Dubias

[demon amphibians]

[QUOTE=yoshimi;164196]I do, I do! Is it true that 1st time pregnant dubia can take 6 weeks to give birth? The 18th was 28 days after I saw the 1st ootheca and still no babies. They're noticeably fat, or at least fatter than the newly molted females. I'm so freaking impatient. Temp and humidity are fine. Any way to speed it up, or do I just have to wait another week or so? Also I'm worried my checking may be stressing them out and may be delaying it.[/QUOTE

i wanna say 4 weeks roughly from the time they mate to berth. But they wont be able to breed for another 4 weeks so each female will have an ootheca once every two months. Now they are susceptible to stress. with that said if you stress them out they will drop there ootheca before they can give berth. I am not totally sure if this happens before they mate or after. more then likely if it has been six weeks since it mated and it still hasn't given berth then i would assume the eggs were dropped due to stress. I check mine once a day and they drop the eggs often. but i have no choice because my bins don't hold moisture well with my lamps and they eat a lot and my colonies are huge. If you have less then 5000 it would be ok to check them every 3 days to once a week. the more privacy they have the better they will do.

[yoshimi]

i wanna say 4 weeks roughly from the time they mate to berth. But they wont be able to breed for another 4 weeks so each female will have an ootheca once every two months. Now they are susceptible to stress. with that said if you stress them out they will drop there ootheca before they can give berth. I am not totally sure if this happens before they mate or after. more then likely if it has been six weeks since it mated and it still hasn't given berth then i would assume the eggs were dropped due to stress. I check mine once a day and they drop the eggs often. but i have no choice because my bins don't hold moisture well with my lamps and they eat a lot and my colonies are huge. If you have less then 5000 it would be ok to check them every 3 days to once a week. the more privacy they have the better they will do.

A girl who got her starter colony the same time I did said she read it can take 2 extra weeks for 1st time mothers. But don't know where she got that info and if it applies to pregnancy or to time needed to mature after final adult molt. She doesn't have baby roaches yet either. All of mine, boys and girls, were large nymphs when I got them in late dec 2012. The 1st winged male appeared jan 6th or 7th (females matured faster, hey like with people, hah). Takes another week or 2 for them to mature enough to mate. I'm going to give it another week, because I haven't seen any abandoned oothecae or casings. It hasn't been 6 weeks yet, since I saw the 1st one, just 5. As soon as I saw her with it hanging out, I closed lid and let her be, came back and she and it were hidden again. I've seen other fat ladies with them partially out, too. I'll try to check on them less, it's just hard when I'm expecting at least a few litters any day now. but better to be patient and let them have their privacy, than to lose the babies and wait MORE time. thanks.

[demon amphibians]

A girl who got her starter colony the same time I did said she read it can take 2 extra weeks for 1st time mothers. But don't know where she got that info and if it applies to pregnancy or to time needed to mature after final adult molt. She doesn't have baby roaches yet either. All of mine, boys and girls, were large nymphs when I got them in late dec 2012. The 1st winged male appeared jan 6th or 7th (females matured faster, hey like with people, hah). Takes another week or 2 for them to mature enough to mate. I'm going to give it another week, because I haven't seen any abandoned oothecae or casings. It hasn't been 6 weeks yet, since I saw the 1st one, just 5. As soon as I saw her with it hanging out, I closed lid and let her be, came back and she and it were hidden again. I've seen other fat ladies with them partially out, too. I'll try to check on them less, it's just hard when I'm expecting at least a few litters any day now. but better to be patient and let them have their privacy, than to lose the babies and wait MORE time. thanks.

It does take the females 2-3 weeks to be able to start breeding after it has had its last molt that part you read is true but it may take longer. But from the time it takes from the time they breed till they give berth may vary as well we are just speaking of averages. my younger ones seem to hold the babies for less time then the older females but the older females will give berth to larger nymphs. The older females will give berth to nymphs almost twice as large as the new breeders but they also berth less of them. I wouldn't be surprised if you don't see any babies for another 2 weeks. Ok these roaches can be sensitive at times and some my drop there eggs and just like there molts the other roaches will eat them so you may not even know it if they had been dropped but there percent that they do drop is very low compared to what they successfully berth. Which is good. Also a stress factor which i have explained in a previous thread which can cause more stress then you checking them to much is to many males in with them. the males are very competitive and they will fight in the enclosure. I go with 5 to 1 for smaller colonies 3 to 1 is just fine. Think of it like a bunch of men in a bar beating each other up over 1 chick. If there were 3 chicks to one guy there would be nothing to fight over. he he. Also moving the nymphs in another bin will lower there stress levels too. But with a small colony the nymphs wont cause to much of a problem for you.

[yoshimi]

It does take the females 2-3 weeks to be able to start breeding after it has had its last molt that part you read is true but it may take longer. But from the time it takes from the time they breed till they give berth may vary as well we are just speaking of averages. my younger ones seem to hold the babies for less time then the older females but the older females will give berth to larger nymphs. The older females will give berth to nymphs almost twice as large as the new breeders but they also berth less of them. I wouldn't be surprised if you don't see any babies for another 2 weeks. Ok these roaches can be sensitive at times and some my drop there eggs and just like there molts the other roaches will eat them so you may not even know it if they had been dropped but there percent that they do drop is very low compared to what they successfully berth. Which is good. Also a stress factor which i have explained in a previous thread which can cause more stress then you checking them to much is to many males in with them. the males are very competitive and they will fight in the enclosure. I go with 5 to 1 for smaller colonies 3 to 1 is just fine. Think of it like a bunch of men in a bar beating each other up over 1 chick. If there were 3 chicks to one guy there would be nothing to fight over. he he. Also moving the nymphs in another bin will lower there stress levels too. But with a small colony the nymphs wont cause to much of a problem for you.

I have 24 gals and 10 boys. Should have been 25 but one lady died within the 1st week, don't know why. They've all had their final molt (or maybe there's one girl left who hasn't). I notice a big difference between the younger, newly molted ones and the older ones, in size/fatness. A few ladies are looking full to bursting. I was thinking that too, about other roaches coming along and eating the dropped egg sack. Or washing their roach hair with it like a placenta shampoo. Sure hoping for roach babies soon, and I will be moving them to another bin only because my toad eats the little ones. Not sure how long I'll go on trying to breed them. If I get 2nd toad, probably a lot longer than I originally planned. Which would mean having to hold some back, or getting some from you, eventually.