With the rise of roaches as feeders, it can be confusing to know which roach species is best for your situation. Should you use dubia roaches or turkistan roaches? The species I am discussing here are Blatta lateralis and Blaptica dubia.
Will roaches infest your house?
The first and most common question I get on these roaches is of course whether or not they will invest one's home. Unless your house is hot and covered in rotting food, I do not think the dubia roach poses any risk of infestation. Their life cycles are too long, they breed too slowly, and they are too poor at escaping to ever establish any kind of a infestation in a normal household. The Turkistan roach poses more of a question. They breed much faster, grow faster, and if there are places that they can get food and moisture, there is a chance they could infest your home. My gut instinct is that they also will not infest the average home but if your house is not kept clean, the odds probably go up that egg cases will go unnoticed and that sufficient food and moisture would exist to help them establish. Obviously, the majority of people who keep them are not infested and in my search of information from pesticide companies they report these as primarily a problem outside of the home with stragglers coming in especially flying males, but there have been problems. From my inquiries to other keepers, most people who keep them even for years do not have an infestation. Secondly, most people who notice a problem take care of it and it is limited in scope. The third case, although rarer, is where someone reports an ongoing problem. I suspect and have some evidence that the third case is where someone develops a problem and tries to use only sticky traps and such to combat it. Such measures are great to help capture potential escapes but are probably far too little too late if you've already allowed a problem to develop.
Will my reptile eat the roaches?
A feeder item is useless if your reptiles will not eat them.This is an area where the red runner roach has an advantage because they are extremely active and are far less likely to stay hidden than dubia roaches. In this sense, the red runners are more "cricket like" and tend to elicit a better feeding response and are simply active on the surface more often. Having said that, most reptiles will also eat dubia roaches. Dubia roaches have the unfortunate habit of hiding underneath of things or borrowing into substrate and staying inaccessible to most reptiles for long periods. Dubia roaches will also freeze and stay still sometimes when they detect danger which can prevent them from being recognized as food. With both roaches, if your reptile will eat from a feeder cup or tongs, I believe this is preferable to simply turning them loose to run around. The dubia will hide and the red runners are more likely to breed in the terrarium or get loose if not contained where they can be easily eaten.
What size of roach do I need?
Depending on the size of animals you are feeding, certain roach species may have an advantage. Dubia roaches do get larger than red runners. If you're feeding a number of small herps, I believe the red runners will have a very significant advantage because their nymphs are both smaller and produced in much larger numbers. However, keep in mind that in a naturalistic enclosure insects of any species may hide and continue to grow. I've heard of red runners that ate dart frog eggs and orange head roaches that a keeper found stowed away that he believes ate some of his small geckos. On many occasions I've cleaned cages only to find the majority of dubia had hidden under papaer towels or borrowed down into the substrate and gone uneaten as a result. Adult and subadult red runners are a good size for medium sized lizards like adult fire skinks. Dubia also come in a good range of sizes. The nymphs are considerably larger than red runner nymphs and I use the smaller dubias to cup feed things like subadult to adult cave geckos while the subadult dubia feed things like adult jeweled lacertas. Red runners can feed anything from tiny geckos to a medium sized lizard while dubia can feed anything from an adult banded gecko to the largest insectivores.
How many roaches do I need to get started?
To produce any real number of dubia roaches, you will need to start with a large number. Dubia roaches take several months to reach adulthood and produce nymphs only every other month on average. If you're willing to wait months before feeding any off, it is less expensive to buy small and medium roaches and let them grow to adult size. If you're in a hurry to begin producing your own roaches, then I would recommend you buy a variety of sizes to begin with including some adult roaches. Keep in mind not all of the roaches will survive, that roaches do get old and stop producing well, and that it takes months for small roaches to become breeders. For all of these reasons, I suggest you start with at least twice as many dubia as whatever number people tell you that you need. Some people like to keep colonies they are just growing out and colonies they are feeding out of separate to ensure they do not overfeed from their up and coming colonies. Make sure to get a range of sizes so you always have new roaches coming up through the ranks. The number of breeding age females is very important as this is tied to how much production is possible within your colony. Actual production will vary based on the environment, but the number of adult female roaches creates a hard limit. With the red runner roaches, they tend to grow faster and produce many more nymphs. Again, I would start with a mixed sized group, but unless you are feeding a large number of herps, I would be less concerned about how many I began with as they will quickly grow to the carrying capacity of whatever container you have them in if not fed off. Around 150 mixed sized roaches will be plenty to seed a medium sized storage box. If you want to begin feeding them off immediately, start with 250 to 500.
How do I setup these roach species?
For both dubia and red runner roaches the setup is very easy. You need food, egg crates, moisture, and heat. For the red runner roaches, I would recommend a gasket sealed storage tub, because of the fact that they have become a pest on occasion. While neither species can climb slick plastic, plastic with even a little texture or that becomes dirty may allow small nymphs to find a place that they are capable of climbing. The gasket seal provides an extra layer of protection. In a non gasket sealed tubs, clear packing tape or products like super slick roach barrier or silicone grease for roaches may be used to ensure roaches cannot find a way to escape. The tape will need to wiped down when dusty and the roach barrier will need reapplied when it becomes dirty. I would not recommend vaseline as a barrier as it tends to be messy and may not be effective enough. Whatever tub you use, you will need to cut out part of the middle of the lid and replace it with screen for ventilation. Be sure that the egg crates are far enough below the screen that roaches cannot climb onto it and possibly find a weakness in where the screen is attached to the lid. The egg crates provide the living space for the roaches and do to their shape create a large amount of usable space for the roaches. Stack them vertically so that roach poop falls to the floor of the enclosure For moisture, vegetables, fruits like oranges and apples, and water crystals all work well. A moisture source must be available at all times. For a base food, I like to use a mixture of non-medicated chicken feed and ground whole grain cereals. With the dubia roaches, I have had better luck mixing a couple of ingredients together with the chicken feed than chick feed alone whereas the red runners seem to do fine either way. You can further increase the nutritional value of roaches by giving them a higher end gutload 24-48 hours before feeding them off. Usually this is done by storing them in a separate, small container like a kritter keeper and providing a high end gutload such as Repashy Superload. Both species need heat to achieve rapid production. The easiest way for hobbyist to do this is to put a piece of heat tape under one half of the roach bin and connect it to a lamp dimmer or purchase a heat mat that comes with a dimmer. This is normally then held in place with a metal foil tape. The ideal temperature could be debated but somewhere around the 95F range should be a good starting point. Bare in mind that once you set the tub on the heat tape, it will trap a lot of the air and the temperature will increase so I would recommend periodically checking the heat tape temperature with a temperature gun immediately after lifting up the tub on a somewhat regular basis.
Where to obtain roaches?
As I mentioned earlier, I believe it is critical for dubia colonies to begin with as many roaches as possible so if going with dubia I would recommend that you take extra time to shop around for the best deals. Also keep in mind whether someone will stand behind a shipment if it goes bad and the quality, health, and age of the roaches you will be receiving. Heavily male based or retired breeder colonies are not what you want to purchase. You may be able to find good deales locally on craigslist or you can check various facebook feeder insect groups, faunaclassifieds.com, and many roach dealers also have stock available on ebay.com see Dubia Roaches
and red runner roaches
. Bare in mind that some suppliers may have climbing species such as lobster roaches in their other roach bins. As these are climbing species, you want to avoid anyone who has a reputation for that problem.
Will roaches infest your house?
The first and most common question I get on these roaches is of course whether or not they will invest one's home. Unless your house is hot and covered in rotting food, I do not think the dubia roach poses any risk of infestation. Their life cycles are too long, they breed too slowly, and they are too poor at escaping to ever establish any kind of a infestation in a normal household. The Turkistan roach poses more of a question. They breed much faster, grow faster, and if there are places that they can get food and moisture, there is a chance they could infest your home. My gut instinct is that they also will not infest the average home but if your house is not kept clean, the odds probably go up that egg cases will go unnoticed and that sufficient food and moisture would exist to help them establish. Obviously, the majority of people who keep them are not infested and in my search of information from pesticide companies they report these as primarily a problem outside of the home with stragglers coming in especially flying males, but there have been problems. From my inquiries to other keepers, most people who keep them even for years do not have an infestation. Secondly, most people who notice a problem take care of it and it is limited in scope. The third case, although rarer, is where someone reports an ongoing problem. I suspect and have some evidence that the third case is where someone develops a problem and tries to use only sticky traps and such to combat it. Such measures are great to help capture potential escapes but are probably far too little too late if you've already allowed a problem to develop.
Will my reptile eat the roaches?
A feeder item is useless if your reptiles will not eat them.This is an area where the red runner roach has an advantage because they are extremely active and are far less likely to stay hidden than dubia roaches. In this sense, the red runners are more "cricket like" and tend to elicit a better feeding response and are simply active on the surface more often. Having said that, most reptiles will also eat dubia roaches. Dubia roaches have the unfortunate habit of hiding underneath of things or borrowing into substrate and staying inaccessible to most reptiles for long periods. Dubia roaches will also freeze and stay still sometimes when they detect danger which can prevent them from being recognized as food. With both roaches, if your reptile will eat from a feeder cup or tongs, I believe this is preferable to simply turning them loose to run around. The dubia will hide and the red runners are more likely to breed in the terrarium or get loose if not contained where they can be easily eaten.
What size of roach do I need?
Depending on the size of animals you are feeding, certain roach species may have an advantage. Dubia roaches do get larger than red runners. If you're feeding a number of small herps, I believe the red runners will have a very significant advantage because their nymphs are both smaller and produced in much larger numbers. However, keep in mind that in a naturalistic enclosure insects of any species may hide and continue to grow. I've heard of red runners that ate dart frog eggs and orange head roaches that a keeper found stowed away that he believes ate some of his small geckos. On many occasions I've cleaned cages only to find the majority of dubia had hidden under papaer towels or borrowed down into the substrate and gone uneaten as a result. Adult and subadult red runners are a good size for medium sized lizards like adult fire skinks. Dubia also come in a good range of sizes. The nymphs are considerably larger than red runner nymphs and I use the smaller dubias to cup feed things like subadult to adult cave geckos while the subadult dubia feed things like adult jeweled lacertas. Red runners can feed anything from tiny geckos to a medium sized lizard while dubia can feed anything from an adult banded gecko to the largest insectivores.
How many roaches do I need to get started?
To produce any real number of dubia roaches, you will need to start with a large number. Dubia roaches take several months to reach adulthood and produce nymphs only every other month on average. If you're willing to wait months before feeding any off, it is less expensive to buy small and medium roaches and let them grow to adult size. If you're in a hurry to begin producing your own roaches, then I would recommend you buy a variety of sizes to begin with including some adult roaches. Keep in mind not all of the roaches will survive, that roaches do get old and stop producing well, and that it takes months for small roaches to become breeders. For all of these reasons, I suggest you start with at least twice as many dubia as whatever number people tell you that you need. Some people like to keep colonies they are just growing out and colonies they are feeding out of separate to ensure they do not overfeed from their up and coming colonies. Make sure to get a range of sizes so you always have new roaches coming up through the ranks. The number of breeding age females is very important as this is tied to how much production is possible within your colony. Actual production will vary based on the environment, but the number of adult female roaches creates a hard limit. With the red runner roaches, they tend to grow faster and produce many more nymphs. Again, I would start with a mixed sized group, but unless you are feeding a large number of herps, I would be less concerned about how many I began with as they will quickly grow to the carrying capacity of whatever container you have them in if not fed off. Around 150 mixed sized roaches will be plenty to seed a medium sized storage box. If you want to begin feeding them off immediately, start with 250 to 500.
How do I setup these roach species?
For both dubia and red runner roaches the setup is very easy. You need food, egg crates, moisture, and heat. For the red runner roaches, I would recommend a gasket sealed storage tub, because of the fact that they have become a pest on occasion. While neither species can climb slick plastic, plastic with even a little texture or that becomes dirty may allow small nymphs to find a place that they are capable of climbing. The gasket seal provides an extra layer of protection. In a non gasket sealed tubs, clear packing tape or products like super slick roach barrier or silicone grease for roaches may be used to ensure roaches cannot find a way to escape. The tape will need to wiped down when dusty and the roach barrier will need reapplied when it becomes dirty. I would not recommend vaseline as a barrier as it tends to be messy and may not be effective enough. Whatever tub you use, you will need to cut out part of the middle of the lid and replace it with screen for ventilation. Be sure that the egg crates are far enough below the screen that roaches cannot climb onto it and possibly find a weakness in where the screen is attached to the lid. The egg crates provide the living space for the roaches and do to their shape create a large amount of usable space for the roaches. Stack them vertically so that roach poop falls to the floor of the enclosure For moisture, vegetables, fruits like oranges and apples, and water crystals all work well. A moisture source must be available at all times. For a base food, I like to use a mixture of non-medicated chicken feed and ground whole grain cereals. With the dubia roaches, I have had better luck mixing a couple of ingredients together with the chicken feed than chick feed alone whereas the red runners seem to do fine either way. You can further increase the nutritional value of roaches by giving them a higher end gutload 24-48 hours before feeding them off. Usually this is done by storing them in a separate, small container like a kritter keeper and providing a high end gutload such as Repashy Superload. Both species need heat to achieve rapid production. The easiest way for hobbyist to do this is to put a piece of heat tape under one half of the roach bin and connect it to a lamp dimmer or purchase a heat mat that comes with a dimmer. This is normally then held in place with a metal foil tape. The ideal temperature could be debated but somewhere around the 95F range should be a good starting point. Bare in mind that once you set the tub on the heat tape, it will trap a lot of the air and the temperature will increase so I would recommend periodically checking the heat tape temperature with a temperature gun immediately after lifting up the tub on a somewhat regular basis.
Where to obtain roaches?
As I mentioned earlier, I believe it is critical for dubia colonies to begin with as many roaches as possible so if going with dubia I would recommend that you take extra time to shop around for the best deals. Also keep in mind whether someone will stand behind a shipment if it goes bad and the quality, health, and age of the roaches you will be receiving. Heavily male based or retired breeder colonies are not what you want to purchase. You may be able to find good deales locally on craigslist or you can check various facebook feeder insect groups, faunaclassifieds.com, and many roach dealers also have stock available on ebay.com see Dubia Roaches
and red runner roaches. Bare in mind that some suppliers may have climbing species such as lobster roaches in their other roach bins. As these are climbing species, you want to avoid anyone who has a reputation for that problem.
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