How to keep Dubia tank clean??

[k0cky]

So I got roughly 200 dooby feeders a few nights ago, am learning what to feed them but my question is how do you keep the enclosure clean? I have them in a 10gallon tank and was thinking of building a tight wire mesh false bottom so the feces gets seperated. What are your techniques?

[Sandy Bear]

You need to make up some sorting tubs to help get it clean.

You will need an assortment of pails and/or tubs to do this.

Step 1)
Get a large Rubbermaid tub to shake all the dubia roaches off of the egg carton

Step 2) You will need a series of 5 gallon pails or other tubs to do the sorting in. Depending on how many sizes you want to sort out, will determine how many pails/tubs you will need. Just make sure that they are all the same so they will fit together nicely. Also, when you pick out the containers that you will be using to sort in, be sure that there is a bit of a gap between each of the pails in the bottom.

Step 3) You will need one container to be the bottom container. No holes drilled in this one

Step 4) You will need one container to be drilled with a 1/8" drill bit. This will separate the frass from the smallest nymphs

Step 5) You will need one container to be drilled with 3/16" drill bit. This will separate the smallest/new born nymphs from the small nymphs

Step 6) You will need one container to be be drilled with 3/8" drill bit. This will separate the medium sized nymphs.

.....Well that's all I go so far, I'm thinking that you will need a 1/2" drill bit, and probably something in between the 3/8" and 1/2" size, but I'm not sure.

[JeffreH]

There is no need to clean the bin with any frequency unless it actually bothers you (sight, smell) or becomes a burden when sorting nymphs, in which case the above post does an excellent job in describing how to sort and clean your bins, seeing as younger nymphs readily burrow in the frass and debris accumulation.

Their frass (excrement) is perfectly suitable for them to live on - you can allow it to accumulate to several inches and behave as a substrate. Just keept the food and moisture sources separate and contained to prevent mold and bacterial growth.

I really only clean most of my bins once a year unless they have an exceptional amount of roaches (20k+) or are an unusually smelly species (i.e Lobster Roaches).