# Some interesting feeders...



## bluedart (Sep 5, 2005)

I've been looking up some additional feeders to begin culturing, and here are some I've come up with. This post serves two purposes: for these feeders to be broadcast a bit more publicly, and in the hopes that somebody that reads this may have some of these feeders and can send me a culture. I'll add more feeders and add un update in the Subject as more come up, because they always do. 

First off:

The Bean Beetle

Callosobruchus maculatus:









The Bean Weevil

Acanthoscelides obtectus:











> Description:
> The beetles are 3-4 mm long, about 1.4 mm high and 2 mm wide, green grey-brown coloured and covered in fine hair.
> The smaller animals are usually the males.
> 
> ...


Seems like another nice supplement, and they're fairly popular in England.


----------



## Darryl (Dec 2, 2005)

Nice to see you here Josh.

I culture and feed Bean beetles to my frogs and other herps, without any problems.

On a thread a while ago I asked the question, concerning using these beetles and weevils as feeder insects, but did not get much feedback, from State based folk.

http://www.dendroboard.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=17567

I have Starter cultures, which ship easily and more detailed culturing and husbandry information, if there is any interest.


----------



## thong_monster (May 6, 2006)

Are those holes created by the weevils or just polka-dotted beans?


----------



## elmoisfive (Dec 31, 2004)

Since both species you mention are noted agricultural pests and can cause significant damage, I suspect that the USDA and your state department of agriculture might have a thing or two to say about individuals shipping these insects across state lines. My understanding is that the penalties involved can be quite substantial although I don't know how often they are invoked.

Having worked with the USDA on importation of living organisms in the past, all I can say is that they were quite aggressive (appropriately so) in ensuring that we were following the rules.

I suspect that one of our noted insect producers on the board (*cough* *cough* Dave) could probably shed more light on this question.

Bill


----------



## zBrinks (Jul 16, 2006)

I tried weevils awhile back when I was keeping some painted mantellas. It was a pure black weevil I found in a bag of seed. I was able to produce several thousand pretty easily - just by keeping them in a pastic shoebox full of sunflower seed placed in a larger plastic box partially filled with water to keep humidity up and act like a moat. I had several holes drilled in the lids of both boxes. After producing several thousand of these seemingly perfect feeders, however, it seemed that the mantellas had no appetite for them. Probably some chemical defense on the beetle's part. Just my 2 cents . . .


----------



## KeroKero (Jun 13, 2004)

There have been weevils cultured for use to feed PDFs, but they were weevils found in bird seed and while the frogs liked them, they reproduced rather slowly.

As for the mentioned species, yes they are probibly excellent candidates for culture as frog food... and the same reasons that make them excellent candidates for frog food culturing makes them pests as well (note - all herp foods under the right conditions can be pests). What is hard in the US about finding the next great feeder insect isn't finding a species that meets the qualifications, but rather one that does and isn't a serious pest species in any part of the US and threatening a major crop. 

This is why the latest craze in feeder roaches is with tropical roaches that wouldn't survive in most of the US and why even a favorite such as termites are not sold online much - they are actually illegal to do so for the most part (illegal to ship over state lines due to being a pest).


----------



## trinacliff (Aug 9, 2004)

Weevil...that is the word I was looking for! I had an old bag of horse oats that got infested with these guys. I couldn't figure out for the life of me what they were, but they were a little black beetle with a long "nose" (forgive my layman's terms...a bug person I am not).

I didn't even think about them as food...or culturing them to see if I could get them producing...I guess I'm a bit leery of just tossing any bug that seems small enough into my frog tank. haha

Ok, I just looked them up...and they seem to threaten bromeliads...haha! That would be a good reason to not use them...Antone look out!  Granted, these are not exactly the same type as the ones I saw, but interesting anyway.

http://savebromeliads.ifas.ufl.edu/research.htm

Kristen


----------



## Ed (Sep 19, 2004)

Weevils are a huge group of beetles and the grain weevils found in stored goods do not attack other items as they have adapted to be a pest of stored grains. 


Ed


----------



## trinacliff (Aug 9, 2004)

Ed said:


> Weevils are a huge group of beetles and the grain weevils found in stored goods do not attack other items as they have adapted to be a pest of stored grains.
> 
> 
> Ed


Ed, I consider you an encyclopedia of knowledge...and I mean that as a compliment through and through.  If you ever leave D'Board, we're gonna have to hunt you down and drag you back. haha

Anyway, if that's the case, would those make for good feeders to help vary diet? Or are they not worth the effort? Is there any way they could be harmful? Like I said, I'm not one to just dump them in to a frog tank and see what happens...haha.

Kristen


----------



## Ed (Sep 19, 2004)

Its because I've been around for quite awhile now working and around animals.... 

I have used them although I think my cultures have crashed as I haven't seen any new beetles in awhile. They do culture slowly and are a little difficult to seperate out of the media (I use a deep media with a funnel buried in it or you an lay a crumpled up piece of paper towel on it and the adults will crawl into/onto the towel). When you drop them into the tank, they play dead and then after a little while they start crawling around. This causes a little more normal behavior then when other feeders are introduced as the frogs can't simply gorge...

Ed


----------



## Dendrobait (May 29, 2005)

Interesting Ed, what species of darts did you try these on successfully?

While its probably not the case with those mantellas, I wonder if we may be pampering our darts a bit too much regarding food with chemical defenses. I'd imagine many of the critters they eat in the wild have chemical defenses, and not just the ones that the frogs turn into toxins either.


----------



## Ed (Sep 19, 2004)

D. auratus, D. tinctorius, D. leucomelas, and Atelopus spumarius. I tried to get the vets let me bring a sample to work to try on the frogs there but they wouldn't let me. 


Ed


----------



## bluedart (Sep 5, 2005)

Ed--what kinds of off-the-wall/uncommon things are you currently culturing? Anything like Shorelinite beetles and onward in rarity would peak my interest.


----------



## Dendrobait (May 29, 2005)

Doubt they are viable feeders as they breed to slow but I've found lots of earwigs in my worm bin lately. The babies are bite sized for dart frogs. You could grow em indoors like springtails. Maybe some Phyllobates would eat the adults but to get most critters to eat the adults you'd probably have to remove the pincers. They are also potential plant pests also.

I think soil decomposers may be the best place to look for new live foods.


----------



## KeroKero (Jun 13, 2004)

Chemical defense wise... i think the impact on their tastiness to PDFs really depends on if they evolved with them or not - I'm sure they "ignore"/don't register a lot of the chemical defenses of their prey due to their coevolving with them.. I'm sure a number of the critters that PDFs eat in the wild are distasteful to other critters, especially those that do not occur in the same area... and of course feeding animals with chemical defenses from areas where PDFs are not found (like native and/or temperate species) would probibly be mighty nasty to a PDF. Most, if not all the foods we feed PDFs are not the exact foods they eat in the wild, usually pest species and native species we've managed to culture or find wild sources for that they accept. I don't think we are pampering them... I think we are just trying to find similar foods to their wild diet that they will accept, since their wild diets are not as feasible for us.

I've found shorelinite beetles... the actual beetles mind you (unlike the RFB adult beetles that are usually not accepted across the board if at all) are relished by all PDFs I've tried (D. tincs, D. azureus, D. galacs, D. truncs, D. auratus, D. imitator, D. vent, E. tricolor, E. anthonyi, P. bicolor, P. auroteania, A. zaparo, A. femoralis) as well as mantellas (M. expectata, M. viridis, M. sp. 'Blushing'), Atelopus s. hoogmoedi, juvie suriname clown treefrogs, and a number of juvie native species (grey TFs, Barking TFs, American and fowlers toads, leopard frogs, wood frogs, narrowmouth toads). RFBs (actual beetles) were usually not accepted by most of the above species, while their larvae was usually taken. Only downers about them seem to be their slow reproductiveness (I'm playing with two different diets right now to see how that effects them) and their larvae aren't as active... but since the adults are so well loved, I just scrapped feeding the larvae anyways.


----------



## bluedart (Sep 5, 2005)

KeroKero said:


> Chemical defense wise... i think the impact on their tastiness to PDFs really depends on if they evolved with them or not - I'm sure they "ignore"/don't register a lot of the chemical defenses of their prey due to their coevolving with them.. I'm sure a number of the critters that PDFs eat in the wild are distasteful to other critters, especially those that do not occur in the same area... and of course feeding animals with chemical defenses from areas where PDFs are not found (like native and/or temperate species) would probibly be mighty nasty to a PDF. Most, if not all the foods we feed PDFs are not the exact foods they eat in the wild, usually pest species and native species we've managed to culture or find wild sources for that they accept. I don't think we are pampering them... I think we are just trying to find similar foods to their wild diet that they will accept, since their wild diets are not as feasible for us.
> 
> I've found shorelinite beetles... the actual beetles mind you (unlike the RFB adult beetles that are usually not accepted across the board if at all) are relished by all PDFs I've tried (D. tincs, D. azureus, D. galacs, D. truncs, D. auratus, D. imitator, D. vent, E. tricolor, E. anthonyi, P. bicolor, P. auroteania, A. zaparo, A. femoralis) as well as mantellas (M. expectata, M. viridis, M. sp. 'Blushing'), Atelopus s. hoogmoedi, juvie suriname clown treefrogs, and a number of juvie native species (grey TFs, Barking TFs, American and fowlers toads, leopard frogs, wood frogs, narrowmouth toads). RFBs (actual beetles) were usually not accepted by most of the above species, while their larvae was usually taken. Only downers about them seem to be their slow reproductiveness (I'm playing with two different diets right now to see how that effects them) and their larvae aren't as active... but since the adults are so well loved, I just scrapped feeding the larvae anyways.


I've got Shorelinite Beetles as well. I got a culture at IAD, and was only just able to split it the other day. I'm using ED's RFB media right now... lemme know how Mike's stuff works. I've been doing some reading on cracked wheat, and apparently it's showing some nice results.


----------



## KeroKero (Jun 13, 2004)

I'm using Ed's RFB media and a mix from Matt Mirabello that he got off some research done with them... as a pest species


----------



## bluedart (Sep 5, 2005)

KeroKero said:


> I'm using Ed's RFB media and a mix from Matt Mirabello that he got off some research done with them... as a pest species


By Mike I totally meant Matt. 

I did my research through pest speciesness too.


----------



## AJ_Cann (Oct 6, 2004)

The species depicted at the top of this thread reproduce rapidly when they get going and are palatable to frogs, if a little chewy. Other species may vary of course.


----------



## Ed (Sep 19, 2004)

Shorelintes and the weevils are about as rare as I have at the moment, although I would like to get a termite colony going. 

Ed


----------

