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is it just the skins of cucumbers?


emmett

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long time, no post!

anyway, today i heard that roaches wont eat cucumbers which has been a little surprising to me. ive had four hissers in the past, making a grand total of six g.portentosa roaches under my care. i also had some dubia roaches 'gifted' to me with the best intentions which turned into a colony i had for several months until i had to sell the entire colony. not the most experience by far (although im hoping to keep working towards more advanced husbandry with more 'difficult' roaches over time) but i wouldve never thought they didnt like cucumbers since all mine ate them. 

since mine are pets, i like to feed them whatever is being used in my own cooking/snacking. its fun for me to personify them and sitting on my bed eating 3/4 of an apple while the boys lose their minds over the 1/4 piece i gave them just makes me feel really happy. the roaches get a 'big' fresh food item and i occassionally throw in some of the 'good' scraps before i toss the rest out back if its something they usually like. i eat a ton of cucumbers and they always get at least a little piece.

my other four hissers werent really crazy about them but as all my fellow roach enthusiasts know, they will eat them anyway lol.

the dubia colony complex or almost completely devoured everything i put in there.

my two hissers ive had since october, velveteen and corduroy, are obsessed at this point. i put down an orange slice and a cucumber slice, they fight over who is standing in the cucumber. i went away for a four day trip leaving them a cucumber slice before i left, and when i got back it was completely gone from the little plastic cup. my brother, who was supposed to mist them and check the heating pad, of course didnt so he swears he didnt take it out. these two definitely eat more than any of my others did (if you dont count the dube's colony as a whole)

is it just the skins? when i was searching around everything kept mentioning skins as an american/german roach repellent but i cant tell if they are referring to exclusively the skins or not. is it like oranges where theyll eat up to the peel and then stop? (i peel the cucumbers anyway bc i like the skin lol) clearly all my roaches are/were fine with them so its not really going to stop me but it was really interesting!

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  • 9 months later...

Great information to keep in mind! I had never heard that cucumber skins could be repelling to roach species, so I will definitely look into that more. 

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8 hours ago, Shon2 said:

Great information to keep in mind! I had never heard that cucumber skins could be repelling to roach species, so I will definitely look into that more. 

still not even sure if its true, it just keeps popping up on people i knows facebook as one of those life hack things and everyone asks me if its true....i dont know!

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2 hours ago, emmett said:

still not even sure if its true, it just keeps popping up on people i knows facebook as one of those life hack things and everyone asks me if its true....i dont know!

Haha, again, great to keep in mind! I want to further research this, so if I find anything concrete, I will post it here :) Thanks again :D 

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  • 4 months later...

Hi Everyone,

Haha I wonder if the skins thing might just be misinformation going around the general public because all my species actually eat the skin first, even if the cucumber flesh is there. The first day any cucumber slices are there, they clean the skin like CRAZY and I just see the flesh sitting there. Oddly, they don't seem to care for the flesh as much. I don't know if it's the taste, smell, or color of the skins but they love it. The ones that have eaten it under my care are:

Common Hissers

Halloween Hissers

Dubia Roaches - These guys are INSANE about the skin. They fight over who gets to eat it first no matter how much of it I offer. 

Domino Roaches - They don't eat as much as other species but still greatly enjoy the skin.

Centurion Roaches - Eat very little so I'll have to study that more.

But the Dubias don't seem to care as much about the fruit flesh as much as the skin; same for my hissers. 

Of course, this is just me observing my roaches I own. It's also worth noting they eat zucchini the same way but do the reverse for yellow squash. It might be worth feeding them some squash as all my roaches love any type. 

Haha dubias in my experience will WORSHIP you if you give them butternut squash. They like treat it like the nectar of the gods lol. I mean they swarm it the minute they smell it; some don't even let me put it down fully before they start jumping on it. They're like fanatical about it. 

Anyway, thought I 'd share my experiences. The dubias swarming the squash is so cute. They look so happy lol. 

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Continuing my earlier reply; I think that people are gonna end up with more roaches instead of eliminating them with cucumber skin lol. Could be that P. americana or B. germanica don't enjoy it but I've never heard of that being the case. I'll be getting P. americana nymphs soon so I can test if they eat it and report back if anyone is interested in knowing how they react but I'm certain they'll eat it.

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On 4/8/2021 at 5:12 PM, RenOfTheRoaches said:

Continuing my earlier reply; I think that people are gonna end up with more roaches instead of eliminating them with cucumber skin lol. Could be that P. americana or B. germanica don't enjoy it but I've never heard of that being the case. I'll be getting P. americana nymphs soon so I can test if they eat it and report back if anyone is interested in knowing how they react but I'm certain they'll eat it.

My dubias don't seem to mind cucumbers, I've never heard of a dislike of the skins before...

This rumor is probably from one of those fake "life hack" channels lol

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2 minutes ago, FlamingSwampert said:

My dubias don't seem to mind cucumbers, I've never heard of a dislike of the skins before...

This rumor is probably from one of those fake "life hack" channels lol

Yeah I feel the same haha. My roaches all seem to like it across the board.

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