Reptile & Amphibian Forums

How to get rid of these #@&*$!g pinheads, any ideas? Start fresh with new soil?

Thanks

Im sorry to laugh. Its just that Ive been struggeling with cricked poplutaion explotions FOREVER. Next youll have those f-ing little beetles than come in the boxes with the crickets making babies like crazy too.

As far as the circkets, as long as you make sure that they dont have anything to eat(which is impossible if you have leaf litter) they will die off on their own. I made the mistake of FEEDING the damn things, thinking that it would be good to have a constant little insect population maintained, so my monitors could snack whenever they wanted. Within a few weeks the soil moved with cricket activity!!! It was horrible. I pulled about 5000 out and GAVE them away to a friend. I then stopped feeing them, and their population dropped within a week or so.

However,Ive still got those f-ign evil little beetles all over my house!

You can bomb the cage with insecticide. There are a couple on the market that are pretty safe from what I hear. I may do that to get rid of the beetles. It seems like they eat dirt! I dont know why there are so many sill crawling around!

Well good luck, and what ever you do, DONT feed them! Youve seen the movie Gremlins right? Well, crickets are WORSE, cause at least with Gremlins, you can feed them BEFORE midnight!!!

Michelle

I don't know about bombing anything with insectide, especially with lizards that are eating insects, sounds like a recipe for something to go wrong.

Squish'em as you see them, The easiest way to keep the pinheads in check is to not put so many adults in.

--Robert

Ive heard that they can safely be used. There is a new one on the market that is supposedly safe enough to be ingested.

I have no experience with these things though. Who knows if they could(the reptiles) develope toxicity and other side effects. I doubt the company is going to be willing to pay for your dead animals if there are any negetive reactions. Just some thoughts...

curses! i can never get my crickets to breed well!
ian

however, in my limited experience breeding crix, I had good success using a few inches of soil for them to deposit their eggs in. So, I would start off with a few hundred 6 weekers in a couple rubbermaids with the soil and egg crates, and within a couple weeks you will begin to see teeny weeny little pinheads all over the egg crate!! I fed them a mix of fresh veggies/ dried and ground grains, and maybe some cereal or malto meal, or other stuff like that. I eat pretty healthy, so my leftovers would go to the cricket colonies! They even eat meat!

Its fun watching the little guys get bigger and develope into little crickets. At about a week old you can actually see their tiny little hind legs! Before that they just look like mites!

You should give it a try! For fun, use an aquarium, so you can watch them depositing the eggs into the soil along the edges! It alot more interesting than what you may think!

-At least then you can say youve bred SOMETHING! Hahaha!

Take care, and have FUN!

Michelle

I use shallow glass bowls I got at the buck store as the egg boxes. That way, you can see all the eggs in the soil. Once they are done hatching, and all the babies are out in the rubbermaid, you can remove the bowl. I never use any substrate with the crickets, just a plain bin with the dry food on one side. Keeping them dry, means a lot less smell.
I still don't like crickets, though.
D.

thats great!
ian

Where are the pinheads? In your reptiles tank, in a seperate bin? If you mean they are in you lizards tank then just let them grow and and lizard will eat them thats what happened to me.

Crickets are voracious and annoying. They will nibble on your sleeping lizard. They crap a ton, and spread germs everywhere. They die easy, and the bodies rot and mould.
And not being able to sleep, will stress your animal. Not a good thing, all around.
D.