Sand Roaches, Isopod Updates & Discoids!

I have successfully isolated pure cultures of both species in the Arenivaga spp. "Sahuarita, AZ" stock that Kyle from Roachcrossing sent me. The smaller of the two stocks appears to be A.genitalis, whereas the larger ones I'll be talking about in this post should be A.erratica. 

These cf. erratica are quite similar to the "DOT Rest Area" erratica I have (which were also found sympatrically with a smaller Arenivaga species, namely A.apacha), though they seem to have less dark spotting on them.

Female

Male

Pair

A hardy and easy to breed species, definitely something I could recommend to a beginner for their first Arenivaga.

---

Several month back I recieved a small group of Arenivaga cf. investigata from Borrego Springs, CA. This strain looks different than the cf. investigata I already have from the Imperial Dunes, namely the nymphs are a darker color, and the pronotum markings on the adult males seems to be quite a bit darker. Females look rather similar, though a bit less rotund than the Imperial Dunes stock as well.

I have them set up in a well ventilated enclosure with an inch or so of sand substrate, topped with crushed leaf litter. I am keeping a third of the substrate moist, the rest dry, and am keeping them at around 80-85F°. I'm feeding them dog food as the staple diet.

Male

Female

Here's hoping they'll breed for me as well as the Imperial Dunes stock does! 🙏

---

My Armadillo officinalis "OG Hobby Stock" colony is doing phenomenal, and while topping their leaf litter off, I got some pictures of 'em.

This colony has been throwing out Orange individuals (you can see one in that last pic), which I have successfully isolating a true breeding colony of as well! Need to show those off at some point for sure...

---

It took them a while, but my Armadillidae sp. "Miyako, Japan" colony is finally popping off! They seem to like consistently humid conditions, and lots of leaf litter. When I kept them on a humidity gradient they barely did anything, but once I started keeping the entire enclosure humid they really started doing well.

These are also throwing out solid orange individuals, which I should probably try and isolate... yet another project for future me to work on. 😅

---

Finally, I acquired a colony last year of Blaberus discoidalis "Banana Bay, FL" from Brandon Maines. This stock was collected by Brandon himself back in 2018, and thus technically probably has different genetics than Roachcrossing's "Banana Bay" stock (which was collected circa 2015).

So for all those nuts out there who insist on adding "new blood" to their colonies (an entirely unnecessary and potentially harmful endeavor that can lead to accidental hybridization), this specific stock has value as a pure line you can outcross your Roachcrossing "Banana Bay" stock to without compromising your colony purity. And you can actually potentially increase genetic diversity in your colony in doing so (which isn't possible for most hobby roach lines that came from a single import, and are thus all very related anyways).

Anyways I have my colony in a well ventilated enclosure with a couple inches of a coco fiber and coco coir chunk substrate mix, topped with eggcrates. I'm keeping a quarter of the substrate moist, the rest dry, and am keeping them at around 80-85F° (previously I had them closer to room temps, and they were hardly breeding at all, bumping the temps up REALLY helped with productivity). I'm feeding them dog food and fruits as the staple diet.

It took them a while but they are finally starting to pop off for me, they seem to like drier and warmer conditions than I'd initially thought.

Anyways, that does it for this post, thanks for reading, hope everyone enjoyed, and I'll see you all next time! 😉 

Isopod Swap with Anthony!

Did a trade with Anthony Green recently, and got a couple neat isopod species off of him. :) 

First off, I got a group of 9 Trogodillo sp. "Green Spot". This is a beautiful species with very broad and flat morphology, and used to be labeled as a Cubaris species, though thankfully we have a better genus ID now (the species name is still under some debate, some keepers think they are T.rotundatus, but the general consensus among isopod experts is that they don't match the description of that species).

These have proven difficult for some people to breed consistently, while others have absolutely no issues with them. I unfortunately fell into the former category, I started with 9 and am down to only three of those starting individuals, all of which are females. Thankfully they're mated females though, and a couple small litters of mancae have been born, so I'm pretty sure the colony is at a net positive from when it started.

The main issue I had when starting them out was likely either lack of adequate ventilation, or too small of an enclosure for an adequate humidity gradient (or both). I started them out in a smaller container, but after the multiple deaths I moved them to a proper gallon container with lots of ventilation, and a proper 50/50 humidity gradient. This seems to have fixed things, as there haven't been more deaths since then and I'm pretty sure a new litter was just born in the new setup. So I guess so far, so good, and the colony is slowly growing.

BTW the substrate is an inch or so of coco fiber topped with bark slabs, smaller bark and wood chips/chunks, sphagnum moss and leaf litter. Keeping them at 75-80F°, and feeding them dog food in addition to the leaf litter.

Here are some pictures of the beauties:

Unfortunate that I had such heavy losses to start with, however the colony seems to be stabilized now, and the mancae are growing slowly but surely. So hopefully I'll be able to establish a healthy colony of this beautiful species.

---

He also sent me a group of Cubaris sp. "Miyako, Japan", often traded under the common name of "Japanese Red Edge". These little cuties have often been labeled as "Cubaris iriomotensis" by many vendors, however that is an invalid name, a synonym of C.murina actually (which these are definitely not), so I will not be using that name, Cubaris sp. "Miyako" is the best labeling for these ATM, however they probably aren't even true Cubaris and may actually represent an undescribed genus.

These are a hardy and easy species to keep and breed, I have mine in a well ventilated container with an inch of coconut fiber as the substrate, topped with sphagnum moss, bark hides and leaf litter. I'm keeping the entire enclosure pretty humid, (though based on their slow breeding rates ATM I'm gonna try a half and half gradient soon and see if that works better), and have them at around 75-80F° right now. I'm feeding them dog food in addition to the leaf litter.

Here are some pictures of them, this species is pretty variable in coloration and varies from mostly grey, grey with red edges, and some are just completely red/orange:

A cute little species, which has already bred for me, hopefully I'll get a big culture going in no time!

Lastly he did send me a small group of Blaberus nymphs he wants me to identify. My suspicion is that they're a craniifer x "fusca" cross, though they could just be pure "fusca", we'll see when they mature I guess.

Well, that does it for this post, big thanks to Anthony for sending me these isopods! Hope everyone enjoyed, thanks for reading, and I'll see you all next time! 😉