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How much do your roaches really eat?


Mad About Cichlids

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Somehow I mixed colony of Dubia and Discoid doesn't seem to eat at all and are producing very slowly. I'll throw a slice of orange in and it probably get a nibble or two before having to be thrown out a few days later. It goes the same with the dry dog food too, I'll throw a small handful in and a few days later it seems like nothing has been eating. I would guess my colony to be about around 200 roaches total.

I'm thinking it might be the temp though, cause I just keep them at room temperature of 70-75. Heating here is free but my GF would kill me if I have the temp any higher :lol: Should I consider getting a heat mat? It's just very frustrating when your roaches are not eating and breeding like other people's.

Foods I have tried:

Dry Beneful dog food.

pedigree canned dog food.

white Wonder Bread

apple

orange

fish flakes

fish pellets

any vegetables

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Oranges aren't eaten much by those species but it is strange the dog food isn't consumed more quickly with two hundred roaches. 70-75 isn't cold enough to stop them from eating. If they seem to be doing well otherwise they may just not need as much food as you expect them to.

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Thanks for reply

Yea I'm at a lost as to why my roaches are not eating as much as I think they should be. The only thing that I can tell they're eating are the breads but even that they seem to only nibble a little. There are no dead roaches lying around or anything out of the ordinary, besides the slow breeding so not really sure what's going on. All the adults matured about 3-4 months ago so I figure I would be seeing alot of nymphs running around but that's not the case.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Mist the dry dog food and bread with water and remove the next day to prevent mold, they SHOULD eat that. Some roaches like soft foods and dry kibble may be too hard for them to chew. I do this with mine and if I dont mist it they wont eat it.

Give it a try for one night and tell me what happens.

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Well, I can tell you that mine roaches eat dry dog food every other day...I have Blatta lateralis, Blaptica dubia and Eublaberus distanti. They can devour about 100gr of dry dog food a day ... that's cose my colonies are big...about 1000 adult B.dubia, about 5000 B.lateralis...so I am sure they can eat dry food and they will soft it by themselves. Mine also eat every or everyother day fruits and veggies.

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  • 5 months later...

It seems like my colonies are eating more than usual but it could be a skewd observation because the populations are exploding. But even if I account for the increase in individuals I think they are feeding at a higher rate. It would be interesting to get some wild caught roaches that are used to a season in the southern hemisphere and measure them up against some established roaches in the northern to see if there is a cycle and ifthere is if it will change over.

Is it me or do the roaches eat more volume in the springtime than any other time?

Thoughts and observations anyone?

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I think you may be correct, Matt ~

Mine have definitely eaten a lot more in the last four months or so, but then, the colonies have been growing quickly due to the warmer season, so that might be why. It's Autumn here now, so perhaps I'll be able to make a more accurate assessment in October... :P

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  • 1 month later...

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