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Breeding crickets


alanmin4304

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I have been unsuccessfully trying to breed locusts and would like to see if I can do better with crickets. I got the locusts to maturity and laying eggs in vermiculite but none will hatch. Anyone out there successfully breeding crickets that would like to explain in words of one syllable and with pics if possible how they do it? I want to feed frogs and the locusts are probably too large for the young frogs anyway. I have set up 2 x 2ft square glass tanks with customwood lids and 60 watt light bulbs (temp 30-35 deg C), insulated with polystyrene and the floor covered in wood shavings to the height of the icecream containers of vermiculite for egg laying. I can see the holes where the eggs have been layed and have moved them to another setup the same but no go.

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have done both but crickets,although good when small(pinheads)for feeding young stuff were pretty much a waste of time for what you got at the end of it.They took ages to get to a decent size and also feeding of them they are pretty quick and hide in your tanks.The locusts were a breeze after a few teething probs as you are having now.Change your egg laying medium to pumice sand from garden center,vemrmiculite does work and some swear by it,does not work for me and I use what works for me! get a smaller egg cup,I use see thru throw away coffee cups in a cut out so The top is at floor level,change once a week and cover with gladwrap so you can see when they hatch.I think your prob with eggs not hatching maybe dessication of the eggs?keep them really warm 34 or so at least,at lower temps they lay less and eggs even though layed can be infertile.The other thing to watchis where you get your grass,even traces of spray can do the same.I have only knowen one sucessful cricket breeder and raiser and I got his locusts going for him and he ditched the crickets,way too slow(depending on how many you want of course.Give the locusts a dish of bran to eat as well as grass.

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Loocusts -straight perlite worked well for me- had no luck with vermiculite - sand, potting mix etc not sure why just the way it is for me.

thing i dislike is collecting the grass for them so if your happy todo that then theyre all good once going - kept mine at 28-30 bottom of fridge and about 40 at the top, they sorta went up and done as need be to regulate there temps- but try kp the bottom at what ever u incubate the eggs at as this is the level ur eggs are at!

Crickets i find the vermiculite way better then perlite otherwise straight pottingmix also works. trouble with these is they eat each other :o , and seem tempramental in the respect they dry out fast

All good fun hth

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Locusts are easy once you get laying medium and stuff sorted, I just use wet sand and now when they lay I put containers in another tank with a heat pad , can be a pain getting grass every day but I had no luck with crickets so have to put up with collecting grass. :D

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  • 1 month later...

I was talking recently with someone who has a huge and very successful locust setup.

No matter what he tries he can't successfully breed from Biosuppliers locusts but he can from others. He wonders if they treat them so they are infertile.

Would be interesed to know what others have found with them.

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I was talking recently with someone who has a huge and very successful locust setup.

No matter what he tries he can't successfully breed from Biosuppliers locusts but he can from others. He wonders if they treat them so they are infertile.

Would be interesed to know what others have found with them.

Ive wundered this in the past but very hard to know if it was just something not right with my setup or the locusts but it did x my mind as ive had great success with some locusts and other times the whole culture seems sick and had to buy in more to get colony restarted atleast twice (over a year or so). but generally they breed well i doubt biosupplies would goto the trouble of doing so,more likely something not right with setup or the grass theyre getting?

or ive also wundered about them going through the post, do nzpost have a scanner or something that may render them sterile?

wild caught locusts would be interesting to try an breed

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locusts from biosupplliers can be bred from.people have had problems getting them going but it is always down to one thing..TEMPERATURE.You can have problems with small ammounts of spray on their food rendering them sterile but 9 times out of 10 egg viability will come down to temp.Just the production of eggs alone is temperature dependant so it goes to follow that sperm production would be the same?You can see it in the colony behaviour if they are active and healthy eating like a swarm of locusts and breeding the same.

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I was talking recently with someone who has a huge and very successful locust setup.

No matter what he tries he can't successfully breed from Biosuppliers locusts but he can from others. He wonders if they treat them so they are infertile.

Would be interesed to know what others have found with them.

i had heard that rumour too, but i have since successfully bred from Biosupplies locusts. and that was my first go at breeding locusts.

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