Breeding Crickets

[Linds]

OK...when I used to house my frog on peat moss, I would always find baby crickets in there. The crickets I would feed him kept laying eggs. So it seems simple enough to breed these guys...lol :p What's all involved? What are the most efficient ways? Is it worth it to breed them instead of buying them if you are only going through 15-30 crickets daily?

[Weather1]

Check this site out it tells you all you need to know.

http://www.geocities.com/RainForest/9008/cricket.html

I hope this helps

[Linds]

Thanks! That helps alot. Now I'm just looking for people's personal experiences. I'm trying to figure out if it is really going to be worth it...

[silke]

well...i try to give my lizards a varied diet ...
i go in fits and starts about giving them crix though since they are a pain
i have had them around for abot 2 months again
i keep them in a 10 gal tank with lidand bits of egg carton, on papertowel
i shake a piece of egg carton into a bag then dust the crix
for my lazy leos i pinch the back legs off so they can catch them...well so that they will at least try to catch them :)
for the bibrons, pictus and skink i just dump some into their tanks as i always make sure to keep greens in the tanks for the crix to munch on
somehow though...crix always get loose and i don't know how...

[Scotty Allen]

Personal experience: breeding crickets for the sake of 15 - 30 a day is a serious pain in the buttocks. If I lived in the tundra where I could not readily buy them, I might consider it but then again, if I lived in the tundra I would not likely have any use for crickets, I'd be keeping polar bears and seals.

It's easy enough to get a gazillion eggs, but the headache comes in hatching and maintaining them. Hatchling crickets are damn near impossible to contain (can't wait to hear "but I never have any problem"), and you end up with them all over the place. Give the adults a dish of damp sand, peat moss or what have you and the females will deposit their eggs there. If you use a clear dish, you can see the eggs around the edges (they look like little grains of rice). Once you can see them, you have many. Keep the dish covered but breathable and warm (80 - 90 F) and soon you'll have gazillions of eensy teensy crickets that will get out of whatever you keep them in, as well as a healthy crop of those little mites that seem to generate spontaneously in everything that is damp. The babies need water and will die quickly if not provided. I found the simplest method was to keep a damp sponge or cotton balls for them, they'll drown in a bead of sweat. Feed them and love them and soon you'll have crickets all over the place and your family will love you dearly for it.

[marisa]

My roomate buys pinhead crickets for one of her native salamanders (long story, didnt just grab him out of the wild though) she usually gets them sooooo small you can hardly see the little buggers...

anyways they are sold to her using a cup much like one you would get at a fast food joint, tall and smooth "plastic". But clear and they use the same type of lid without the "X" cut in it for the straw hole. It looks like they use a sewing needle to melt some small holes in it, and they are sold in this cup with egg crate (small piece) and some cricket water stuff smeared thin on the side. They do fine in this it seems. :) I have no clue where you would get these cups, but they seem to be the best thing we have found for housing those tiny tiny pinheads.

marisa

[Linds]

LOL :p That's exactly what I was looking for Scotty! I don't even keep crickets for my leos or fat frog, but was thinking of getting a Cuban Tree Frog or a cham of sorts in the coming months. I'll stick to buying :D

[aaron]

I tried breeding them when we had our baby beardie thinking we'd save some money! Ended up with a billion pinheads but couldn't keep them alive or contained as Scotty said! If there isn't enough airation(sp). it gets very humid and moldy and the pinheads die if you put holes for them they get out! Better off buying and save yourself a big pain in the butt!!:)

aaron

[BILLP]

Linds

I am with Scotty raising crickets is a pain and you end up with hundred of crickets running around the house. but for a set up this is what I did. I took a large rubbermaid container and cut a hole in the lid and screened it. Then I would take a shollow container and fill it with potting soil and place it in the cage. Within a week you will have eggs in it then place it in a 15 gallon tank with a temp about 85 degrees. and you will have lots of babies but they drowned very easy so use damp paper towels for water. It is a real pain in the butt. I have 20 lizards and I still just buy mine. I order from reptilefood.com I have had really great service and results from them. If you need little feeder try raising fruit flies. They are far easier and if they get out they die within about a week. Fruit flies are what I feed all of my baby lizards. The only this is that fruit flies can climb glass so have a screen with tiny holes in it.

[Youkai]

I never had a problem with having escaped baby crickets, unless I did something very, very stupid. (And I did once, more on that in a second.)
When I have my hatchling G.k. splendens, C. mitratus, and pictus, I needed to have a ton of pinheads, so I started throwing containers of moist peat moss into the cricket bins. After a few days I pulled them out, threw them in an incubator, and in a week/2 weeks I had baby crickets. I raised them in large sort of rubbermaid bins that I had on a shelf and on top of a heat pad. I had peat moss on the bottom of the container for substrate. I misted them a few times a day, and used moist cotton balls for a water source. Doing all this, I never had escapees. Until...

Once, I had a batch I thought went bad. I mean the container just filled right up with this bright white fluffy mould. It seemed to happen almost overnight. I had to run, and accidentally left the lid slighty ajar on the container the egg/mould mess was in, and the hovabator.
Guess what I found when I came home a couple hours later? Heh...vaccuum time...