One of my biggest fears growing up was Crickets, to his day crickets give me the hee bee gee bees. Of course when you have some types of herps, you have to have crickets. Ok I can deal with them being in the house in their container, she chirp doesn’t bother me, it having them on me. Of course the crickets came today and Sean wasn’t here to deal with them. After psyching myself up I was able to dump them into their container. After letting them gut load for a few hours I knew I needed to feed. This came the difficult part, getting them into a container to transfer them to the critters. Does anyone have an easy solution on how to do this without have to any get on you? As I’m typing this, my skin is crawling… Help! Snakes really seem to be a great herp right now.

I keep mine in a 20 gallon tank with a screen top. I have a few layers of egg carton for them to crawl in. At feeding time I take a large freezer bag (ziplock), add a little vitamin dust, place that bag open in the tank, and shake a piece of egg carton into it. The crix fall into the bag. It might take a few different pieces to shake enough in. Then I zip the bag up,,,shake it to coat the crix, then pour into the feeder tank for whichever lizard.

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Ken
" The United States Marine Corps......sure we are a department of the Navy,,,,,,we're the MENS department "

If you take a cardboard tube from the inside of a roll of paper towels and stick one end down into the container with the crix in it, you may be able to get them to crawl up inside. Then I shake them into a zipper baggie with a little calcium/vitamins in it, shake 'em (but don't bake 'em), then hold the bag over the herp container and gently encourage the crickets out of the bag (I never have to touch them except through the plastic -- and if you use only a teeny bit of calcium/vits, you can just dump the crix in by shaking the bag out into the herp tank).

Another option -- you could wear plastic/rubber gloves to help you feel some distance from the crix. Those thicker, long rubber dish gloves might be good -- close-fitting so you can use your fingers, but good coverage.

Failing all that, you could wear a bee-keeper's suit.

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Amy

I'm not scared of crickets, but I hate getting bitten(yes they do bite) Since I have to dust them anyways I get my tweezers and one by one put them into my joes crabshack margarita cup turned jury rigged duster, then I dust them and they get thrown into withe tank im feeding. If your not dusting its as easy as throwing them one by one into the tank with tweezers

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ginko tutors in basic math just ask paris hilton

obsoleta lindheimeri(texas ratsnake)
varanus nilocticus(nile monitor)
Sternotherus odoratus(musk turtle)
pagona minor(2)(bearded dragons breeding pair)

There's critter keepers for crickets with tubes in them...wouldn't that work? It's kind of hard opening a lid without some jumping out but if u had them in that keeper you could just open the hole and put it in the tank till some hop out

my problem with the cricket keepers is price, noone should have to pay that for two cardboard tubes and a plastic container also the tubes aren't as effective in keeping the crickets alive as they should be, even when your feeding the crickets orange cubes. Also it isn't all that easy to get the crickets out. thats why I like my tweezer method and I just keep my crickets in a regular cheap critter keeper with some egg carton stuff.

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ginko tutors in basic math just ask paris hilton

obsoleta lindheimeri(texas ratsnake)
varanus nilocticus(nile monitor)
Sternotherus odoratus(musk turtle)
pagona minor(2)(bearded dragons breeding pair)

yeah I have to agree with the expense thing but if you don't want to touch them at all I don't think I'd be able to shake them...but I think crickets are cool so it wouldn't bother me...flies bother me...crickets not so much...

roaches....ahh

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Don't be jealous the voices only speak to me...

www.herprecon.org

I have a cricket keeper and love it, personally (but agree that they're overpriced). But if I can't shake this herp acquisition addiction that I seem to be developing, it will soon be too small!

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Amy

Thanks for the suggestions: I order at least 1000 at a time because we are feeding 4 beardes, 5 Leopard Geckos, 4 turtles, 1 tarantula and a newt. I wonder if I left a few tubes in the container then all I would have to do is lift out the tube and shake it into the bag. I have tried shaking the egg cartons into a container and they get all over, I'll have to try doing it in a large zip loc bag. There is only a problem when Sean isn't around and I can't talk anyone else into getting crickets for me.