I wasn’t sure if I would make it through the experience of visiting a feeder bug shop. I pay someone to kill roaches; I don’t go visit them. Fortunately, I don’t have roach allergies like Chris Beaucher, who can quickly progress from an itchy throat to anaphylactic shock upon contact. My bug with these bugs is rooted in resentment and manifests in cringes and shivers.
I blame the massive “palmetto bugs” that invaded our home when my husband Donnie got stationed along the Gulf Coast. Those crunchy critters were big enough to carry your luggage—and they flew, a fact previously unknown to me. A giant roach on the wall greeted us the night we moved into our ancient, drafty rental. I begged Donnie to kill it, saying, “Well, at least they can’t fly.” At that exact moment, the roach became a buzzing brown blur divebombing my head. I screamed as it tangled in my hair, and I’ve hated them since.
Accepting this assignment was something of a bravery test for me, but I was pleasantly surprised when I entered Kristin’s Bugs. It was balmy warm inside, with a faint earthy odor in the air. Tables held neat bins and bowls containing a few inches of what appeared to be soil. My heart rate elevated when I peered inside and realized the entire mass was moving. Each container held thousands of Dubia cockroaches waiting to be shipped to hungry reptiles.
“Roaches are much cleaner than crickets,” bug-handler Justin Hudgins said, dispelling a common belief. “If we were raising crickets, you wouldn’t be able to stand the smell in here.”
Kari Apted
“I wasn’t sure if I would make it through the experience of visiting a feeder bug shop. I pay someone to kill roaches; I don’t go visit them.”
When I asked why the roaches didn’t escape their open containers, Hudgins explained that they couldn’t climb the steep plastic walls. Even if they fled, the native jungle insects cannot survive long in our cooler climate. Hudgins then opened a small refrigerator and dragged his hand through a plastic shoebox that appeared to be full of sawdust—until countless white maggots wiggled through his fingers. He explained that they are a great source of calcium for growing reptiles and would remain maggots as long as they were kept cold. If he accidentally left the container out over a weekend, he would find the shop swarming with flies on Monday morning.
Hudgins showed me multiple types of worms, all of which provide different nutritional benefits, and explained why there were so many different sizes of Dubia roaches. Young lizards must eat young roaches; mature roaches won’t fit in their mouths. Older, larger lizards enjoy bigger roaches, so many are reserved to grow into these satisfying meals. It’s like feeding your toddler a slider and your teenager a Big Mac.
Dubia roaches are one of the best feeder insects because they are easy to keep, parasite-resistant, easy to digest and nutritionally dense. They can live for months, allowing pet owners to keep live meals on hand. They are rounder and flatter than roaches to which we’re accustomed, and they cannot fly. Large males have wings and may attempt to take flight but cannot travel far. As you can imagine, I was particularly glad to learn that fact.
I left Kristin’s Bugs in good spirits, thoroughly impressed by the Beauchers and the Hudgins. I was in awe of brave little Kristin Beaucher and the fight she fought with cancer before her death at age 9, and I was glad to learn that not all roaches deserve the negative lens through which we view them. Still, I’m going to need all of them to stay out of my hair.
Click here to read more stories by Kari Apted.
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