Good food vs. Bad food

[Digger]

I feed my flies honey and water. crix get potato and some lettuce. Never had a problem and they do very well on these diets. The mantids gobble em up too. No need for all the fancy additives.

My budwing nymphs are able to eat medium sized red runner roaches. They go gaga over them. But i only have a limited supply. Otherwise they will easily eat 4 small crix in a sitting. What temp and humidity do you have Ponder at?

good question Mike. Temp and humidity are not optimum. Temp is fine during the day, about 80 deg F. At night (and for about 7 hours) the temp slowly drops to ~65 deg F. Then brought back to 75 - 80 in the a.m. Humidity (during these winter months) is very low. I do keep a bowl of water on a supplementary heater in the room (my home office) and also mist Ponder's condo twice daily (a little more than usual). It's a challenge for many of use in the northern winter climates.

 

[Mvalenz]

good question Mike. Temp and humidity are not optimum. Temp is fine during the day, about 80 deg F. At night (and for about 7 hours) the temp slowly drops to ~65 deg F. Then brought back to 75 - 80 in the a.m. Humidity (during these winter months) is very low. I do keep a bowl of water on a supplementary heater in the room (my home office) and also mist Ponder's condo twice daily (a little more than usual). It's a challenge for many of use in the northern winter climates.

Raise the temp 5 degrees to 85 during the day. You'd be surprised how different they act from a small change in the temp. 65 seems a little low for night time. try 75. This may be why he is not eating so much. Low metabolism. I keep mine at about 85 day 80 night.

 

[Digger]

Mike -

Unfortunately I don't have zone heating in the house. So 85 in the den would be 85 throughout the house. No can do. Any suggestions for temperature control just for Ponder's small apartment? Do'nt want to keep a heat lamp on at night because of possible fire hazard.

 

[Introvertebrate]

I buy spikes by the 1000 and keep them in a small fridge, hatch some out as needed, keep in wide shallow deli, feed honey, and that lasts 3-4 weeks. simplistico...

Got it. Thanks.

 

[lancaster1313]

Mike -

Unfortunately I don't have zone heating in the house. So 85 in the den would be 85 throughout the house. No can do. Any suggestions for temperature control just for Ponder's small apartment? Do'nt want to keep a heat lamp on at night because of possible fire hazard.

You can place the apartment on top of a warm electrical appliance. Maybe on a satellite receiver which is always warm even when it is off?

 

[sally]

You can place the apartment on top of a warm electrical appliance. Maybe on a satellite receiver which is always warm even when it is off?

I use a small reptile pad heater. You do have to plug it in but I don't think there is many issues with leaving the plugged in. I stuck mine on the ouside of the container, on the bottom.

 

[Digger]

I use a small reptile pad heater. You do have to plug it in but I don't think there is many issues with leaving the plugged in. I stuck mine on the ouside of the container, on the bottom.

Last night on chat, a seedling heater pad was suggested. Maybe I can find a reptile heater pad locally, perhaps @ Pet Smart.

 

[sally]

Last night on chat, a seedling heater pad was suggested. Maybe I can find a reptile heater pad locally, perhaps @ Pet Smart.

Yes. I went to Petco. I use a gauge for temp. and humidity and the pad keeps the heat regulated nicely.

 

[Krissim Klaw]

I've had a lot of luck with crickets as my core feeder. I have a breeder tank of crickets and at any time can pull freshly hatched nymphs to adults to feed. There is no need to order anything or run to the store and since I am raising them I can be assured of what sort of living conditions they are coming from. I've been curious to try the banded crickets Ghann's cricket farm has recently switched over too to see how they do.

In addition to crickets I also try to feed a variety of other feeders. I do wild caught. I also have used house flies and blue bottle flies. I enjoy the flies but I'm not keen on having to order them so often. can you extend the shelf life of them by ordering spikes versus pupae? My main problem is I only have a handful of mantises at any time and every time I have gotten pupae a huge portion goes bad before I have time to feed it. It seems they only last a month or so in the fridge before they start to perish if you don't hatch them out.