoebox rubbermaid container if they are big enough and you aren't hatching them from eggs. I cut a decent sized hole in the top of the enclosure and hot glue bug screening on it so they can't get out. Then put some gutter guard down so the frass falls through but I can clean it easily.

 

[Dro B]

You are always gonna have silkworm die-off but the number seems high even for a cup. I keep mine in a Rubbermaid container too. I don't use screening at first because they're frass is dry but after they get a little bit bigger I roll up paper towels or use plastic screen 8n so they are off the ground a little bit. If I have a few hundred its not unusual to lose one every other day or so until they're about 1 inch then it goes down significantly.