How many dubia roaches to start a colony

Daytime temperatures ranging from degrees are ideal. Generally, many of the same techniques you would use to keep any reptile warm can be used to heat your Dubia colony, though you should stay away from heat lamps. A basic reptile heat tape or heat mat is your best bet. But while Dubias prefer some moisture in the air, they can breed successfully and your colony can survive fine if you live in a moderately humid area.

But if you live in a very dry area some basic misting can be performed to keep your colony in this range. Now that you know some of the basics of what Dubias need to thrive and reproduce in their new colony, what do you need to do to get your colony established? First, make sure you have the right materials on hand to build an appropriate colony for your roaches.

Here is a basic material list of what you will need:. You will want a bin that is at least 22 gallons, and a Sterilite storage bin is a good choice. We recommend screen door mesh, which you can buy at a hardware store for cheap. Whatever material you use for this step make sure it is something that is durable, and will let in air without letting in other insects or letting out any Dubias.

We recommend the kind of wire mesh used in screen doors, which you can get at any hardware store, because it is very sturdy and durable, and will provide an effective barrier while letting in enough air.

This is perfectly natural and acceptable. Over the years experts have isolated a number of factors that can affect how many babies your colony produces. Dubia roaches dislike sunlight. Quite the opposite in fact — they have a strong preference for darkness.

Placing your dubias in a clear tub near a window is therefore likely to cause them undue stress, reducing their breeding results. It is recommended that your roach colonies are kept away from direct sunlight, ideally in a shady room or part of the house.

Some breeders even take this a step further, and instead of using clear containers to house their dubias they use coloured plastic. Some people, for example, use black plastic bins with ventilation holes drilled in the lid, to almost entirely block any light from their colony. Providing suitable places to hide away and feel safe can have a massive impact on the success of your colony.

Cardboard egg trays are the most usual solution, with them being stacked vertically and in close contact with one another. This creates little dark, secretive hiding places in the dips where the eggs would normally sit.

These egg trays can easily be bought on Amazon and delivered to your door. Dubia roaches like a warm environment. In extreme cases, if your home is particularly cool, you may find that your female dubias refuse to produce any young at all, or that any young produced die soon after hatching.

Depending on the ongoing temperatures in your home it may be necessary to consider some form of artificial heating in order to achieve these targets. That said, this in itself can increase the costs of producing dubia roaches at home, at which point it might be cheaper and easier to just buy in additional feeder insects when you need them.

Keep a rough eye on gender ratios as you slowly work your way through the adult males, until you achieve the recommended target. From the environmental conditions available in your home, to gender ratios, to the speed at which you pick out specimens to use as live food, two different breeders can experience wildly different results.

But be aware that when you buy them, you need to take care of them until they are fed as well. However, there are more benefits by breeding them yourself. One of the significant pros is that you know precisely how well-nourished they are, and therefore how nutritious they are to the animals you feed them. Because they are fed continuously without the interruption of transporting them from the shop to your facility or home, and along with different diets, they will be in better overall health.

Another significant advantage is that you have the flexibility to grab every size of roach you need at that moment.

When you have young animals, you can use the smaller nymphs to feed. And especially with larger facilities with many animals, this can become very handy. Lastly, roaches are an exciting food source to use as enrichment. It can stimulate hunting behaviours for many animals, or in slow feeders encourage longer foraging time. Depending on your facility and your situation, breeding roaches can be very beneficial. It is essential to realize that allergic reactions have been recorded to dubia cockroaches, or their faeces, shedding body parts or saliva.

It is not common, but when you take care of them on a day-to-day basis may result in the development of an allergic reaction to cockroaches over time. So when you keep a colony pay attention to irritation of the skin, eyes, nasal congestion, coughing or sneezing more in the proximity of cockroaches.

Also, when having asthma, you may be affected more to an allergic reaction. When you take care of them daily, we advise you to wear disposable gloves and face mask to decrease the risk of developing an allergy to cockroaches.

Dubia cockroaches are the most known species of cockroaches and are often used to feed the animals. However, more species of cockroaches can be used as a feeder insect.

In this guide, we focus on the more popular breeding of dubia cockroaches. The reason for this? We already talked about many wins earlier. They are livebearers which relieve you from all labour around hatching eggs and set up good egg environments. They also tend to be remarkably clean and problem-free. But still, proper preparation will give you a higher probability to successfully breed dubia roaches. Good practice tip : This practical guide focusses on breeding dubia cockroaches, but can also be useful for breeding other types of cockroaches as well.

Be sure to adapt the environment, husbandry and nutrition to the species you focus on. When reading this you need to decide, or already have decided, to breed dubia roaches instead of buying them. But what are you breeding them for? This question sounds simple and obvious. You want to breed them to feed to other animals. Though, ask yourself this: how many animals do you want to feed roaches? Is it a crucial part of the animal diets, or can it occasionally be replaced with other food sources?

Do you have a plan in the event you end up with too few roaches? And what if you have too many? A prepared start is half the work. It can be of great benefit to decide what you want from your dubia breeding colony before you start.

Think about the time, resources, supplies and space you want to dedicate to your colony. Good practice tip : Be prepared is half the work. Make sure you plan ahead before starting a breeding colony. A colony needs a suitable environment to get the best breeding productivity, and a good location contributes to this. Good practice tip : The dark hours are more important to dubia roaches that the light hours.

Darkness is an important factor for an optimal breeding result. This ambient temperature is lower than the ideal temperature in the breeding bin because it prevents overheating.

There needs to be a good air circulation to make sure there is enough ventilation in the breeding bins. You can use natural lighting, but you should never have direct sunlight on the dubia enclosures because this can cause overheating of the dubias. But breeding colonies are just doing fine with artificial lighting. Dubias like the dark more and when it comes to breeding, there is no such thing as too much darkness. Adjusting ambient parameters is more manageable in smaller areas than large ones.

So, choose a location that is big enough for your enclosures and to work comfortably, but not too large of a space to manage. To house a breeding colony in good condition, one of the most important components is a suitable container. The best option is using plastic storage boxes, and preferably that they are stackable and are included with a lid.

This way, it is easier to clean and to move around. Smooth surface is a must-have to prevent escaping. Usually, you can say that if the walls shine or have a glance, it is smooth enough that roaches will not be able to climb.

However, if you have smooth walls, a lid to prevent escaping roaches is not necessary. On the other hand, a cover also prevents that unwelcome animals pets or other insects can come in or stuff that falls in. When you plan to use a cover lid, you must allow ventilation. We suggest to drill holes in it and cover it with metal window screen secured with either hot glue or with wood or metal frame.

If you use fibreglass screen or plastic screen to cover these holes is fine, but be aware that dubias can chew through these materials. If you rely upon that the screen prevent escapes, you need to choose metal. It is better to start with an enclosure bin where you can ultimately house the number of roaches you plan to keep see: plan your colony , however, it needs to be manageable too.

It would be better to house them divided in multiple enclosures. Good practice tip : A large enclosure bin can house many dubia roaches, but it needs to be manageable too. If you want to breed with many roaches, it may be better to house multiple breeding colonies. These high-quality bins are sturdy, durable during higher temperatures and conditions, have a smooth surface and are easy to work in. To boost dubias for breeding, you need the best environmental conditions for them.

The correct temperature and humidity are vital to have a high production outcome of your colony. We already talked about the ambient environment where you place your enclosure bin.

Now we take a look at the local parameters. Good practice tip : Temperature is one of the most important factors for a good breeding result.

Make sure you have your temperature set up correctly! Cockroaches are known to be survivalists, surviving a large range of environmental condition. If the temperature dips lower, it slows down your dubias. Heating can be done in several ways, but most commonly used are light bulbs, heat mats and heat cables.

Good practice tip : If you need to heat your enclosure a lot to get the right temperature, the humidity may dip to a too low level and dry out the enclosure. All heat sources need to be installed outside the enclosure, so there is no direct contact possible between the roaches and the heat source. Which heating is used depends on your situation, but I have a preference for heat mats.

The advantage of heat mats is that it gradually and evenly heats the enclosure, does not generate light, and does not reach temperatures that easily melt or burn plastic. Be sure to leave a small space between the heat mat and enclosure bin so the heat can leave and prevents overheating. On the other hand, to be sure and safe, it is good practice two provide two types of heat sources.

If one fails, you have one backup heat source remaining. But you can avoid harmful low temperatures by having a higher ambient temperature. A higher ambient temperature has one more advantage. When you need to heat a lot to get the enclosure to the right temperature range, the humidity may dip to a low level and dry out your enclosure. It is better to have higher ambient temperatures to keep your humidity level more steady. Good practice tip : Make sure if you are using a heat lamp it is out of reach for roaches to get burned or that furniture is not touched to prevent unsafe situations.

Another point considering is regulating the temperature with a thermostat. It is not per definition necessary, but it makes it easier to control the temperature to fall in the optimum range. And, besides, thermostats are relatively inexpensive and widely available. So it would be a wise decision of having one to avoid catastrophic consequences to your colony.

Females will drop their eggs and start making new ones.