Feeding your feeders

[PookaDotted]

So we all know how important a varied diet is for your mantids, but a varied diet for you feeders is equally if not more so important.

I am creating this topic to help everybody elaborate on what they feed their feeders. So far my list for the diet of feeder insects is as follows:


Dubia roaches:
- Chicken mash
- Dog food
- Cat food
- Citrus fruits
- Fresh Vegetables
- Fish food
- Corn flakes
- Rolled oats
- Bok choy

Blue Bottle flies:
- Bee pollen
- Honey

Crickets:
- Potato slices
- Commercial cricket diet
- Fish food
- Oat meal
- Bee pollen
- Dry dog food
- Ripe fruits (pears, apples, etc.)
- Fish food
- Leafy vegetables
- Zucchini
- Yellow squash
- Chicken layer pellets

Meal worms:
- Oat meal
- Carrots

Fruit flies:
-Commercial fruit fly culture mix
- Home made culture ingredients

Wax worms:
- Oatmeal

A lot of Mantid keepers also feed insects that they find from the outdoors, or insects that sneak into the home. It is advised by other hobbyists to go against this method due to the unknown origin and potential pesticides or parasites the insect could be carrying.

If anybody can add feeder/ feeder food to the list or suggest more id love to hear it!

 

[hibiscusmile]

wheat germ, wheat, corn crushed.....brewers yeast

 

[HungryGhost]

Crickets:

-dry dog food

-bee pollen

-ripe pear slices

-fish food

Blue Bottle flies:

-honey

-bee pollen

 

[Rick]

Crickets get leafy veggies, dry oatmeal (substrate), high quality dry dog food, fish flakes, some occasional fruit like apples.

Flies get honey.

 

[Introvertebrate]

Wax worms:

- Oatmeal

Don't the need honey too?

 

[Rick]

Don't the need honey too?

At what point in its life would a mealworm ever eat honey?

 

[PookaDotted]

wheat germ, wheat, corn crushed.....brewers yeast

For which feeder?

 

[Lou]

Yellow squash or zuccini are great for crickets for hydration and they tear it up.I use them in conjunction with chicken layer pellets that I run through a coffee grinder to pulverize into a fine powder.Even day old crickets will be able to easily eat it.

 

[Addlement]

For dubia roaches: Oranges, rolled oats, and bok choy.

I did a pretty large-scale (i.e. tens of thousands) Dubia Roach breeding stint for a while, and I learned that I had the best success (fastest growth, highest reproduction rate) with a combination of a constant supply of oranges, bok choy, and rolled oats. I didn't supply them with water or water crystals, and kept the temperatures ~80 +/- 2 degrees Fahrenheit. It not only did almost twice the growth and reproduction rate of just about any other method I tried, including cricket crack and several brands of dubia chow, but I also never had colony collapse or mold in any instance. This was running ~100 bins at ~100 breeding adults in each, with several generations of offspring at any time. I also had pretty good success with several types of squash, but they tended to mold or rot before they were eaten all the way, whereas the aforementioned method also only took weekly cleanings, so it was practical. For reference, each bin got its bottom filled with an inch of oats every month, and there was typically only small chunks of dried orange peel and nothing left of the bok choy each week when I switched them out. Each bin got six fist-size oranges cut in half and about half a head of bok choy each week. It wasn't the greatest diversity in food, but it definitely had the best results in my experience. And really, who doesn't want more roaches?

 

[PookaDotted]

Thank you for that descriptive addition Addlement. I plan on breeding dubia roaches, so I appreciate your info coming form person experience. I find experience > google and youtube searches haha.

 

[Introvertebrate]

At what point in its life would a mealworm ever eat honey?

I was referring to waxworms. She listed 6 different feeders. Duh.

 

[devetaki9]

I keep the waxworms in organic bran and wheat germ and give them shaved beeswax that I get from Rebecca, they will all come right up to the top to eat it.

Crickets and roaches fresh fruit and veggies, oatmeal, high quality cat food, water crystals, fish flakes, honey powder and bee pollen....

Supers and meals are kept in bran/wheat germ and given apple or potato or zuch/ summer squash

 

[reptilia5]

When I was keeping my leopard frog I always fed the crickets flake fish food mixed with calcium and reptile vitamins and lots of different fruits,particularly oranges and banana. If crickets are fed juicy fruits like oranges,pears,apples then no other water source is needed. Crickets also enjoy carrots,celery and peppers,all good sources of liquids and nutrients.