# Breeding Locusts revisited 2015



## semmyroundel (Oct 24, 2015)

Hi all, I've read with interest the previous forum posts regarding breeding locusts and wanted to share with you all my findings.
To start with, I should say thanks for all those who posted before regarding this topic as it set me on the right path to breed them.
My son is in University studying Biology, he wants to study Entomology to Masters level, and for his dissertation for his (now) third year, he wanted to study the effects of heat and moisture on breeding pairs of locusts.
So after gathering all the info I could find here, and elsewhere, I came up with a plan to build a vivarium to specifically to do this (he was busy with exams so it fell to me to build it).
First off, I'll debunk some myths, sort of.
Play sand is fine, it may be bettered by other substrates, but we've successfully bred thousands of nymphs in it (mixing a bit of soil in it or vermiculite may make it a bit lighter and better for the locusts some say).
You don't have to bake it for two hours as we initially did, but of course it may help, I currently am looking at holes that have appeared in two tubs of unbaked and even UNWASHED sand!
It's not difficult to do, and not necessarily expensive, as I eventually had to build five vivariums to breed the quantity he needed for his dissertation.
you just need a well ventilated cabinet with a decent amount of room in it and the sand in tubs for them to breed in.
In my next post I will add some photos and explain how I did it, and crucially what our findings were in order to achieve success.


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## semmyroundel (Oct 24, 2015)

Temperature and humidity.
The first part of his practical involved him measuring the humidity that the locust liked to lay their eggs in.
What he did was, get a humidity meter(they only go up to 50% scale) so to get a 0-100% reading he wired in in series a variable resistor so that when the prongs were immersed in a glass of water, the meter went to 49.99% (50% near enough) he then checked that upon removing the meter from the glass of water the reading went to 0%, so he knew that the readings could be doubled to give a true percentage humidity.
Cut a long story short, after numerous tests, it would appear that they liked a humidity of around 65% to 70%, pretty moist for desert locusts.
The humidity in the pots was checked daily with the meter which had the two prongs extended about 6" so that a reading could be taken way down in the pots where the eggs would be laid.
The next part of the practical element of the dissertation consists of varying the temperatures of the cabinets the nymphs are in to check the ideal temperature that they thrive in.
I'm about to load up pics from the camera to show how he designed the vivariums to handle mass breeding programmes (quite successfully I might add).
I'll probably do that tomorrow, so watch this space, any questions please ask.


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## semmyroundel (Oct 24, 2015)

Ok back again, another "myth" to debunk, that the locusts only breed once, or twice.
Those reading this that have bred them will know the truth. In the pics I'm about to post you'll see out of 11 locusts in the viv, at least 3 pairs are mating couples, and currently I have four mating couples, leaving 3 insects on their lonesome.
They've all been in the viv for over three weeks, and have mated several times.
By the way, these are bought from Pets at home, they get deliveries Tuesdays and Thursdays, and so we've been going on these days to buy adults that have a good range of males and females (the males are slightly more yellow, but the real sexing is done by a slightly different rear end), I'll see if I can get an image from the net for this, but to be honest, the colour difference has been enough for us to sex them.
I've just tried to add pics but can't seem to find a method, just a URL.
Is this the only way to post a pic on this forum?
Anyone help, I'd appreciate it.
Thanks.


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## semmyroundel (Oct 24, 2015)

Hi all, I don't know what happened, but I posted another bit but it hasn't appeared, also started an album of pics, that too hasn't appeared, I don't know if moderators are away or something, but I'll check back tomorrow.


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## semmyroundel (Oct 24, 2015)

Ok, I've found the first three pics I posted, more will follow.
I'm a bit of a newbie to forum etiquette so didn't quite know how this worked, text will follow tomorrow.
http://www.reptileforums.co.uk/foru...-locusts-equipment-picture221260-dscf1771.jpg


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## semmyroundel (Oct 24, 2015)

http://www.reptileforums.co.uk/foru...-locusts-equipment-picture221259-dscf1789.jpg


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## semmyroundel (Oct 24, 2015)

http://www.reptileforums.co.uk/foru...-locusts-equipment-picture221258-dscf1782.jpg


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## semmyroundel (Oct 24, 2015)

Ok, another myth to debunk, we were told that the adult males would only mate once, but after having these in the vivariums over three weeks, and still mad at it, I think we can safely put that myth to bed.
Furthermore, it's not just one pair or two, we have 11 or 12 locusts in there and at least 4 pairs are mating, the proof of which is two new holes in the sand.
Here's a couple of pics to show a female laying her eggs, and a hole with the foam at the top
Reptile Forums - semmyroundel's Album: Breeding locusts equipment - Picture
Reptile Forums - semmyroundel's Album: Breeding locusts equipment - Picture


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## semmyroundel (Oct 24, 2015)

Another thing we learnt, you'll find that most of the egg pods will be near the side of the jars, so it pays to have wide jars like we had. This is because locusts in the wild lay their eggs close to plant roots where the humidity tends to be stable.
That's partly the reason there's sticks in the pots, to imitate plant roots going down, to make the locusts feel like they're putting the egg pods near roots, partly to help them get in and out.


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## semmyroundel (Oct 24, 2015)

Sorry, I didn't know you couldn't edit posts, so here's two other pics of the eggs that didn't make it before we knew how humid the sand needed to be, you'll see the yellow eggs that were dumped by the female as she felt conditions weren't right to lay them.
Since then, we found the ideal conditions and the ladies stopped dumping them and laid them in sand instead.
Reptile Forums - semmyroundel's Album: Breeding locusts equipment - Picture
Reptile Forums - semmyroundel's Album: Breeding locusts equipment - Picture


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## fazzer (Jul 19, 2009)

*Locust breeding*

Did you know that if you have an excess of eggs , you can store these in a fridge and bring out at a later date to incubate . I used to do this a lot many years ago .I bought a locust breeding chamber from a guy on this forum a while back , if your old like me 45 you may remember them from school science classes . I'm just starting again with them . Interesting thread . Cheers Chris


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## semmyroundel (Oct 24, 2015)

Thanks Fazzer (chris) I didn't know that, you learn a new fact each day!
In fact we didn't have the need to do that, we needed nymphs to just appear, then they were taken to the urban farm to give to the spiders for food, and the adults reptiles etc.
In fact, our experiment is drawing to a close because the practical element is nearly finished, so I'll have a load of eggs and adults to give away to anyone who fancies them.
By the way, We're not old, I would love to be 45 again-52 now!


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## semmyroundel (Oct 24, 2015)

Here's a couple more pics, one of the eggs in the pod (close up) and the other, taken today so you can see the 4 mating couples, proof they're still at it after 3 1/2 weeks in the vivarium.
Reptile Forums - semmyroundel's Album: Breeding locusts equipment - Picture
Reptile Forums - semmyroundel's Album: Breeding locusts equipment - Picture


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## semmyroundel (Oct 24, 2015)

Sorry people that second pic was one that I'd shown before.
Here's the pic of the 4 mating couples, taken this morning.
http://www.reptileforums.co.uk/foru...-equipment-picture221282-4-mating-couples.jpg


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## semmyroundel (Oct 24, 2015)

EQUIPMENT
I should talk about the hardware really.
This vivarium that you see in these pics is the mark 2 version, tomorrow I'll put up pics of the first one that was way too small, and the problems we had being so small.
The cabinets are made out of spruce 18mm ply with 2mm acrylic sheets on the front and top.
There are three holes in the floor pan as you see, accommodating the three pots of sand, when one pot has a few egg pod holes in it, it can be removed for incubating or left there with the red lids on (they have holes in the top to allow air movement).
If a pot is removed, and another pot is not put in its place, then the cutout that came from the hole which now has a piece of wood across it serves as the blanking off plug for that hole so the locusts cannot drop into the area underneath the floor area.
Again, tomorrow I'll post pics of the vivarium with a blanking plug in so it will become clear.
To continue breeding, just put another fresh pot of sand in the hole that a pot with eggs in it has just vacated, or if you feel a pot has enough pods in it, just pop the lid on it and the locusts will just lay their eggs in another.
Tomorrow along with the pics that I just mentioned, I'll talk about heating and lighting.


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## semmyroundel (Oct 24, 2015)

Hi guys, sorry for delay, I've been busy lately.
To finish off this hardware section, I'll upload pics of the first effort, then pics of the details for operation.
Currently unable to load pics because of some problem with the forum, but check back later, pics of babies too!


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## semmyroundel (Oct 24, 2015)

Here's some pics of mark 1 vivarium.
http://www.reptileforums.co.uk/foru...t-picture221380-mark-1-viv-light-outside.html
http://www.reptileforums.co.uk/foru...custs-equipment-picture221379-mark-1-viv.html
http://www.reptileforums.co.uk/foru...ipment-picture221378-mark-1-viv-close-up.html


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## semmyroundel (Oct 24, 2015)

In these pics you can see as mentioned before, the vivarium mark 2 with the pots moved out from the base, with the wooden blanks in place (when you suspect that there are enough egg pods in a pot, then you simply remove the pot, and insert a blank, or another pot)
Reptile Forums - semmyroundel's Album: Breeding locusts equipment - Picture
http://www.reptileforums.co.uk/foru...e221375-top-view-showing-removable-light.html


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## semmyroundel (Oct 24, 2015)

EQUIPMENT:
Hopefully, you can see in the pics the basic sizing of the mark 2 vivarium.
The heating is via two sources:
1. A heat mat 40 to 60 watts (not critical which) goes in the bottom section behind the pots so that the pots don't actually sit straight on the mats in case of overheating, these are wired to a digital central heating thermostat that we set to 24 degrees celsius. (this was the minimum that the viv got to at night).
Others leave the vivariums to drop to 15 degrees at night but then the lamp takes longer to heat up the viv during the day.
2. The lamp is on a batten holder (60watt reflector type).
If the environment is a bit cold then a 100watt lamp is required.
We had this viv that you see up against a radiator and this with a 60watt lamp got the day temperature up to 32-33 degrees, with a 100 watt lamp it would've been too hot with the radiator running.

So, in the morning we turn on the lamp (wired into a simple inline switch), the temp would've been maintained by the heat mats to 24 degrees at night once we turn off the light, which we did about 10pm, and during the day, the lamp tops up the temperature to normal working temp of 28 to 32 degrees.


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## semmyroundel (Oct 24, 2015)

Finally, the panel at the bottom, you'll see in some pics that it is unscrewed, that allowed us to look at the pots (and spin them round) to see if eggs had been laid)
And, the result.... the babies.
Reptile Forums - semmyroundel's Album: Breeding locusts equipment - Picture
Reptile Forums - semmyroundel's Album: Breeding locusts equipment - Picture
These nymphs and the adults have now been given to the local reptile house for feeding to their spiders and bearded dragons etc. as the practical element of the dissertation has now drawn to a close. The second part involved testing how warm the nymphs needed to be for a rapid succession to full adulthood, needless to say very warm (35 degrees celsius seemed to work best, but the others at cooler temps just developed more slowly)
So I guess it just remains to say, if you have any questions, please ask.
These vivariums, I suppose I'll have to put up for sale as we won't need them any more, so head over to the appropriate section (I'm only going to ask for material costs, and can disassemble them, and split up the hardware if required)

Thanks for looking, hope it helps someone!


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