Cricket Culture

Housing:
Crickets can be kept or raised successfully in large jars, cans, aquaria or boxes 18 to 24 inches deep and as wide as possible. If a screen top is not provided, the sides of the container must be waxed in order to prevent escapes. Clean, dry sand is a good floor cover. Crickets can breed and grow rapidly at temperatures between 80 and 90 degrees F. If this temperature cannot be maintained, heat should be provided by an electric lamp suspended about 12 inches above the floor of the container.

Care:
Poultry mash or Startena, a commercially prepared food, in a shallow dish is a good food. Lettuce greens may be offered sparingly once a week. Water may be provided in inverted test tubes with cotton plugs, in a water fountain such as is used for watering chickens, or in a shallow bowl with rocks in to prevent the crickets from drowning. Crickets do best if kept clean, dry and warm. Daily attention is needed in order to insur they have clean water and food available. Dead crickets and droppings must be removed at least weekly. Crickets will not thrive or reproduce if these basic procedures are not followed.

Reproduction:
The female cricket is readily distinguished by the ovipositor, the organ with which she deposits her eggs. The ovipositor is a long, narrow tube originating from the rear of the abdomen. It is nearly as long as the body of the cricket. Twenty to thirty adults are all that are necessary to start a culture. The eggs are laid in moist sand (provide a separate container) and hatch in 8-20 days. Crickets do not breed untilthey are two to three months old. As many as 400 crickets can be raised every three months in a can 24 inches in diameter.