# Breeding Turkistan Roaches (Blatta lateralis) - A guide by Ben.M



## Guest (Oct 9, 2011)

Been a busy little beaver today organizing user submitted content for the website today (had some rather bad news so been keeping myself busy for the day!), anyway, heres another user submitted article, this time by Ben.M from RFuk. Let me know what you think guys 

Breeding the Turkistan Roach (Blatta lateralis) for Live Food


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## PeterUK (Jun 21, 2008)

Moonleh said:


> . Let me know what you think guys


Not bad but I fail to see why they are being fed powdered calcium. Inverts do NOT need calcium in their diet. 

In my experience a thermostat is not needed with a heat mat as they like the temps HOT and is an unnecessary expense.

Turkistan roaches AKA Red Runners are not livebears like dubia and just drop their egg cases (ootheca) in a place that the female deems suitable according to the temps in the container. 
Do not throw the egg cases away prematurely as you will not have any juveniles to grow up as feeders :whistling2:

TIP . . . Do not EVER use adult females as feeders, feed the males off first as you only need one male per few dozen of females.

Here is a thread i recently made on the spider and invert section.



PeterUK said:


> My red runners have got slightly out of control recently, they just seem to breed and breed and breed and breed and no matter how many i use the population is still rising.
> 
> I fed my spiders today and counted how many i used . . . . 791 :gasp: and the amount that I used didnt even dent the numbers.
> 
> ...


Click the picture for video


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## Ben.M (Mar 2, 2008)

PeterUK said:


> Not bad but I fail to see why they are being fed powdered calcium. Inverts do NOT need calcium in their diet.
> 
> *I know they dont but many reptile keepers like to dust the livefood before it is fed, much easier just to include calcium in the enclosure and use them staright away when needed*
> 
> ...


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