A bunch of questions about crickets

[numpty]

Hey there,

I have a couple of young tree frogs, raised from eggs, which until recently I was feeding fruit flies. While they still seem to like eating the flies, I've been making the switch to crickets, if for no other reason than that the flies are a pain in the neck to keep in the terrarium and the wife's tired of finding them crawling across the living room floor.

There aren't many options here for feeding as far as I can see (I'm in Taiwan), but there do seem to be brown (field?) crickets and black (house?) crickets available most of the time, and I was wondering if anyone had thoughts about the relative benefits. The brown crickets are fast as lighting and jump high, but they look ... I don't know ... "meatier" than the black crickets. The latter tend to mope around more, not presenting such an attractive target for the frogs, but they're a heck of a lot easier to handle.

Also, would one species be hardier than the other come wintertime? Unheated temps in my house would probably get down to the mid-teens Celsius for spells. Also, at these temperatures, would crickets die, or just slow down in growth, feeding, etc? Would they still breed, if I feel like going that route?

Finally, at about what size do crickets start to show their gender? All the feeders I've bought, up to about 3/4 inch, have only had the two prongs. I would have thought some of them would be showing ovipositors by that size. Do they just need more time to develop, or have I been buying all male or all sterile crickets? None of them have had wings, if that means anything.

Thanks in advance for any and all help!

[numpty]

A couple of photos to show the two different types of cricket I was babbling on about:

[Mentat]

The brown cricket pic looks like the ones being sold locally for feeders (Acheta domesticus). If they jump too much for your frogs can always remove the rear legs. Not sure what kind are the black ones; but make sure the skeleton is not too tough and they are not overtly aggressive.

Last year some bigger crickets landed in US feeder market, think they were from Africa. Those things were very mean and would actually attack amphibians, reptiles, and even your hand. As soon as word got around they were pulled from market.

During transition make sure the crickets are gut loaded with lettuce, carrots, and cherios cereal for 24-48 hours before feeding frog. They should also be same or smaller than distance between frog's eyes.

IRT temperature parameters and other rearing questions, this article should help: Frog Forum - Culturing Crickets - Care and Breeding of the Common House Cricket. Good luck !

[numpty]

Thanks for the reply!

Oops, I made a mistake: I meant brown for house cricket and black for field cricket.

The black crickets, to my eye, look like the field crickets that a Google search throws up, but without the wings. I've never seen anything wing-like on any of these feeder crickets. I'm not sure if they're just not mature enough, or there's something else going on.

The black crickets don't seem too aggressive, and anyway I'm bowl feeding the frogs, so they just hop in, eat, and jump out again. When the crickets are being raided, it seems their instinct is just to freeze until the frogs lose interest in them.