Double Roach Question

I would like peoples opinions on making roach chow. I have read some recipes but everything seems to be geared towards gut loading for lizards. Are there any recipes anyone has found to be very successful?

Secondly, I have a bag of roach chow I purchased when I ordered my Dubia's just so I had something proven to feed them while I researched recipes. Unfortunately there are now little beetles in it. They look just like the beetles that show up in flour. When I used to bake, we'd just toss the flour, but in this case is there a way to get rid of these beetles? Baking or Freezing??

Of course any insight is appreciated!

I used to feed roachs when my monitor was little.

Magic bullet was my best friend for this.

Average weeks worth of chow (refrigerate/freeze extra)

2 medium sized carrots
Cup of dry dog food
Cup of rabbit pellets
Handful of Old Fashioned Oatmeal (without additives)

This worked for me, but the roaches ate a lot of it.

I know a lot of people add bee pollen / kelp / crickets / honey to this (pretty common to do so I've heard) but I've personally never attempted to make it that... well, expensive.

Not sure how many you plan on feeding, so you might need to adjust this as necessary. But I find that it works to a pretty balanced diet. The carrots you kind of sneak in there (just like with children) because I've never seen a roach go for them by themselves.

Awesome, thanks! I'll give this a shot, although my hissers love carrots. My Dubias, don't seem to like much at all, I've started to catch them eating as of late. My Dubias are a much smaller starter colony though. The hissers however go through anything. I have been putting carrots and broccoli in for a little while now and there is nothing left in 2 days. I even leave the greens on the top of the carrots and they love it. Maybe I just have some freak roaches though! Either way, thanks for the quick response and the insight!

Absolutely mate.

Roaches are easy to feed. Remember super high protein, and some vegetables to supplement vitamins and water.

Goodluck and enjoy!

Quick after-question though, are you starting a colony for study, or just raising future food (if I read the first post correctly, I believe it's the former, but curiosity demands I ask!)

Kerrby wrote:

Absolutely mate.

Roaches are easy to feed. Remember super high protein, and some vegetables to supplement vitamins and water.

Goodluck and enjoy!

Quick after-question though, are you starting a colony for study, or just raising future food (if I read the first post correctly, I believe it's the former, but curiosity demands I ask!)

Well, a little bit of both I started the Dubia colony basically as a cool and fun way to feed the other pets. I had a buddy who fed his Tegu hissers and his colony got too large, so he offered to give me some. I thought since I had a tub for Dubias set up and the roaches already in the mail I'd take him up on his offer as I had seen them before and they were really cool! My son loves playing with the hissers too so the roaches are definitely both pets and feeders. Not much for studying as the only other people that will benefit are people I interact with. It's not in my profession or anything, but I am definitely fascinated by them just the same as I am my scorps, t's and my ball python.

Actually I am planning on talking to some local zoo's to donate some roaches, and maybe scorps and t's and of course time to help maintain and/or train others to care for them, we'll see, but thought it would be a great way to expose some very cool, very misunderstood creepy crawley's to the general public. And also a means for me to offload any excessive specimens.

Thanks again

Excellent plans, iitomodachi1

By the way, how are the hissers as feeders? Have you fed any adults or are you only feeding nymphs and freshly molted ones?

H. laoticus wrote:

By the way, how are the hissers as feeders? Have you fed any adults or are you only feeding nymphs and freshly molted ones?

I haven't used the hissers yet. I was planning on using the dubias because they are supposed to have a softer exoskeleton to my understanding.

Talking to another guy I met on another forum and bought some T's from I guess the hissers produce this chemical that is non-toxic for both arachnids as well as people but has a numbing effect and his T's have eaten some but all have eventually refused to eat anymore after some time. I did give some to a friend from work who wanted to try them with his T's and he said they loved them. My main concern was that they climb smooth surfaces while the dubia's do not. They also have spikey legs .

I will try to feed some to my T's as they will climb the walls too but scorps would never catch them if they climb. I'd also make sure to feed nymphs also and not the adults.
Of course this is all the best of my understanding and reasoning as to why I haven't been feeding them to anything as of yet. Most of T's are also slings and my larger T's act as clean up crews for my scorp left overs. Any crickets I clear out of their vivariums I drop in for the spiders as they eat everything immediately!
I'll post more though after I try using them