Ghostie survey

[dlemmings]

So my limited experience is that there are generally more females than males froma single ooth does this sound correct and does anyone have an idea what the ratio is?

I had to post for quite a while looking for a male earier this year, with the word on the forum and from locals being that males were tougher to come by.

also to build breeding stock I picked up some L-1 nyphs from a SoCal breeder (thanks Brian!!) and of the 17 or so I got, 13 have survived in Semi communal conditions (space limitations have forced me to keep two groups of 3 in 32 oz deli-cups and one group of 2 per delicup) the rest are either bigger gilrs or smaller boys I felt needed to be kept seperate) and over the past couple months have not lost one. of the 13 I think only 3-5 are males...I will have to count.

what are your experiences?

 

[gripen]

I have had a consistent 5/6-1 ratio female to male.

 

[dlemmings]

My males have thier work cut out come breeding time...lol.

I may have to hoard my males from next generation.

 

[Danny.]

I have a pair of Ghosties. Thanks Brian

 

[Termite48]

Dennis: To find out the reason for the imbalanced ratio of F/M one could, if you have enough oothecae being produced to allow it to an experiment to see why this happens. One could use temperature, humidity, & hours of light for the varying parameters under which the oothecae are incubated. If you see the ration change, then you have it. It could happen in the process of the egg production due to similar variations in the conditions, but it also could be a hatching issue that the females hatch rate is higher under certain conditions. This is an interesting experiment potential.

 

[dlemmings]

Wow...good observation Rich. I had not thought of how many eggs may be male/femal based on parental conditions...surely this could be a factor though. I had a crash of BBF that led to very small ooths...1st hatched out 15-20 ghosties...(gonna be sending you a few ooths as part of our earlier trade) so untill I can breed my small colony of pre-subs and reap some ooths this will be hard to study. even then I may find it hard to make the detailed notes and control groups to really get objective data. fun idea!!!!!