Feeder Roaches for Sale

All of us who have reptiles, invertebrates and amphibians need to feed them some kind of insects for the most part for there continued survival. In the past crickets and mealworms have always been the going staple for our pets. Well times have changed in recent years and now there is a larger variety of feeder insects to offer our pets. Our website, Greg’s Reptiles & Inverts offers a few of these more current staples.

Although we don’t offer crickets, we have a good alternative, roaches. Roaches have become pretty popular in the past few years. You can read a short article on roaches here for using them as feeders! We currently raise and breed four (4) types of feeder roaches, and two (2) of worms.

Blaptica dubia (a.k.a. Guyana Orange Spotted Roach)
B. dubia roaches are found throughout Central and South America including French Guyana. This species of roach ranges in size from 1 1/2″-2″. B. dubia is one of the most popular feeder roachs in the U.S. and Europe…read more! Watch Video Setup! Order here!

Blatta lateralis (a.k.a. Turkistan roach)
Turkistan roaches originated in tropical areas of Asia and Africa including Egypt, Libya, Sudan, Saudi Arabia, Israel, Jordan, Iraq, Iran, Pakistan, India, Soviet Central Asia, Kashmir and Afghanistan. Blatta lateralis were…read more! Watch Video Setup! Order here!

Blaberus discoidalis (Discoids)
Blaberus discoidalis also commonly called the false death’s head cockroach. This species of roach lives in tropical South America. They can grow up to 7.6 cm (3.0 in) long and although they have wings as adults, they do not fly or climb smooth surfaces such as plastic or glass. The markings on the back of the head give rise to the name death’s head since it appears to be something like a vampire symbol to many people. Discoids are false death’s head because of their superficial resemblance to the true death’s head cockroach.

Blaptica dubia and Blaberus discoidalis are similar in many ways. One distinctive difference is both adult B. discoids have wings where only the adult male B. dubia does. All three (3) species of roach listed above are easy to maintain and care for as feeders. None of them can climb smooth surfaces. The males can flutter fly, meaning if you drop one they’ll flutter to the ground.

They will eat just about anything but should be fed a dry source of protein such as cat/dog food or our high protein roach chow. You can give the carrot and potato for moisture. We use water crystals for a source of water. They also eat and should be given a variety of fresh fruit and vegetable scraps a couple times a week and also provides moisture and keeps the humidity up.

Keep their food/water gel (water crystals absorbed) in shallow dishs, dry and wet/fresh separate. The roaches don’t need any substrate (just makes it difficult to clean) and give them egg flats set vertically to spread out on and hide. Also even though they can not climb glass they can climb silicone and will climb the corners of aquariums, so use a screen lid . The nice thing is if these get out you don’t have to worry about them infesting your house. They are tropical and will desiccate rather quickly if not given a water source.

As for worms we raise and breed mealworms and superworms. Caution should be used when feeding these worms as staples. Mealworms have more chitin and are less nutritious than superworms. They are good for treats if fed in moderation to avoid impaction problems. Mealworms are used for smaller reptiles, inverts and amphibians. Superworms are used for larger lizards such as bearded dragons above 15″, small monitors, tegus etc…

In conclusion, there are better alternatives to crickets. We use the B. dubia and B. discoidalis for feeding our bearded dragons and larger tarantulas. The Blatta lateralis roaches are used for small tarantula slings and juveniles and our scorpions. Much easier to handle then crickets. The mealworms and superworms are used as treats a few times a week.

Valid comments on/about/experience are all welcome. Spam, hate, offensive, etc… will be ignored/deleted. Thanks for reading, Greg Hagedorn.