Some Returning Roaches from Brandon!!!

Magnificent Beasts 2022 Package Series Pt. 1/3

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Got an amazing package from my buddy Brandon Maines of Magnificent Beasts. 😁 He's preparing to get back into the game and start selling inverts again, so hopefully he'll start taking orders again within a month or so. 🤞😄

In this post I'll be discussing species of roaches I just got from him that I used to keep before (and one I was already culturing currently).

Let's start off with an old favorite, my old strain of Arenivaga bolliana from "San Antonio, TX", collected for me by an old friend circa 2016. When I left the hobby in 2018, I sent my fairly large colony to Brandon, who bred them quite successfully for another couple years after that. However the culture has been slowly fizzling out on him for some odd reason, but luckily I asked for them in the nick of time, and he's sent me most of the colony to try and restart them. 

I've got my two adult females, ~8 small nymphs and two viable ooths in a very well ventilated container with a few inches of coco fiber as the substrate, with leaf litter on top. I'm keeping half the enclosure humid, half dry, and keeping them fairly warm (75F°). I'll be offering dog food as the staple diet, in addition to the leaf litter. Hopefully these will pull through and breed just fine for me, though I may have to sex the nymphs from a fairly young age and cool the males to sync them up with the females. 😅

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He also sent a couple adult females of another Arenivaga species, though one I already own, Arenivaga sp. "Mt Ord". Reason being, despite the fact he's 95% sure these females were in the presence of several adult males, and look quite plump and gravid, they just will NOT lay oothecae for him. I know the feeling, as I've long had the same issue repeatedly with A.tonkawa (a curse I have recently lifted though! 😁), hopefully I can get these females to breed for me. 

I've dumped the females in with my other nymphs, specifically the container I have my female nymphs and one subadult male nymph in (the rest of my male nymphs I have in a different container, they're being kept cooler than the main culture since the males of this species seem to grow quite a bit faster than the females). So worst case scenario, within a month that one subadult male will probably be mature, and can mate with these adult females if by some small chance they're not currently fertilized.

Here are some pics of the females:

Such a pretty species, fingers crossed these females pop some ooths out for me soon! 🤞 😅

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Next, I got a starter colony of Plectoptera poeyi "Big Pine Key, FL", the Florida Beetle Mimic roaches! 😁 The ones I sent Brandon last year have bred quite well for him thankfully, he's the only person I sent them to who had success with them. 

Evidently the key to his success is just not having a million springtails get into their 32 oz deli cup, which has a cloth mesh lid. Thankfully he had some of those delis to spare, so I asked him for one along with the starter colony, so I can set them up identically to his. 😅 Hopefully round #2 goes better for me with this species, and I can get them past a couple generations in my care!

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I also got a starter colony of the beautiful Panchlora sp. "Costa Rica - Yellow". Just because they were my second favorite Panchlora species to keep (the first being sp. "White"), and they do well for me. Not a ton of people have them ATM so figure it can't hurt to have another colony out there. 😄

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I also asked for a couple Deropeltis sp. "Masai Mara" ooths, a species that has done very well for Brandon but I can't hatch for the life of me... Brandon's been keeping his quite humid, and thinks my failure with hatching their ooths in the past has been due to me keeping them too dry. So this time I'm keeping these ooths super humid, but warm and well ventilated too. We'll see if I have any luck this time, if keeping the ooths too dry was my only mistake with this genus, that's gonna be funny and slightly depressing... 🙃😂

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Lastly, but perhaps most excitingly, Brandon sent me a new morph project to try and isolate fully: Neostylopyga propinqua (African Bullet roach) "Bloody Bullet".

Brandon's African Bullet roach colony has been throwing out a lot of high red individuals lately, and so he picked out the reddest ones he could find and sent them to me, to try and isolate and further refine the high red coloration on them. The morph name "Bloody Bullet" is super cool IMO, and I hope to do that name justice by isolating out a very red line of this species! 😁

I've got them set up in a moderately ventilated container with a thin layer of coco fiber as the substrate. They've got bark hides, and I'm keeping them fairly humid, at around 75-80F°. I'm offering dog food and fruits as the main diet.

Here are some pictures of a couple nymphs, and a couple adults:

Nymphs

Adults

The nymphs are VERY high red, like, they have much more red coloration than I've ever seen in my old normal colony of this species. And while I used to have a few reddish adults pop up in my normal colony from time to time, these adults of Brandon's have a much redder base coloration, especially on the abdomen, with lighter red blushing extending from the thorax well into the abdomens as well. 

Hopefully I'll be able to get a colony breeding true for this coloration, and perhaps intensify the red coloration on the adults in particular with selective breeding. 😁

Well, that's it for this post, thanks for reading, hope everyone enjoyed, stay safe, stay buggy, and I'll see you all next time! 😉 

Return of Drymaplaneta & Deropeltis!

Nennips-Nebahcs Shipment Pt 2/5

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I'm so happy to announce that in this shipment, I got a group of Drymaplaneta semivittata, AKA the "Gisborne Cockroach"! 😁 ironic considering they aren't even native to New Zealand, but rather Australia... Similar to the "American Cockroach", Periplaneta americana being native to Africa. However, all captive cultures of D.semivittata come from invasive NZ populations, so it's not the worst common name. 🤷

Anyways, I'm glad to have this species again, I got rid of my healthy culture back in 2018 when I left the hobby, and while they persisted for about a year afterwards, they did eventually die out in US culture... Hopefully I'll be able to reestablish them easily enough, especially since I've got a good handle on their preferred conditions. 😅

I've got my ten or so individuals housed in a well ventilated gallon container with a thin layer of coconut fiber as the substrate. I'm keeping them bone dry, with a moist corner, and warm (75-85F°). I'm offering eggcrates, leaf litter and paper towel rolls for hides. I'm feeding them dog food and fruits. My group is mostly adults, and I've already got several oothecae from them! 😁

Here are some pics of these pretty, underrated beauties:

Hopefully I'll have babies hatching out soon, this species can be rather prolific, so I'm sure I'll be offering babies back on the market in a few months. 😄

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I also received a small group of Deropeltis sp. "Masai Mara" that my friend Brandon bought, I decided not to buy any myself since I suck at breeding Deropeltis spp.... However, most of them were mated, adult females, and there were oothecae in their shipping container, plus they laid a couple in my temporary care before I sent them to Brandon. He actually let me keep a few of these ooths to try and hatch myself, so guess I'll be trying one more time with this species... 😅

I've put them in my Gyna bisannulata enclosure, on the substrate in between the dry side and moist side of their enclosure. It's warm in there, at least 75-80F°, and we'll ventilated too. So with any luck, I'll get some of them to hatch out, fingers crossed! 🤞 If not, I give up completely with Deropeltis. 😂

Anyways, that's gonna do it for this post, thanks for reading, hope you all enjoyed, stay safe, and I'll see everyone next time! 😉

Less Than Happy Updates...

It's about that time again, time to tally up the losses in the collection over the last month or so. 😔

First off, my Myrmecoblatta wheeleri female finally kicked the bucket, I think... Noticed she was absent from the Macropanesthia enclosure on 6/17, so all in all she lived almost 8 months as an adult, impressive for such a small roach species, especially that I wasn't keeping optimally... Hope to try again with that species one day, but for now it's clear my attempt to breed Myrmecoblatta wheeleri has been a complete disaster.

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Secondly, I unfortunately am down to a single female Ceronopus concolor, and a single, probably male Trogloderus sp.... 

The C.concolor just kept dying over the winter, I don't think they are particularly long lived, either that or I just kept them horribly, though I don't know what I did wrong if so. 

Whereas for the Trogloderus, I'm pretty sure I accidentally murdered them... We had a bit of a heat wave recently, and I didn't expect my dryer enclosures to dry out completely as fast as they did during said heat wave, the lack of moisture and high heat seemed to kill 3 of my 4 Trogloderus, and one of my CB Cryptoglossa muricata adults too... Sad about the latter, but the biggest hit for me was the Trogloderus, as even though I had not been successful in getting any offspring from them thus far, my hopes of breeding them were completely dashed with that blunder of mine. 

Pretty bummed that I made such a bad error, but stuff like this happens sometimes I guess, I'm certainly being more careful not to let any of my other enclosures completely dry out like that again.

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My Hyporhicnoda sp. "reflexa" females have all passed away, sadly no offspring from any of them. In fact, absolutely none of them had ooths in them upon dying, and I never saw them abort ooths either, so I half wonder if they are semelparous and only produce one internal ootheca before dying. If so, they might have aborted their ooths long before I got them, and so I never had a chance at breeding them... It's the best theory I can come up with ATM, definitely a bummer for sure though.

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My last Hemithyrsocera vittata nymph matured a month or so ago, and it was a male... So I decided to try and put him to use, and put a subadult female H.palliata in with him, to see if these two species can hybridize, and what the babies would look like if so. I personally really doubt they can hybridize on account of how different the hatchlings (and even larger nymphs) of the two species are in terms of morphology, but why not put it to the test? 🙃

Well, a few days ago I found the male dead, partially eaten, and the H.palliata female was now mature. I'm hoping the male lasted long enough to at least possibly mate with the female, maybe he tried and afterwards kicked the bucket after using up that energy? Or perhaps the adults of these two species don't get along and will kill each other if housed together, (which might make sense considering their overlapping natural ranges, which is yet another reason I doubt they can actually hybridize). Basically, due to my uncertainty here, I won't be able to disprove that the two can hybridize, but I may be able to prove they can, if I find babies in the enclosure after a month or so... 

I'll keep you all updated on the little project, but I highly suspect the female will pass away and no babies will ever be created. If I DO get hybrid babies though, rest assured I won't be selling them and will use this info to prevent such hybrids being created by other people who just want to house these two species together for fun.

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Lastly, I have failed yet again at breeding Deropeltis... my sp. "Masai Mara" ooths all ended up being rotted inside, and I really don't know why. 😭 I kept them warm, kept them semi-humid (gave the adults a moisture gradient), and well ventilated, still I failed. Don't think these are getting established in the US, not from this batch at least, which really sucks. I pretty much give up on this genus, I evidently can't breed Deropeltis to save my life, which is a shame considering they are some of my all time favorite Blattids. 😔

Anyways, that's gonna do it for this bummer post, hope you found it informative at least, thanks for reading, stay safe, and I'll see you all next time.

The Last Month's Losses...

Well, it's that time again unfortunately, gotta post about the losses in my collection and some misc sad updates as well. 😟 But you know I gotta do it, so let's dive right in...

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Let's start off with one of the two roach species I re-entered the hobby with, Gyna capucina. My colony has unfortunately basically been in a long, downward spiral since I got them, due to a series of unfortunate mistakes on my part... First I let their Oribatid mite population get out of hand, then I accidentally starved them, and on top of it all, it appears I never really kept them warm enough for adequate reproduction. Despite my best efforts, with my current heating situation (a single heat cable) I could only heat them to 78F°, maybe 80F°, but it seems like they require temperatures closer to 88F° or higher for consistent reproduction.

So, I sent my remaining 3-4 adult females (only one of which probably still has an ootheca left in her), plus the 4-5 mixed nymphs I had left in my possession to Kyle Kandillian, who has a small starter colony ATM that he got from Ty Randall. They wouldn't have been of any use to anyone who didn't already have a culture of that species, so hopefully they help boost Kyle's small colony, and he can get his G.capucina thriving for him. Figured it was better than letting them die out on me, at least the remaining individuals of my broken colony can possibly help further the spread of this species the US hobby. Once I can get a heat lamp or space heater or something that would let me better heat an enclosure to 88-90F° or higher, I will get another colony of this species and hopefully do a lot better with them. 😅 But yeah, I no longer have pink roaches, so that's a bummer.

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Unfortunately, all four of the Hemithyrsocera vittata ooths my females produced before dying prematurely were duds... 😭 So that species is functionally extinct from US culture, AGAIN. It's so frustrating and frankly embarrassing that I lost my females to what was probably a simple ventilation issue, my two males and the stunted nymph are still doing perfectly well in their better ventilated deli cup. I really hope I can get this species again and actually help establish them in the US hobby, but it looks like for now, this species is not getting established here.

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Now, this isn't exactly an unexpected update IMO, but still disappointing nonetheless, my last Myrmecoblatta wheeleri female has finally died, seemingly of old age... and I didn't get a SINGLE. DANG. OOTHECA. Brandon and Alan have both told me their ooths are pretty similar to those of Compsodes, and they they just affix them to objects much like Compsodes. After scouring the various enclosures I housed my Myrmecoblatta in, I can definitely confirm that, for whatever reason, they NEVER produced so much as one ootheca, and honestly I don't know why not. For the first couple months I had them (before microfauna found their way into their enclosure), they were doing great and should have laid at least a few oothecae, but I suspect they needed higher heat and ventilation levels...

This species is probably possible to breed in captivity repeatably, but they're super, super finicky, perhaps the most difficult US native to ever enter culture. Here are my notes on their husbandry:

•1 They definitely seem to be mold feeders based on my personal observations, as my adults always lost a lot of weight when no mold was available. They'll nibble on other foods but can't survive solely on them, or at least probably won't breed without fungi to feed on. Food molds like the stringy white molds and Trichoderma spp. seem to sustain them pretty well. Still, this is more difficult a food source to provide than a lot of people would think.

•2 They can't handle ANY, I repeat, ANY springtails or mites in their enclosures, springtails both stress them out with constant tactile contact, and most importantly, absolutely wipe out their main food source, molds. Mites bother them with tactile contact and probably food competition as well, but honestly, besides mites that have hyposus stages (which can be fatal to Myrmecoblatta), springtails are more troublesome because they prevent mold growth, which Myrmecoblatta need to feed. Fungus gnats are also intolerable.

•3 They didn't seem to like cardboard or even smooth bark for hides, only rotten wood and hides made of cork board were readily accepted. 

•4 Temps 75F° or above and/or lots of airflow are probably needed for oothecae production. 

Overall, they're really a lot of dang work for a pretty low payoff, they are TINY, don't seem to be a prolific species so can't be used as feeders, and they certainly can't be used as cleaner crews given how finicky they are. The only purpose M.wheeleri serve in culture is as a challenge for true Blatticulture enthusiasts... 😅 I hope to try them again one day, but I need to wait until I can heat a whole room for my bugs, so I can keep mine in a corner far, far away from the rest of my collection so as to prevent mites or springtails being introduced to their enclosure, but still keep them warm enough to breed.

Sorry I let you down Alan, guess I owe you my kidneys, PM me to let me know how to go about doing that...

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I was completely unable to get a SINGLE one of my Eleodes obscura sulcipennis larvae to mature successfully, a large portion of larvae died off in their later instars in the communal setups, and all survivors (including those reared individually in their own deli cups) died in the pupal or pre-pupal stages... In retrospect, I HIGHLY suspect a diapause was needed for the larvae, it would explain all the deaths, and it makes sense considering I never really see adult obscura emerging in any numbers until late Spring, so it seems likely that larvae overwinter, pupate in early Spring, and emerge as adults in late Spring or Summer.

So, that project was a complete and utter bust, but hey, at least I think I know what went wrong, and it's a pretty simple fix TBH, so I can try again one day, or just get a southern strain that doesn't require a diapause.

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Lastly, one of the earlier ooths my Deropeltis sp. "Masai Mara" female laid split open a little at the seam and was all rotten inside... I'm very very worried all my ooths might be duds or just died for some reason, I've moved them straight into my Bantua enclosure to give them some more heat, better airflow, while still keeping them a bit humid and misting them often. Apparently female Deropeltis spp. sometimes just lay dud ooths, and the majority of mine still look healthy, but then again Deropeltis seem to hate me, and I wouldn't be surprised if I failed breeding them yet again at this point, (though I sincerely don't know why these ones would have failed to hatch). So yeah, don't know if this is a total loss yet, but it's been over four months since the first ooths were laid, and I'm growing more and more concerned about the lack of hatchings...

Well, that's it for today's bummer post, y'all know I hate doing these, but I gotta, since failures can be just as informative as successes. I hope some of you found this post helpful, thanks for reading, stay safe, and I'll see everyone next time! 😉

Deropeltis Ooths!!!

My female Deropeltis sp. "Masai Mara" has been quite busy, having laid four nice sized oothecae so far, and I just found her carrying her fifth! 😁 She's affixed them all to bark, and covered most of them up in substrate. However, I think I spooked her while she was still covering one of them, and she never went back to finish the job, so it's still exposed quite a bit. Good for pics though I guess, so here are some pictures of that bare ooth, plus her producing her fifth one:

Fingers crossed they all hatch for me and I end up with lots of velvety little babies, I'll be keeping my fingers crossed! 🤞😅

Well, that's gonna do it for this short update, I hope you all enjoyed, thanks for reading, stay safe, and I'll see you all in the next post! 😉

My Deropeltis Matured!!!

My Deropeltis sp. "Masai Mara" pair have matured! 😁 They're a little on the small side for this species, probably a result of crowding in their old colony, but gorgeous nonetheless! Looks just like Deropeltis sp. "Jinka" to me, when mature at least. The female was super inquisitive during handling and tried nibbling on me a few times, really love these black velvet roaches! ☺

Here are some pictures of the pair in their new skins:

Adult female

Adult male

Adult pair

Such a neat species, now here comes the difficult part, I gotta breed the suckers now... Getting a bit of PTSD from failing with my sp. "Jinka" a few years back... 😂 Hopefully with a horizontal humidity gradient, and steady heat, I'll have success this time in hatching their oothecae! 🤞 Keeping my fingers heavily crossed! 

Anyways, that's gonna do it for this post, thanks for reading, hope you enjoyed, stay safe, and I'll see you all next time! (so, tomorrow... 😜)