Why do feeder crickets stink?

Crickets smell bad. Any tips on reducing this problem?

Crickets smell bad. Any tips on reducing this problem?

They do stink though, don't they?

Either switch to another food supply (roaches, etc.), or make sure that the cricket enclosure is kept very clean and not moist. I've noticed a LOT of smell when the crickets are kept in a moist environment. I have egg crates in the enclosure now and I've noticed a dramatic improvement in smell.

Yeah, definately ventilation. Of late I've been keeping mine in a deep open topped plastic container and there's hardly any smell now much improved!

They still smell bad if you catch a whiff though

-- Jon

I also try to buy only a 2 week supply of crickets at a time, and then I throughly wash and clean out the container they live in before I get a new supply. I'm not sure if this helps with the smell, but I pick out the dead ones and toss them every other day or so.

I will be cricket free soon My roaches are going strong.

My roaches are going strong.

Everytime I buy more than 1 carton from the local supplier, by the time I get to the last carton all the crickets have killed each other.. Those things are murderous !! And of course very smelly

toss crix breed roaches lol
Rev

Frequent spot-cleaning of the cricket enclosure helps, as does a dry substrate. If you're hoping that a female will lay eggs, confine the moist area to a container buried in the substrate.

Any of these suggestions are just ways of minimizing odor, crickets seem to stink no matter what. It's purely a matter of how much.

i keep my crix with no substrate in a 10 gal tank with a screen lid and something for all of the to climb on IMO they do not smell as bad when they have no substrate...and yes plenty of ventalation will help as well
and crix do stink

i've never noticed this :?

It must be a thing with the ventilation

I also keep mine on no substrate, but they still stink.

Get roaches! I'd breathe roach air any day!

yup I agree, roaches are better. or you can try placing some sliced apples, the aroma of apples specially when they dry up sometime mask the odor that crix produce.

I use a layer of dry oatmeal in the bottom of my 10 gal tank and it cuts down on the odor too.
Donna

I think that it is also problem of cricket species. I had five species: Acheta domesticus, Gryllus bimaculatus, Gryllus campestris, Gryllus assimilis, Gryllodes sigillatus. Gryllus bimaculatus is the worse thing (smell, agression etc.). And I agree that roaches are much better. Try Nauphoeta cinerea, they are very easy to care.

And here is my terrarium for crickets (don't look at text )

I totally agree with all the "get roaches" comments. Not only do they NOT stink, they don't make any noise, they don't kill each other, they live longer, breed better, and you can feed them just about anything if you wanted to.
As far as crickets go...they just stink, period.

keeping crix with no smell takes a lot of work. one must always keep dead crickets out of the enclosure, if the egg cartons get even a little moist by contacting potatoes or apples, they have to be changed. damp cardboard and cricket poo is part of the 'cricket smell'. the other part of the smell is dead cricket. trust me, i did a little good old fashioned trial and error with my nose. i almost puked once with the 'dead cricket test' which is most of the scent that people smell when they refer to "stinky" crickets. crickets themselves don't stink. there is a third part to the smell. the decaying vegatable matter. potatoes are the worst. it's interesting in that only a bin of adult crickets will stink. any other age won't because adults are the ones who can't seem to stop dying. i have to be the odd ball here when saying i hate keeping lobster roaches as feeders. i really don't see how they're a good food source. when i kept a colony, the damn things kept running around their enclosure are were very hard to capture and toss into a spider's tank. their feet kept sticking to everything they came in contact with including my hands and arms. some of my spiders didn't even get to eat them because of the roaches ability to squeeze between the glass (or plastic) and where the substrate pulled away. some roaches buried themselves in the substrate and never came out. once i put a roach into a 2 inch Ephebopus cyanognathus deli cup and found it a year later sitting at the bottom happy as can be. food items aren't supposed to be happy in a spider's house! i really don't know if there is a special method in feeding those things to spiders or what. but it didn't work at all for me.

-Lonnie

I have a blaptica dubia roach colony running now for over a year and still have problems feeding them to my T's. The blondi's, genics and all my slings eat them... but still have a lot of T's that don't want them... even a L. parahybana, all the avics, all the brachies and all the grammostola's don't like them... So i still need crickets and hoppers...

They smell, but when well ventilated and without substrate they do (almost) fine...

Yes, if you pick up a cricket and stick it up your nose, they do have that stinky smell (& I'm not advising you to try)... and the T's probably think "tasty!" because of that! Anyhow, for me, extra ventilation, no substrate, no horizontal egg carton stacking (I switched to vertical side-by-side kinda arrangement), no excess fruits/moisture. And bi-weekly/monthly complete cleaning. I think I'll stick to crix because (1)My family won't allow me rearing roaches (yeah it's an impression thing) and (2)Crix are soft and juicy and have a relatively thin exoskeleton. And they are good for feeding other things apart from T's.

P.S. & yes removing dead ones regularly helps a lot. But the high ventilation alone already helps keeping down the mortality rate tremendously.