How do you culture crickets ?

[kristy55303]

How do you culture crix and do it so it is sanitary and healthy for darts? I need help on this issue as I have basically only dealt with ff but I need the crix cultured for both my terribillis and my adult breeders that are large. kristy

[talanyth]

have an enclosed (escape-proof) aquarium-like enclosure. Fill with 3 inches of potting soil. Add crickets, add cricket food and water. Water soil occasionally. Crickets will grow, mate and lay eggs in soil. Eggs will hatch in decently moist (not wet -wet soil will drown eggs ) soil. You can add egg crates in enclosure to add living demension for crickets so that a higher population can be supported before crickets try to cannibalize eachother.

Crickets will not cannibalize if you provide enough food, water and space for them.

[kristy55303]

i am however selling my entire colletion i have left take a look under the dart frogs for sale section.....even the terribillis are up for sale...all are proven and/or breeding now. accepting reasonable offers. kristy

[mentat7]

Kristy sorry to hear about your health problem.
still it's a great question others may be interested in.
I know i've been spending $8/100 crix plus a $16 express shipping charge to ship pinheads to my house every week.

at any rate here's a link to very good article on raising crickets.

http://www.anapsid.org/crickets.html

crickets do have an ammonia odor, so this isn't an option for everyone, also escapees may be unwelcome in the house.

0.0.4 D. leucs
150+ orchids
3.1.0 felines

[kristy55303]

thanks for the reply.....i think i have opted not to culture or do crix for my darts even my terribillis as they can harbor disease such as parasites. i dont want to risk it and it sounds like more trouble than it is worth....i will however check out that site and see if i still come to this conclusion kristy

[fknighton]

I had to have crickets all the time for my bearded dragons and believe me they are smelly! I would much rather deal with fruit flies and other cultures.

Fran