Quality feeder food ?'s

[fish4all]

I researched a lot of brands for a long time when my wife wanted to get a dog again. It didn't help that she wanted a bull terrier. So when I finally decided on a dog food it was Diamond Naturals, beef and rice. Now I consider this a quality dog food, at $1 a pound it better be much more nutritious than the grocery store stuff.

I was just wondering what brands of dog and cat food everyone considers quality food that they would use to feed their roaches and other feeder insects.

I honestly don't plan on using dog food at all but I have to ask, one for future reference and two in case I find the roaches want more than my current plans for feeding them.

[Murray of the Deep]

I researched a lot of brands for a long time when my wife wanted to get a dog again. It didn't help that she wanted a bull terrier. So when I finally decided on a dog food it was Diamond Naturals, beef and rice. Now I consider this a quality dog food, at $1 a pound it better be much more nutritious than the grocery store stuff.

I was just wondering what brands of dog and cat food everyone considers quality food that they would use to feed their roaches and other feeder insects.

I honestly don't plan on using dog food at all but I have to ask, one for future reference and two in case I find the roaches want more than my current plans for feeding them.

Pedigree would be good for cats Friskie , they are very famous here as dog and cat food and a high quality one.

[unkempt1]

I know from time to time people come to this board (and other forums) asking for a roach chow recipe. I've been tweaking mine over the course of the last few months and have found one that seems to work really well. It seems no matter what I put together they eat it (they're roaches for God's sake ) but this one they take to the best, even favoring it over veggies as long as I have water crystals in there too. I still haven't put one together they prefer over fruits, but when I do I'll share that one too! Or start selling it! Well here it is:


3 parts dog food
2 parts Cheerios
1 part soy flour
1 part dried coconut flakes
a few dashes of rolled oats (I'll explain below)


I use a smaller mix of dog food with other proteins to lower the protein content (Cheerios and soy flour are in there to "water it down" but to also add other sources of nourishment). I've read articles about too high of a protein diet increasing their uric acid content, which can cause early colony die-offs and health problems with your dragon. I do admit the jury's still out on how factual this argument is, and I don't want this thread to become a debate on that. I just do it as a precaution.


The dried coconut flakes serve as a sweetener. I found that when I put that much soy flour in the mix, they wouldn't eat the chow unless it was the only thing in the tub. I want the flour in there for the reason above, so I added the flakes and they've taken a huge interest in it. I use the flakes because my wife was going to throw them out, so this was more out of convenience. You may remember I used to use raisin bran flakes and Nilla wafer crumbles. This is easier as it's in a smaller package.


Lastly, I use the dashes of rolled oats because its a good filler and it seems to make cleaning the coffee grinder I use to grind everything with easier. Let me know what you think! Try it out and see how yours like it! Share your recipe too if you like, I'd love to use it to see how my roaches like it!

[fish4all]

What brand of Dog Food Unkept?

[unkempt1]

What brand of Dog Food Unkept?

The cheapest kind (or what you already feed your dog)! Let me go back to my post: I "dumb down" the protein content with other non-dog food items. I currently use something called "high performance" dog food from HEB in my chow, which is the prominent non-Walmart version of a grocer in San Antonio.

I guess your response begs the question, "Why are you concerned with certain brands of dog food?" What are you worried about your roaches eating? Let me know!

[fish4all]

I'm not, to be honest but most online articles and most people who write recipe using dog food say high quality dog food so I had to ask.

Some use too many fillers, some use a lot of preservatives, some use this, others use that. Does it matter, I don't know.

I am one who will ask a question just to get answers like yours! Knowledge isn't very useful if you take the word of one and stop at that!

Only real things I can think of is a ton of wheat and corn in cheap dog food. Does it matter to the roaches, most likely not. Will it matter to the frogs and the animals we feed the roaches to, I don't know.

I don't plan on using dog food. My plan is something like this:
Egg Layer Mash
Oatmeal baby cereal
Pond pellet fish food, because it's the cheapest I have found
Possible ratios:
4:1:1
6:1:2
8:2:4
Will have to see what they like best and how they react to different ratios. It might be more baby cereal or a more even ratio but that is my best guess as to what I will likely try.

But I will admit I may have to add some breakfast cereal to the mix and I like you Rolled oats idea.

Cheap, quick, easy and full of vitamins, minerals and everything I can think of.

Gut Load: Haven't decided if I will change a thing yet. If I do I was thinking I would add some brewers yeast to that mix and possibly some honey and/or molasses to make a nice sweet crumble to make sure they load up.

If I do decide to use dog food, I won't be feeding my dogs food to them! Not at $1+ a pound when I can get other brands for $15 for 40#.

I guess the biggest reason why I asked is because of what a person might consider a quality dog or cat food. My sister thinks O'l Roy is quality food, my dad, Iams, me, Diamond naturals. If I can have 3 different views from my own family, not to mention the ones from friends, I thought it was a good idea to see what everyone thought of as quality dog/cat food. The best top quality dry dog food I can think of is right around $6.50 a pound. Lowest quality, $0.25 cents a pound. Somewhere in between I hope to get an idea of what is considered "quality". Whether it matters or not, having options and different things to try is never a bad thing.

[badkelpie]

Kirkland signature (costco) dog food is diamond. It's a step above the diamond naturals, almost identical to their chicken soup line. I think $25 for 40 lbs.

My roaches don't eat much pre-made food. I toss in an orange or a couple carrots, or some kale or leaves or leftover spaghetti or chicken bones. Whatever I have that I think they'd eat. Except cantaloupe, they won't eat that. They're huge and healthy, and breed faster than I can keep up with.

[unkempt1]

Only real things I can think of is a ton of wheat and corn in cheap dog food. Does it matter to the roaches, most likely not. Will it matter to the frogs and the animals we feed the roaches to, I don't know.

Ah, now I think I understand. The answer is more than likely yes, whatever contents are in their stomachs will pass on to your animals. I keep two bins. One for feeding and one for breeding. My breeder bin gets the recipe above, with different fruits and veggies I have as table scraps throughout the week. My feeder bin only gets things like collard greens, mustard greens, turnip greens, and very rarely apple and mango slices. This is to pass on a healthy gut to my frog and bearded dragon.

If I were you I would have a similar system. You want to have full control of what goes into your pets, and its equally important you bother your roaches as little as possible. They will breed more and multiply faster.

[MatthewM1]

I made a batch of chow that the roaches really seem to enjoy they sometimes even go for it over fruit and veggies. I bought a box of individual size bags of trail mix, but took one of those minus the m&M's(leaving rains, almonds, cashews and peanuts) and ground it up with a handfull of cheerios

[unkempt1]

You know, I was rereading this thread and it gave me pause. What dog food has the fewest or no preservatives? Even something in a small amount, since a little dog food really goes a long way when making roach chow. Anyone have any thoughts or experiences?

I ask because even with gut-loading, impurities can still exist in feeders (uric acid being a good example). It would probably be no different with feeders that have been given preservative-heavy diets. A good gut-loading may not be enough.

[fish4all]

There are tons of them that say they use no artificial preservatives. Tocopherol is a natural vitamin-E preservative in my dogs food. I have no clue how long any preservative would stay in a roaches digestive track or body parts.

[unkempt1]

There are tons of them that say they use no artificial preservatives. Tocopherol is a natural vitamin-E preservative in my dogs food. I have no clue how long any preservative would stay in a roaches digestive track or body parts.

Exactly! I have no clue either, but like the uric acid thing, I don't want to take chances. I guess I'll just look around at the store today and see what I find.

[fish4all]

All I know about the dog food I would use, If I decide to use it, is it will likely cost less than $1 a pound and more $0.25 a pound. Somewhere in there should be something that will work well enough for the roaches and not have so many contaminants in it that you can't get the roaches cleaned out enough while gut loading to make them "safer".

[demon amphibians]

If you guys are debating using dog food and cat food for protein and are worried it will harm the roaches and your frogs. you must consider this. Vegetables have protein. Raw veggies that are high in protein are broccoli, asparagus, potato, sweet potatoes, sweet corn, cabbage, cauliflower, various types of squash, avocados tomatoes, carrots and lettuce. Don't forget beans, and whole grans. Your roaches will accept all of these very ambitiously. However i do feed my breeders a mixture of dog and cat food blended, wet and with veggies mixed in along with fish flakes. I have just seen so many testimonials of gut loading your feeders with it i decided to gut load my feeders with everything i have listed except dog and cat food. however I will gut load my feeders with cat and dog food that i feed to my toads. Because my toads will eat dog food. Dog food is even used to bate cane toads in Australia. I have thousands upon thousands of dubia roaches and have been feeding them these products for months and my fatality rate is very very low. I lose maybe 1-2 breeders a months. But i totally believe that those deaths are contributed with age and humidity at times. although I do clean my bins twice a week because of the number of babies produced. But i do have a method of preventing the babies from eating the dog food blend. I use a dish only the adults can access and the babies cant. It is a plastic dish that is just high enough that the babies cant climb over but the adults can. I am producing 1500+ babies every two weeks. So something i am doing is definitely right.

Don't over think this. Just use organic dog food. If you are worried. My roaches do get a large amount of protein but just alternate what you feed them daily one day give them dog food. The next offer lettuce and carrots. problem solved. Roaches can actually eat more types of plants then humans can. You can feed them leaves and grass. I have found few things harmful to them however. Don't feed raw meats. And don't feed any rotten food of any sort to them. Mold WILL kill them so avoid fungi. I haven't tried mushrooms and yeast and i wont chance it, seeing is that molds that are harmless to us are deadly to them. Also with veggies of any sort give them organic. regular store bought veggies have pesticides that aren't noticeably harmful to us but will be to them. I have had no problems with pesticides but I wouldn't chance it.

There are so many foods out there to offer and it is very in expensive. Roaches are some of the most successful insects on the planet and not to mention some of the easiest insects to breed and care for. Your primary focus is to give your feeders something that wont harm your frogs as far as gut loading is concerned. Keep the bin clean and you wont ever have to worry about toxins building up in there environment no matter how much protein you offer.

Also keep in mind the babies eat the adults experiments so high protein diets is also important to the young.These guys are the ultimate recycling bugs i have ever attempted to culture. They will also eat there own molts for protein.

Oranges make them breed like crazy i have witnessed this first hand. i don't know how but it works. They are not crazy about lemons and limes. I tried and very little was disturbed. Apples and banana's are also there first choice. No matter what i put in, those items are the first to disappear. I have much reason to believe these items also help with reproduction.

[fish4all]

Okay, here is a question, how much dry food can I expect to go through to feed 250 adults a months? Might seems irrelevant to some but I don't plan to breed roaches because it will be fun. I am doing it to save money. If they only eat 1-5 pounds of a food a month then I can buy "quality" anything for them without breaking the bank. They will still get veggies and fruit scraps from the local market, probably going to dehydrate a 5 gallon bucket full of whatever I can get.

I am glad I got the information from everyone though. If my roaches don't do well on my planned diet at least I know what dog food to look for.

[badkelpie]

250 adults will not eat much. Maybe a few cups? Why not skip the dog food altogether? Fruits and veggies and a little chicken every once in a while is plenty. They like leftover spaghetti too.

They're roaches, they thrive on pretty much anything. I had some in a cup in a cupboard and forgot about them for a MONTH, I took the cup down to see what was in it, and they were all alive. After a month with no food or water.

[unkempt1]

250 adults will not eat much. Maybe a few cups? Why not skip the dog food altogether? Fruits and veggies and a little chicken every once in a while is plenty. They like leftover spaghetti too.

They're roaches, they thrive on pretty much anything. I had some in a cup in a cupboard and forgot about them for a MONTH, I took the cup down to see what was in it, and they were all alive. After a month with no food or water.

I tried the lower protein "no dog food" route and the males went gladiator on each other. At least for my colony, fruits and veggies aren't enough.

[fish4all]

The egg layer mash will be the protein source for me unless I have problems with them eating each other then I will get dog food. I think badkelpie's reference to chicken was the mash, I could be wrong though. I have found that the mash has the same levels of protein as dog food and a a lot of calcium. It may be my gut load go to with a mix of veggies and baby cereal.

Chicken Mash : 14-28% protein
Dog food: 16-34% protein
Brewers yeast: 25-44% protein
Baby cereal has 2g protein, can't find % value.

Brewers yeast is one I focused on because of adding it to fruit fly cultures for added nutrition. I figure it couldn't hurt to add small amounts to roach feed. I could be wrong and it could be a huge mistake so I will start at very small amounts.

I can not even pretend to know what the percentages mean and what it will mean different to the roaches. I know I have a quick and easy backup plan if the roaches show that they need higher levels of protein, having a dog already and her food makes a quick change easy.

The good thing is it seems that roaches are very forgiving until you can get things balanced for them. Crashing a fruit fly culture is way too easy and killing a bin of crickets without thinking I did anything wrong was a real pain.

[badkelpie]

No, chicken chicken, like real food instead of processed . I never mentioned feeding no protein, I am just talking about real sources instead of dog food.

Throw in a few chicken bones every once in a while, they eat off the meat and some of the marrow. They love it.

I don't feed only fruits and veggies. They also get leaves (maple usually) and hay (because I already have it and they like hiding in it, they always end up eating it too), and they have a chunk of drift wood, and get oatmeal and powdered milk, and bread, and rice, and leftover baby food, and whatever funky food items my friend's mom keeps sending home with him that we're afraid to eat.

My colony has been going for almost three years. They have NEVER attempted to eat each other.

They are 3 billion times more forgiving than crickets .

[demon amphibians]

I tried the lower protein "no dog food" route and the males went gladiator on each other. At least for my colony, fruits and veggies aren't enough.

Males are territorial. No matter how much protein you feed them you will always have the same result if you have to many males put together. That’s why its recommended that you keep 1 male to every 3 females the bigger the colony the smaller ratio, right now i keep about 8 females to 1 male, with excellent results. The rest of the males I feed off because they will battle it out causing a commotion which greatly disturbs the breeding process. Protein has absolutely 0 effects on a dubia roaches aggressiveness. However i have read that to little moisture will cause cannibalism but I haven't seen it.