Breeding Dubia Roaches: How Can You Start Your Colony?

Dubia roaches or Guyana orange spotted cockroaches are one of the most popular insects used as a food source for zoo animals. They are a brilliant feeding source, mainly for animals that demand large insects. And the best thing is that you can develop a colony by breeding dubia roaches.

Maintaining a dubia roach colony takes some work, though. However, if you keep a dubia colony, it offers some practical benefits like:

• If your dubia roaches repopulate, you can save money because you do not need new feeders.
• Your food source will be reliable if you can maintain a well-run colony. Moreover, you do not need to worry about running out of dubia roaches or wait endlessly for the next batch of roaches. This way, you’ll always have all the food your pet needs.

Get a Proper Place to Keep Dubias

You can keep your dubia roaches in a 40 to the 60-quart box. The insect never climbs the sides of the box, but things can get knocked over from time to time. Hence, you can upgrade to larger enclosures if the need arises.

Maintain a Proper Source of Heat

Since dubia roaches are accustomed to the tropics, your colony will need a good heat source if you want your Dubia roaches to reproduce. Similarly, keep your roaches at a minimum temperature of 68 degrees to ensure they survive. And the higher temperatures are better to ensure your roaches breed as they should.

Remember, your dubia roaches can produce best when you keep them at about 90 degrees F. You can accomplish it by using a general under tank heater or a ceramic heat emitter. Similarly, make sure you use a thermostat with the heater to ensure that you do not roast your dubia roaches or melt the plastic container.

Ensure Proper Humidity

When breeding dubia roaches, you must remember that these insects thrive in mid to high humidity. Hence, invest in a basic hygrometer to measure your roach colony’s humidity levels. Always maintain a 40-60% humidity rate, mainly if you live in a dry area.

Create a Space for Dubias to Crawl Around

You can set up an egg crate standing on end to give your dubia roaches little apartments to permit them room to grow. It even has the advantage of keeping them out of the fray.

However, you need to stack the egg cartons in the enclosure and ensure that they don’t go to the top so that cartons do not help dubia roaches escape.

Choose the Right Number

Since you want your dubia roach colony to have lots of genetic diversity along with speedy reproduction, you must begin with the right number of roaches. A hundred dubia roaches are a good number to start with, and you can even go for more.

To sum up, while breeding dubia roaches, you must wait until your colony is vigorously reproducing before you use it as a chief food source for your pets. However, if you speed up the breeding process, the colony may not stabilize, and you’ll end up with disappointing results.

If you lack time and energy to breed your colony, source dubia roaches from a reliable supplier using proper methods and techniques for ensuring proper quality.