Cockroach Offspring Census

So far so good for 2020, I decided to take some better counts of my two roach species in an attempt to get a better idea of where my colonies stand, and was pleasantly surprised by both! 😁

First of, let's start with my Gyna capucina. I counted 60+ nymphs, a dozen or two of which were newborns, and there were around four pre-sub or subadult females, which is great of course! 😃

There were also another dozen or so adults, four of which were females, two of which seem to have matured rather recently... The longest one of them was actually a rather bright pink color, which I was happy to see, she was also the plumpest of the four, so hopefully about to give birth? We'll see, but in any case, I had to get at least one shot of her before letting her go back into the substrate:

She's a beauty isn't she! 😍
I also have switched back to a vertical humidity gradient as originally planned, thanks to my decision to move the heat cable around to a better spot, and I think this gradient will work a lot better for them than the temporary horizontal gradient I had to use.

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As for my Bantua sp. "Namibia", I've either been counting the amount of offspring per litter wrong, or there have simply been more litters than I thought, because I thought I'd have around 30 or so babies in there. In reality, I counted 56+ L1-L3 nymphs!!! 😮 Plus there's a dozen adults, (mostly females), and 2-3 nymphs from the first litter my colony produced that are still a couple molts away from maturity. So they're doing fantastic! 😄

No pictures this time, but in case you all haven't seen it, I did just make a quick care video on these guys, though for more precise husbandry info you should definitely read my caresheet for them!

Anyways, that's gonna do it for this post, I hope everyone enjoyed, thanks for reading, I'll see you all next time! 😉

Tiny Teneb Update

So apparently my two Lepidocnemeplatia sericea and sole Opatroides punctulatus are all still alive, still no offspring, think I got unlucky and caught all males, oh well!

Anyways, decided to test out my sister's new camera, with one of the L.sericea as a test subject, I think the result was pretty nice, best picture I've gotten of this species for sure:

So yeah, might be seeing more pictures from that camera on this blog, I'm also thinking of using my phone for more pictures or at least videos in the future, I'm not sure...

Anyways, that's it for this short post, thanks for reading everyone, hope you all enjoyed, I'll see you next time! 😉

Valentine's Day Gyna Update!

My Gyna capucina are doing great, I'm seeing more first instars in there, and the small nymphs from my original package are all growing nicely now, so I'm sure my females have been giving birth! 😁

I'm getting a new wave of adults maturing, mostly males, some of which are pretty large, others are super tiny... Why that is, I'm not sure, as their enclosure is pretty dang spacious, and they've got more than enough food, just weird variation I suppose! 🤷 Since it is a mix of sizes, and they're all healthy looking, I'm not complaining!

Anyways, here's some pictures of one of the smaller males, figured this would be a good post for Valentine's Day, they are pink roaches after all... 😜 (Let me know what ya'll think of photos aligned to the center of the post, rather than the left).

"Belly rubs?" (covered in dust because he tried escaping a couple times)

Here's hoping I'll have plenty of these guys available this year, they seem to be doing well so far, I really wanna try and get these well established in the US! 😄

Anyways, that's it for this post everyone, I hope all you couples are having a great Valentine's Day, and hope all you singles are doing alright too! 💕 Thanks for reading, I'll see you all next time! 😉

Some Bantua Pictures

So far my Bantua sp. "Namibia" babies all seem to be doing great, they are growing well and several are third instars already! 😁 A couple of my adult females may be about to pop soon, the rest all either recently matured, or just gave birth.

The main point of this post is that I took some pictures of one of the adult males and a plump female recently, which I will share here!

Male

Female

Gotta love this species, I am really looking forward to posting some for sale when it gets warmer, so be on the lookout for the return of the "For Sale" page here in the next couple months!

Anyways, that's it for this post, thanks for stopping by, I hope everyone enjoyed, will see you all next time! 😉