DUBIA ROACH, MY OPINION!..

[spook]

I Got into dubia roaches about a year ago. before, i could not stand the thought of roaches in my house.I had just lost my big rubbermaid full of mealies that i had started back in 06'. my cat found the rubermaid with the lid of and used it as his litter box. so i threw that away. and tried superworms.i had little to know success with keeping those going. so i tried the lobsters and turks. i hated them i did not want to chance an infestation so i went with dubia. they dont climb the rubbermaid walls,they dont fly,so no escapes or infestations. they are not so bad to touch,at least not sticky like those turks.their not as fast so they r pretty easy to catch.and they dont give my leo's a hard time to catch. they dont stink like crickets,and don't make noise at night,like crickets.Now i have 5 bins with 20 females and 10 males in each and aa couple bins of just thousands of nymph and small dubia.soon ill have to start selling them too keep the numbers down. and i have over 30 leo's too feed. so just throughing this info out there if you end up getting more gecko's and u cain't stop! like me starting a dubia colony is the way to go. dubia are easy to maintain and to use as a staple diet for any inscect eating reptile. if u can just get past the creeepyness, and dont worry about what other think. let them do their thing and u do you'res.you're reptiles will stay fat and satisfied. just my 2 cents.
DUBIA FEEDERS RULE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!................:main_thumbsup:

 

[Ga_herps]

I love dubia's, but maybe instead of selling off because overproduction why don't you knock down your colonies. 30 geckos is not alot, and I believe you could accomplish your needs with 2 maybe 3 bins at the most with the amount of geckos you are working with. I have around 150 adult geckos and two really big bins, and one nymph grow out bin is plenty. Even during baby season I don't need anymore. I do feed mealies also on occasion, but even if I did not that would still be enough.

 

[gothra]

I agree!! I love my dubias and so do my geckos! I have 25-26 breeding female dubias, and only 9 geckos. I'm getting overwhelmed with nymphs at the moment...

 

[Shadraak]

AWESOME post i agree started my colony however not many would love to get more just dont have them around me and shipping is a bit much but i will hopefully get them going..

 

[Haligren]

Jeez, I really wish we could have dubia up here in Canada. Lousy Canadian laws....

 

[serialzombie]

Turks are sticky?

 

[robinson]

crap i didn't know that dubia roaches are not allowed in canada... are there any roaches that are allowed in canada that make good feeders for African fat tailed geckos?

 

[theCREECH]

I have some questions for some of you.

what is one gets loose, will there be an infestation? Like one night I'm loading a container or cleaning one. If a Roach should happen to fall out of my bin, should I be freaked out that soon I'll see hundreds roaming the kitchen??? My wife is totally freaked out about this.

My wife does the morning shift of feeding out bearded dragons, but refuses to touch the bugs, would the roaches still climb into the dark tubes that the cricket keepers have???? Right now she just pulls out a cricket keeper tube and dumps the bugs in for dragons. Would she be able to do the same thing??

Cricket costs are killing me, but it's hard to convince some one that the dubia roaches aren't the same.

to most a ROACH is a ROACH.

thanks

 

[tastyworms]

Well if you consider that Dubia are omnivorous, scavengers, and breed at room temperature - then they are fairly close to normal roaches. They bear live young, so one roach could concievably deposit 40 nymphs somewhere in your house, which could conceivably survive and cause an infestation.

As long as your careful it shouldn't be a problem. Just use a container with really high smooth sides. I haven't really ever heard of this being a problem, but it could become one if you don't use caution .

 

[Desdemona]

I love my Dubai's too! I pulled out a bunch of babies from one of my gecko's tanks and put them in a little critter carrier with some food for later feedings. They were all piled up in one corner this morning sleeping on each other. It was strangely cute... in a roachy sort of way.

 

[T-ReXx]

I have some questions for some of you.

what is one gets loose, will there be an infestation? Like one night I'm loading a container or cleaning one. If a Roach should happen to fall out of my bin, should I be freaked out that soon I'll see hundreds roaming the kitchen??? My wife is totally freaked out about this.

My wife does the morning shift of feeding out bearded dragons, but refuses to touch the bugs, would the roaches still climb into the dark tubes that the cricket keepers have???? Right now she just pulls out a cricket keeper tube and dumps the bugs in for dragons. Would she be able to do the same thing??

Cricket costs are killing me, but it's hard to convince some one that the dubia roaches aren't the same.

to most a ROACH is a ROACH.

thanks

Unless you live in a hot, humid area dubia will not infest your house. For one thing, they die at temps anywhere lower than 75 fairly quickly. Secondly, without fairly high humidity the nymphs have trouble molting and die. I get escapees on a fairly regular basis, mostly from being careless while feeding them to my animals or from the reptile cages themselves, and I find dead roaches, but have never had an infestation, not even in my herp room which is generally warm and humid. I also get escaped lateralis every so often and have no issues there either. Cats either catch and eat them or I find them dead.

I keep paper towel tubes in my roach bins, when I feed I pull out a tube full of roaches, shake them into a size sorter, and feed off what I need. No need to touch them if you don't want to, though it doesn't bother me.

I haven't bought crickets in years and I will tell you I will NEVER go back. Roaches are just so much more convenient, clean and easily bred. I also find them readily taken by virtually any insect eating species, including some known to be difficult feeders.

 

[Chestersmom]

I love them too they are so easy to care for and breed. All I do is feed and water them. And all my lizards go nuts for them.

 

[leoman5654]

i am really glad ot hear how satisfied everyone is with their dubia roaches. I just ordered some today that will feed 3 leopard geckos and 2 bearded dragons. I will try to keep the colony small since I only have 5 animals but I just really want to get rid of crickets all together. I ordered mine from the roach guy.

 

[theCREECH]

i am really glad ot hear how satisfied everyone is with their dubia roaches. I just ordered some today that will feed 3 leopard geckos and 2 bearded dragons. I will try to keep the colony small since I only have 5 animals but I just really want to get rid of crickets all together. I ordered mine from the roach guy.

I would love to see an update on how things go for you. I'm about to order some for my animals, but I have to get the cages and tubs ready first.

I'm with you, I want to get rid of these stupid crickets. I have to say I'm one step closer since I watch a Youtube video the other day. In the video this guy put his Dubia's into a silver dog bowl... it appeared the dubai's couldn't get out at all. The dragon just walked over and started eating them like they were meal worms. Awesome! My Beardie cage isn't that secure for roaches. So this idea was really apealing.

 

[theCREECH]

ok. So, after the 3rd problem with Cricket deliveries, I have got to switch to Roaches..

I LOVE the idea of a colony making me self reliant. Relying on someone else to ship on time, and shipments actually arriving alive is a huge pain.

I'm changing to mealworms and Roaches.

 

[Desdemona]

I get mine from the roach guy and there were no dead ones in the shipment. I like my roaches as well. Getting them a heat source today after work so that hopefully they will start making me babies.

 

[jermh1]

I started with 400 back in 08
I think Im around 6-8 k females. im feeding 56 geckos and was up over 100 for a while. I dont feed roaches the good stuff anymore due to how much they eat. It costs a 50lb of dog food every 2 months, and some mixed veggies, I only gut load with the veggies, before feeding them off.
It almost feels like free food.
O and check out sexing the nymphs it is great no more waiting till the last molt. I recently found it online, now im saving only the females, so no more dumping 1000s of useless males, or feeding off hundreds of valuable females.
Males have a small last segment 1/4 the width of the segment before it
Females Have a last segment about the same width as the one before it.
you dont even need a picture, just look at a few over 1/2 in and you should see the difference right away.

 

[prettyinpink]

Ooh great read! I'd love to breed my own feeders, I've wanted to for a couple of years...since I got my bearded dragons. If I can get over the grossness I should be fine! If I can get over the worms, I should be able to get over this

 

[Desdemona]

Oh, thanks for the nymph sexing tip jerhm1!

 

[Digby Rigby]

cats snakes

Ooh great read! I'd love to breed my own feeders, I've wanted to for a couple of years...since I got my bearded dragons. If I can get over the grossness I should be fine! If I can get over the worms, I should be able to get over this

Lions are dangerous and can kill people dont get cats! After all lions are cats Dont get snakes cobras are dangerous venomous beasts! There are about 4,000 species of roaches of which maybe a dozen or so are pest species. Gila monsters are lizards and are venomous, would that preclude you from getting geckos:main_laugh: after all both are lizards.

The point being one must judge things on a per species basis or its individual merits. Seriously, you can not tell me roaches are creepier looking than crickets. When you start to look at things this way it helps get over the fear of roaches. We are the ones who were singing the praises of roaces as feeders for 7 years now. In the beginning everyone was disgusted by what we were saying. Now look what has happenned. Here is the roach gallery:
http://s270.photobucket.com/albums/jj90/DigbyRigby/Roaches/?start=all