RaZias

Gambia Roach - Gyna sp. 'GAMBIA'

Sundablatta sexpunctata

female Catara rugosicollis Catara minor Mature male Catara rugosicollis

These are avaiable from: http://www.schaben-spinnen.de/Content/shop.php?cat=11&start=45

Hemithyrsocera histrio

Princisia vanwaerebecki

I am going to buy some Elliptorhina laevigata, when I will have a colony of them I will try to mate them with an Elliptorhina javanica. The project will start in January. This is a Elliptorhina laevigata:

It´s possible that temperature has an influence over humidity. Maybe it was that the case. They gave birth like 3 weeks after buying it. The seeler was ZOO CENTRE at ebay.co.uk. He is an english seller so you can asking him in english. It´s possible that the mother roach was almost giving birth and when I putted in my vivarium it gave birth because it was time for it. So maybe the best conditions were from the buyer and not mine...it´s just a teory. http://www.zoocentre.co.uk/ https://www.facebook...302318939867173 http://stores.ebay.c...fsub=2415574013 Either you contact him by ebay or by e-mail info@zoocentre.co.uk

Right now I have 4 species of nymph hissers separeted from adults and I have no deaths...when they were with adults there were always some dead nymphs. I think that "gut bacteria theory" is just a theory. Maybe in some species is true...but not for all of them.

I had a transparent 80 L plastic tank full of egg crates, the humidity was between 50 % to 60 %, it seems that above 60% there were more deaths. Temperature is 20 ºC. The food was apple, carrots and cat biscuits. I only had like 10 nymphs with 18 adults, there were like 6 females and the rest males. I say "...I had..." because I stopped to use egg crates because I prefered to see them when I wanted and they were always hidden. Without egg crates they stopped reproducing.

I have seen a female Javanica always in the food zone...sometime ago I have seen a hisser female doing the same. The female Javanica has found dead over the food...I guess that each time a roach passes all the day on the food zone without eating it might be a sign that it´s sick. The female Javanica seemed pregnant.

I have put nymphs on a separated box (a small tight one, I can´t find tight big ones). Every time I find a nymph that escapes from the adult box I put it in the small tigh one. Until now no one has died ! Normally with adults there would always be like 2 deaths in a group of 10. I think this doesn´t support the idea that nymphs to survive need to eat the adult´s poop to get gut bacteria to survive (as said by a member). It is possible that maybe in the future one or other will die due to trauma while picking them up to clean the small box. They are doing great.

I have started the known post "Internet pics of beautiful Roaches". This post has grown with the contributions of members (members indicating new flickR photos). I would like it to be pinned since it would be a shame to see it lost between all other topics. I think it is one of the few topics about gathering several images from a lot of beautiful and exotic roaches. I have seen more exotic images and I would like to put it on the topic, this means that is a topic that will always have a future in the forum. It will be the best "welcome card" to any new member.

You can use a tupperware as a temporary tank, you just need to make micro perfurations on the tupperware cover. The cover is air tight so no problem. It works for me.

Bear Grylls eating an Weta: Put in youtube " Man vs. Wild - Bear Eats an Exotic Bug " I can´t post the link...this site doesn´t allow it. Bear says that eating it tastes realy bad....and everyone knows what this guy has eaten in allow of his shows !

I would have to send it from France. They cost 25 euros each. I would need to put it inside a carton box (otherwise the transport mail would not transport it...). The cartoon boxes would need to be made of 3 glued cartoon boxes because there isn´t one with that size. (it´s 21 gallons of size)........This is the "impossible part" for me! Plus there is the shipping cost. I think that if you search on internet for 20 gallons palstic boxes you might find them in USA. Check this site: http://schweppeinc.com/products/129095?link=/products/suppliers/&id=2722

They are 80L plastic containers. I live in France and I got them from a big store that sells everything for construction for DIY (like tools, plywood, etc...), it´s named Mr. Bricolage. I think Bricolage is the french term for DIY. They aren´t escape proof for nymphs...I am working on that. I am going to try to use Teflon tape to see how it works. They have 6 vertical holes between the edge that goes from one blue holder to another.

I have Insignis, Javanica, Princisia and Portentosa. They were at 64.4 degrees and they didn´t stop eating, Javanicas even had babies. They all poop so they are all eating...

I have ordered from amazon Teflon adesive tape and I will see how it will perform. http://www.amazon.co...0?ie=UTF8&psc=1 Don´t buy the small white ones that are for plumbing, they are weak and aren´t adesive at all. I have a lot of Javanica nymphs escaping. One appeared in the kitchen, other in the bathroom, another one near my books... I tried the "weatherstrip seal tape" (as proposed by 910eckogal) and they steal escape. In fact they force all the way, they press down the foam and walk between it and the container wall...they do it without being squashed !! If everything fails you can put all the nymphs on a small "tupperware box" (it´s air proof so make tiny holes to allow them to breed). I don´t know if they need to eat adults poop to obtain the gut bacteria so they can digest food (as said by Keith). If Keith is right you need to had some adults to the tupperware box so they will have poop when they need (...I don´t belive I have written this...) Another aproach is to glue a tissue to the top of box. That tissue will have a long zip across it so you can open it.

They don´t bury themselves, they stay in the shadows with no problem, this is my vivarium. You can make vertical walls with egg crates, separated by spacers (or a set of eggcrates perfurated with a metalic tube on each corner) so by spacing them you can see what happens. I have Javanica, Insignis and Portentosa and altough they are hidding species they don´t hide with this set up, they just stay on shadows.

You can try Aelurodopoda Insignis. They are hissers but they rarely hiss. They won´t inbreed with Portentosa since they are from a different Genus. I have them and they rarely hide. If you want to see all of your roaches you can try to put a box inside your vivarium with several vertical walls inside (to make several sections). That box won´t have one side so the interior can be exposed to you. The vivarium must be placed in the room in a way that the walls will creat shadows. The walls inside the box can be made of egg crates with spacers so you might see between them without problem.

-------- About the climbing ability on plastic: Mr CrackerPants: I belive that sanded plastic egg crates are easly climbable. The hissers don´t use a sanded surface to climb, they use a irregular (non flat) surface to climb. I have seen them climbing and in fact they "hug" 2 vertical irregular zones to climb.

Some conclusions about it: I used plastic letter trays, I sanded it with a metalic brush (what a work !). The plastic letter trays were cutted with a soldering iron. Each letter tray has an "entrance" that I made with the soldering iron so a roach can go from a letter tray to another. ---------- A bad point: I putted them vertical because when the roach is vertical on the wall it poops towards the ground. That way in teory will create a distance between the poop and the roach (I think that is the teory about putting the egg crates vertically and not horizontaly) So what is the problem ? Well...even hard sanded plastic is hard to climb. Only Insignis climb it well and small Princisia roaches. Altough a small Princisia roach made it, it seams that it doesn´t do any more because it leads to nowhere (instead of a hidding zone like the cup section of an egg crate). I think that if I glue a cork panel or a rubber panel it will be more easy to climb. Why I didn´t used only cork panels ? Well...they bend very easly and they are fragile, I think that the plastic will make a nice holding frame for it. The vertical position reduces the area that a roach can move but it allows to create separated sections that males roachs can defend...an open horizontal territory would create to much conflit because it´s more hard to defend. ------------------- Improvements to make: I am thinking on gluing a plastic horizontal structure between each letter tray so it will make a new floor. The plastic structure will be a cutted letter tray (with a rion soldering). The roaches will have a cork panel to help them climb. I must test the roach ability to climb a cork panel before I implement it. ------------------ Alternative to cork panel A nice alternative to a cork panel is a sound sponge, it can be glued to the plastic. And it even has the same structure as an egg crate...but I wonder if it will resist less time than an egg crate... ------------------ Plastic VS plywood: Plastic is impermeable. Plastic is more easy to cut (a soldering iron cuts it more easly than a saw cutts a plywood board). A plastic letter tray is more cheaper than plywood. But plywood is more easy to climb and it allows for a certain micro-fauna to grow (like the egg crates).

The letter trays are holded with tape. No tape has an exposed gluing area so the roachs will not accidently get caught.

Each box is equipped with a "temperature/hygometry" measuring device.