Frograck: Welcome to episode 22 of the Frog Rack podcast. Amphibians eat invertebrates. appropriate housing and environmental parameters are set up, feeding is the major aspect of husbandry that we must provide captive amphibians. It is the aspect of keeping where we experience the most interaction with our animals. It is the ongoing aspect of husbandry that can have the greatest impact on our animals' health. Where I live, the only source of live invertebrate feeders are overpriced and often dead crickets from big box pet store chains. So I do regularly order crickets online and have them shipped, but for the sake of offering my animals a variety of feed save some money and because extreme weather sometimes makes shipping feeder insects impossible, I've been culturing my own feeder insects for as long as I've been keeping amphibians. The availability of invertebrate feeders has really improved in recent years. Small businesses ⁓ as today's guest, are doing the work to culture large quantities of live insects for the hobby. Jordan from Ontario Invert Farm is doing just that. I'm really excited to welcome Jordan to the Frog Rack podcast to hear about the insects that he cultures, to get some tips for how I can improve my own ability to culture insects and provide better nutrition to the amphibians in my care. Welcome Ontario Invert Farm to the show. Thanks for joining me today, Jordan. How are you? Jordan: Good, thanks. I'm happy to be here. Frograck: All right, why don't you start by giving the audience, assume that they haven't found you on social media, don't know what you're up to. are you and what do you do in the Herp Hobby? Jordan: So, in Invert Farm, ⁓ the main, I guess, ⁓ main goal of what I do is to cultivate and offer people alternatives to crickets and mealworms. was the impetus for why I started the business because back when I started, like, when I first started, ⁓ into this hobby. ⁓ catching amphibians ⁓ in my backyard, virtual in that red-backed salamanders, American toads, ⁓ spring peepers, ⁓ tree frogs. was just fascinated by all of them. ⁓ And then I came find, as most people do, that the feeders in the store are very limited. And it's grown in years, but it's still, we're taking animals that in the wild eat hundreds of species and we're limiting it to or two for their entire lives. And we expect them to be not only healthy, but happy. In my mind, these animals like... Frograck: Right? Jordan: We don't know how much is going on in their heads. But I believe that ⁓ environmental enrichment for these animals then comes largely from what we feed them. And if you were just given the same thing day, then I can't imagine that's a very fulfilling life. Or it wouldn't be a very healthy life, obviously. And so... ⁓ Frograck: Sure. Yeah. Sure, yeah. It's at least, as you say, very different from what they would experience in the wild. And so it sort of puts the responsibility on us to do something about that as captive keepers, yeah. Jordan: 100%. It's your animal's well-being as a keeper is largely dependent on you. so I think that responsible keepers have the duty to ensure that their animals have fulfilling content lives. And that largely comes with diet. Frograck: So someone who as an adult is breeding lots of insects has an origin story. What was, ⁓ you mentioned ⁓ capturing native amphibians when you were young. Do you have a memory of what was one of the animals that you kept for a while and ⁓ like, were you feeding it mealworms from the pet store? Jordan: One of the first ones that I found lots of and was just fascinated by were Redback Salamanders, which are so small that it's like... I was frustrated by pinheads. don't get me started on crickets unless you want a very long rant. ⁓ so it felt incumbent on me to find foods that were small enough ⁓ Frograck: Right. Yeah Jordan: use with that species then Yeah, I would say that after I started breeding my own, culturing my own feeders, that just coming to, when you come to know an animal, when you come to learn more about it, get an appreciation for it. And I guess that appreciation grew with the insects ⁓ and a whole passion for it. Frograck: Right on, yeah, yeah, So as far as getting your hands on feeders, whether you captured an American toad and you wanna keep it in the house for a few days as a kid, or whether you have a frog room full of dart frogs and tree frogs or something like that, you sort of have three options, right? You can collect from the wild, you can outside and try to find appropriate food items, you can buy ⁓ at a store or online. even from people like yourself, or you can try to take on the responsibility and culture things yourself. thinking through, like, talk me through those three ways getting your hands on invertebrates, and just maybe each one has pros and cons, I imagine. Jordan: do. So as I mentioned those are the three broad categories. The first, if you're wild collecting feeders, it has its in that you are getting insects that are nutrition value, that are free, and you're getting that variety. Very important. You also need to know how to ID your insects because not all insects are good to feed. And you need to know where you're getting them from because you don't know where they've been. And... I guess those are the two main ones for Wild Collected. Frograck: Yeah, you need to identify, people often bring up that there would be potential exposure to pesticides and herbicides if you don't know where you're collecting it from. Jordan: Yes, so that's always a concern and a valid concern too because pesticide drift does go into the windrows and it's like, yeah, you have to be sure that ⁓ ⁓ potential for contamination is, ⁓ have to minimize that as much as you can. ⁓ Frograck: Right. Jordan: and obviously can't go into areas and parks ⁓ are protected. So you do have to be very selective about where you're getting your field plankton. Then the next category is ⁓ you mentioned getting them from ⁓ outside source like a pet store or a such as mine You have to trust that the business that you're getting them from took care them properly raised them correctly and cleanly and It's yeah, that's that's one of the big things too is that ⁓ people ⁓ seem to think that it's like, I fed them crickets. aren't they thriving? It's like, ⁓ you to make sure that you have that added vitamin dust because a lot of the time in the stores, they're starved or they're just fed bran. And it's like, if you think that that is giving your animals the nutrition they need, ⁓ you're falling short. And so it's finally the last option is in my opinion the best option, raising yourself. Because you're not only quality control that at that point you know what's going into your insects, which by transitive properties going into your animals, ⁓ it's saving yourself. money as well as ensuring a sustainable and consistent supply of food for your animals too, which is important. ⁓ Because as you mentioned, one of the main aspects of this hobby is keeping your animals fed. It's like after you get things set up, which is a big, a large initial cost, but the long-term maintenance and health of your animals is largely dependent on what you're feeding them. Frograck: Right, right. Yeah, for sure. I'll go on a little tangent about crickets and stores ⁓ naming a company. I noticed a little while ago, there's a company that markets crickets and like you can either buy regular crickets from them ⁓ vitamin crickets that they have a proprietary name for. And I know that actually means. I think it just means that they, you know. ⁓ fed it maybe some sort of cricket diet gut load right before shipping it off. But even then, I imagine that vitamin-enhanced cricket, ⁓ maybe, maybe it arrives to your house still with some nutrition in its gut. But it may also have just passed that and you just spent money for another empty cricket. And then on the topic of gut loading, I remember, you know, when I started off in the hobby as a kid too, I didn't think, I didn't even know what this was. Just a bug is a bug, feed it to your frogs. Then I got exposed to the idea of gut loading and there was cricket diet products on the shelves of pet stores in the nineties. And even today, I've come to appreciate that you can do even more than gut loading. Like if the cricket ate crap its whole life, but then ⁓ right before, a day before you feed it to your animals, you gut load it, that's better than nothing. But you also could have been feeding the cricket nutritious food its entire lifespan, and that actually makes a difference. So why don't we go down a tangent, if you have any other thoughts on gut loading or just providing really nutrition to the feeder insect itself. Jordan: Well, like you just mentioned, it's... to give it just good food at the last minute is a little bit of an afterthought on the nutrition that the animal is getting while it's growing. And so there is definitely a difference, I argue, in ⁓ an that's been raised on a nutritionally sound and complete diet than one that's been vitamin enhanced at the last minute. Also, again, echoing what you said in that it's like the that the food stays in the gut of an insect ⁓ isn't long. ⁓ And ⁓ it is important to make sure ⁓ you're maintaining quality through the whole rearing of the food for animals. Frograck: I imagine as much, Jordan: rather than just doing it as an afterthought. And so it's... I guess people it's easy to appreciate the quality ⁓ difference in that I've chicken that's free range and that has got flavor and it's tasty. And for me like yeah I like tasty chicken. But also the meat is actually nutritionally superior as well. Frograck: Yeah, right. Jordan: It's not just in a cage eating cracked corn. And so ⁓ don't have a nutritional breakdown in front of me, but ⁓ you are what you... ⁓ Frograck: That's fine, yeah. Yeah, we don't need to, we don't need to nerd out about nutrition science because neither one of us are nutrition scientists, but I think, I think chickens are a really good example. We keep laying hens. And so for years now, I think we've been kind of spoiled by free range hens that get, only part of their diet comes from ⁓ store bought grain and maybe, maybe 50 % of their diet comes from kitchen scraps and insects that they find outside. And everyone. who has had farm fresh eggs knows the yolk is like really dark orange and tastes really nice. And then ⁓ the winter when the chickens aren't laying as much, sometimes I break down and I buy store bought eggs and so pale and flavorless. And so, ⁓ you that's another ⁓ chicken that nutrition really, it's often hard us to appreciate because we don't see it. doesn't make, you know, nutritional differences in the amphibians or reptiles we keep or in the feeder insects. Like you can't see it, touch it or taste it. At least we can't, maybe the frogs can. So it's often like something that we can overlook, but it's real. In our conversation earlier, you used the term mesophona and that's not a term I was familiar with. What do you mean by mesophona? And for that matter, how do you define microfauna? Jordan: So mesophauna is ⁓ of soil that are 0.1 to 2 millimeters in length. So whereas microfauna, you're talking about soil microbes ⁓ and stuff you need a microscope to observe. ⁓ Frograck: Okay, yep. Jordan: Whereas mesophona is springtails, mites, nematodes, all the stuff that's microscopic that you just need a magnifying glass to get a good look at. Yeah, I'd that's for the boundaries. ⁓ Frograck: Gotcha, okay. So in the hobby when we call dairy cow isopods microfauna, we're sort of taking our liberties with that term. Yeah. Jordan: Yeah, I'd say, yeah, you're taking a very liberal approach to using that term, but... Frograck: Sure, sure. It's just become sort of ⁓ a word. We all know what it means when we're using it in terms of our hobby. We joke around sometimes about the term bioactive, that has come to mean something as simple as like a corn snake keeper ⁓ put in their cypress mulch bedding. so now, ta-da, my tub is bioactive. And then people like to disagree it or roll their eyes about it. But no one has a nailed down definition. But I think everyone agrees that the term bioactive means that there's more life in your terrarium than just the animal inhabitant. And so what role do invertebrates, and ranging from micro, meso, and larger, what role do ⁓ invertebrates ⁓ in bioactive keeping? Jordan: I'd say that your invertebrate aspect is probably one of your most important aspects of a bioactive terrarium. Because what you're doing with bioactive is you are trying to recreate an ecosystem. so when you think about it, it's like back when we first had zoos, we kept animals in sterile cages, just bars and maybe like threw a ball in there with it you just had an animal in a box and that's basically a prison. No wants to see ⁓ an in a box. It's sad. ⁓ And it's fulfilling ⁓ for animal either. And so are coming like modern zoos are not that. People have their Frograck: Yeah. Jordan: their pros and cons against it, zoos will always be necessary in a conservation role, I believe. And so it's on a personal level, you are creating enclosures animal interacts with. It's not an animal in a box. And so you're creating ⁓ a ⁓ ecosystem. the fundamental of that is the decomposers, the nutrient recyclers, role that ⁓ invertebrates play in helping the whole thing move along. It's not just a planted tank. Although also play the role in it, it's like I said, it's ⁓ creating a small system. Frograck: Right, okay, so what are, other than just springtails and isopods, what are other possible decomposers that would work in various, I mean, reptile or amphibian habitats? Jordan: So one of the overlooked ones that when you say mites, ⁓ of ⁓ get antsy it's easy to think of the bad ones. ⁓ But there's orbited mites, ⁓ which are also moss mites. ⁓ And these mites ⁓ an ⁓ enormous role soil and ⁓ nutrient recycling. Frograck: Yeah. Jordan: And believe from what I've read, might be one of the ⁓ give dart frogs where they ⁓ gain poison from is from eating these mites. Which again, they're fine shredders. So have... Inverts like isopods and certain snail species and beetles break down waste and leaf and then that gets broken down further by the mesophona which is small enough to help break that down so it's a ⁓ usable source of nutrients for the plants and helps break down Wastes like ammonia. Frograck: Right? I imagine, you know, sometimes mites get in your spring tail cultures ⁓ isopod cultures. And don't like that because we were trying to like stay in control and culture a specific invertebrate, but the, ⁓ you a mite boom because they're probably, they like the same conditions and serve the same role in soil as the springtails do, huh? Jordan: in ⁓ springtail colonies, and I do a lot ⁓ of springtails, I offer at least six different species and I'm working on more. Like we were sort of discussing before, I've sort of really gotten on to springtails, I find them just fascinating. But the mites that to get in are... Strathium, ha, simetis mites. I'm with ⁓ the ⁓ names. I constantly try to... These mites are, I them soil lions because they will eat over, it's dozens and of soil pests. They go after thrips, ⁓ they go after mites, they go after snake mites, they go after... Frograck: I've never heard a scientific name of a mite before, so it'd be news to me. Jordan: Pungus gnat, they go after anything that's small enough for them to attack, they'll eat. And then they will also eat algae and plant debris. so ⁓ ⁓ you get these mites, they eating springtails because that's that's small enough for them. And so numbers eventually Frograck: Gotcha. Jordan: And if you don't have a very prolific species, you can find yourself with just bit of mites. ⁓ so ⁓ understand the frustration ⁓ it if you're just doing a monoculture of anything, you're going to have the predators of that get into it eventually. And you're going to have to do mitigation or. Frograck: Yeah, right. Jordan: learn some to at least manage their numbers as best he can. yeah, ⁓ like that, it's like what's a bad mite for me might be a good mite for you because you want fungus gnats in your tank. They look ugly, they eat plant roots. Frograck: Right, right. Jordan: They fly in your nose and on your face. So it's like that's a great mite for dealing with fungus gnats. In the right situation, they can be good, but then in the wrong situation, you want them gone. Frograck: Yeah, right. Yeah. Yeah, when we're thinking of small invertebrates helping sort of deal with waste, deal with the feces from frogs in a frog tank, for example, they're sort of like maintaining the substrate, probably moving around in it, aerating it, dealing with waste. A misconception might be that they literally eat poop. Do you know? down there in the soil diversity web, what's really going on with things like springtails and isopods when they are, you know, cleaning up Jordan: So I think that's kind of like a bit of a misconception about bioactive tanks. People get the idea that it's like, oh, if I make it bioactive, I don't have to clean. I'm like, that's not accurate. bioactive tank means you have to clean less. But you still have to spot clean. But for animals as small as dart frogs, Frograck: Right. Jordan: It's like, yeah, you do need something that is helping to break down the waste. so larger invertebrates, ⁓ that's where isopods come in, do help break down the waste material. the poop and stuff left behind by animals as small as dark frogs. then beyond that you have to break it down further, which is where you have the mites and the springtails start to do their work there. Because just having isopods alone isn't gonna cut it. I would actually argue that springtails ⁓ are probably... I'm going to go off on a bit of a tangent here, like springtails, if you have bioactive setup, you need springtails. Terrariums are, just set for mold formation. You're going to get mold if you don't put in methods to control it. so ⁓ are ideal in that they're small enough that they can eat mold spores. Frograck: Yep. Yep. Jordan: There's other invertebrates that I'm working on too. minute fungus beetles, which are also only a couple millimeters long that eat spores. But you have to have something that's going to work on reducing the of mold formation that you get because in the still air and humidity of a terrarium, it's a matter of when, not if. Yeah, you need to get on top of your mold. Frograck: Right. Right, right. think, frogs, the that someone gains when they keep dart frogs can be misleading because dart frogs do so well ⁓ in small bioactive setups. I'm not exactly sure why that is. I'm just thinking out loud with you here. It, it may be because their skin is highly evolved to be down in the leaf litter. And so maybe they have like a really high tolerance for like bacteria and fungus and mold being on their skin a lot. And so it's not necessarily the case that every single one of us who keeps dart frogs has done such a good job recreating nature that it's the perfect pristine ecosystem. And so our dart frogs thrive. I think maybe it's just that the dart frogs are very resilient to the conditions ⁓ a glass enclosure full of rotting leaves and ⁓ own poop. And ⁓ the springtails definitely just help that web. But then when people scale up to other species, it often doesn't go as well. Usually what people cite as the reason why it doesn't work out is that the waste load of larger animals is just too much to handle. Jordan: Yeah, ⁓ hmm. would say, you, you scale up like that, you also need to remember that you have to have enough invertebrates in there to help manage with the additional waste. It's like if you think a springtail is going to be able to take on the waste of a ball python, you're to be very disappointed early on. Or even... You can use almost any example because once you, the larger the animal, the larger the poop. Right? And so you do start needing, that's when the spot cleaning would come in more. Frograck: Right. Mm-hmm. Jordan: never going to get a functioning within a tank. You just won't because it's a closed system. With adding to help with that, you're trying to mimic it as closely as you can, but you'll never get there fully. And it's such... It's hard to get a really good balance sometimes because if you have dairy cows, dairy cows ⁓ great in that they'll eat almost anything organic. They breed well, they're hardy, they can live in almost anything. That well if you have enough for them to eat. If you don't and you have them in a planted tank then all your plants start disappearing ⁓ you get a balance and then they start breeding and then ⁓ have a tank of largely just dairy cows. Frograck: Yeah. Jordan: So, and guess in addition to ⁓ the right amount of micro and meso fauna, ⁓ also making sure you have the right substrate too. Substrate is a vastly under, sorry, overlooked ⁓ of bioactive tanks, I would say, in they're not made equal and... ⁓ Frograck: Yep. Jordan: People all seem to have this obsession with cocoa fiber, which is, I don't know. It can be part of your substrate, but it shouldn't be the only thing your animal's living on. There's, sorry, I don't want to get too carried away on a tangent, because once I myself talking bugs, I just go, go, go. But it's the complexity of the system you're creating and. Frograck: Mm-hmm. That's right. Jordan: Like I said, you'll never match it completely, so you as the keeper still have to do maintenance. Bioactive doesn't mean no cleaning, it just means less cleaning and a more pleasant environment for the animal to be living in. Frograck: Yeah, including maintenance, including ⁓ occasionally changing substrate when it just has decomposed beyond its usefulness or adding leaf litter frequently, which of mimics what happens in nature. Yeah. Jordan: Leaf litter is, you can't go wrong adding leaves a lot of the time. I've always said that. It's like most of my tanks have leaf litter in them. Whether the animals use it directly, eat it directly, or just use it as shelter, leaf litter is always a plus. Frograck: Yeah. I'm always so jealous when people down south post pictures of a live oak or magnolia bushes in their front yard. I'm like, he's like, man, nice, endless source of really good leaf litter. must be nice. ⁓ all right. B beyond, beyond springtails and isopods, you culture and work with a lot of different insects, both feeders and sort of like curiosity. So why don't you give us, give us a big overview of different, you know, list of different species of insects that you work with. Jordan: the Yeah, really. Frograck: and then I'll start asking you some questions about specific ones. Jordan: Let's see, some of the main ones that are like my focus in addition to the bioactive species would be dermestid beetles, which are popular for taxidermy. beetles are almost like little lamb piranha, where if you put a skull in with them, they'll just cover it and eat everything but the bone. And then that's how get a nice mounted... a nice specimen for amounts and they're so effective at their job and they do such a good job that they're still used by museums. Museums have big freezers full of these beetles so that's one of my focal species. Another one is American Giant Millipedes. I don't know, I guess I haven't looked at the face of other millipedes under the microscope, but American millipedes have the giant millipedes just have these adorable, they're just little black round eyes. They look almost cartoonish. just watching them move is fascinating. They are all around probably one of my favorite native species to work with. ⁓ Great coloration. Frograck: Mm-hmm. So much better centipedes. Millipedes are way better. Centipedes creep me out. ⁓ Jordan: I always say that giant centipedes are a nightmare fuel whereas giant millipedes are the cow version. Just adorable and fun. Other interesting species are raised giant silk moths. That's a lot of work. Frograck: Yeah. Right. Jordan: But ⁓ at the end, seeing these animals in person they're stunning. Sacropia moths, one of the largest, no, the largest native giant silk moth species we have. Wingspan that easily is ⁓ length of my palm. ⁓ ⁓ just gorgeous coloration. only for about seven ⁓ days as an adult because ⁓ they don't have any functional mouth parts. That whole week is just dedicated to reproduction. And so when raise these you come to appreciate that the life of a caterpillar ⁓ is ⁓ and pooping and resting. Frograck: Right. Jordan: In relation to that, also raise silkworms, which are the only fully domesticated insect that we have. ⁓ And ⁓ another animal that is genuinely, ⁓ love learning about the history of it and ⁓ Frograck: Right, right. Jordan: Just like, they... The amount of silk you need to make shirt even is enormous. You need thousands of cocoons. And I said, if you ⁓ know goes into raising caterpillars, which just eat and poop, you are either fetching them food or cleaning up their poop. ⁓ And... The amount of work that silkworm farmers must go in, put into these animals, it's like, now you understand why silkworms are a dollar a piece, which is pricey for a bug. Frograck: Mm-hmm. Jordan: And then beyond that, guess, smaller scale, also raise other, ⁓ more ⁓ pet So I like doing little, buy a group tarantula slings, raise them up, then off a cup, most of them, except I keep one or two. my pets afterwards. So I raise the food and I raise the bugs that them. I also do have a couple Herp-tile pets myself. Unfortunately, when I moved away in universities when I had the height of my collection, my parents, I guess, reasoned ⁓ well, if he's... ⁓ keeping reptiles and amphibians, at least he's not going out and doing drugs and joining gangs. yeah, it's, with the amount we pay for hydro in Ontario, I'm surprised that my parents let me have as many tanks as I did. But when I moved off to go to university, my parents said, we'll take care of your sugar gliders, but we're not doing the rest of this all. Frograck: Yeah, right. Yep. Jordan: So unfortunately, had to re-home a lot of that, but still have a couple of the, that I'm living on my own, I'd course go and get a leopard gecko and, well, I the only amphibian species that I keep right now is a cane toad. Frograck: Yeah, yeah. sweet, what does that eat? Jordan: Anything it can fit in its mouth. it's only a year old and it's already, yeah, sizeable toad. it, ⁓ one my go-tos ⁓ now I'm cricket free for years, thankfully, ⁓ is I roaches. Team Roach all the way. ⁓ Frograck: Everything. Yeah. Cool. Yep. Yeah. Right. Jordan: They're cleaner. The not there. The noise there. They're easy to breed. They are nutritionally superior. Frograck: They say live better. Jordan: Yeah, oh, 100 % because you know, in the tank crickets will only live for like a week unless they escape and then they'll hide under your heaviest appliance and sure forever to remind you that you're gonna kill them. But yeah, oh, and so just like mites, when people hear roaches, they immediately think, I wouldn't want those in my house. No, no, no, no, no, no. There's over 4,000 species of cockroach globally. And like, probably less than 12 of them are actually problematic. Even the species that can ⁓ a pest problem, at least in Canada, I find, really there's only one that ⁓ is a problem, and that's German roaches. But... Frograck: Jeez. Yeah. Jordan: American roaches are, in my opinion, an outdoor species that accidentally ends up indoors and under the right circumstances can be problematic, especially if you're from a warmer climate. by and large, they're not chewing into your... have to have a dripping faucet. You have to have crumbs everywhere. You have to... ⁓ Frograck: Right. Jordan: have food and water available for them to become problematic. German roaches though, yeah, that's a whole different horse. Frograck: What is about German roaches that make them so ⁓ robust that they can infest a house? Jordan: Their size, the size of like their uthica, ⁓ the egg cases are, they're so small that it's very easy to miss that even if you're doing ⁓ a application, these days our pesticides are not as broad spectrum, they're more which often means that these pesticides aren't even ⁓ Frograck: Mm-hmm. Jordan: getting to all stages. What might kill the adults and the nymphs might not work on the eggs. And so when you have a species that small, it doesn't require much food. can, it's, it's a lot more adaptable to taking advantage of the situation rather than a larger species that also has ⁓ Frograck: Right. ⁓ Jordan: need for more food, water, all these sort of requirements. Frograck: Yep. I imagine that maybe a German roach can breed easily even in suboptimal temperatures. Jordan: That's another big part, yeah, is that they do fine at room temperature. if you're, I a couple of American Roach. They're special though, ⁓ the different color that you can get. ⁓ So yeah, have some that are white eyes and a morph called venom, which is menelistic and also has the white eye mutation. Frograck: Cool, yeah. Jordan: And so it's a black roach with white eyes. And I'm like, that's so cool. Trying to get them to breed is actually, you need a fair bit of heat. You're not gonna get that in Northern States or in Canada. So largely they're not as much of an issue. Whereas like you mentioned, German roaches are just fine. If you're fine, they're cool. Frograck: That's kind of cool, yeah. ⁓ Right. Yeah, right. What are some mistakes people make when using different feeder insects in really elaborate bioactive setups? Like what has the potential of going wrong there? Jordan: ⁓ hmm. What has the potential of going wrong? Frograck: I'm thinking roaches living in your substrate and growing too big. Jordan: That's definitely an issue. ⁓ One of roaches that I work with that I love as a feeder, Suriname roaches, they're great. They're soil roach, so that means that they get out, their water awful. They'll just die within about 48 hours. You'll find dead ones on the floor, dry it up. But because they're a soil roach, as soon as hit soil, they're burrowing. That means it's out of sight of your animal. They're also a greenhouse pest. And so it's like, you have a roach that's burrowing, that's feeding on your plant roots, that's parthenogenetic, so it clones itself, and the nymphs are tiny. So if one gets in there, it just takes one. Frograck: Right, right, right. That's sort of what I'm thinking. Okay. Jordan: That it's like you your plants a tank you'll notice over time. It'll start to decline and then ⁓ also notice that There's suddenly they got the soils moving a lot more and then if you do some investigation You'll see why your plants doing so aren't doing so hot That's that's probably one of the big drawbacks to serenams so While they are awesome low maintenance roach love using them It's very situational. There's species that's best, I feed off with tongs. So I know my animal's getting fed directly, and yeah, there's no chance for that serinam to hide because ⁓ that off your feeding schedule, ⁓ the not getting fed on time. And then nutritional profile changes the ⁓ longer ⁓ roaches eating what you're feeding right? ⁓ Frograck: Right. Right. Jordan: I've also had other where like, I thought it was going to be a good addition, and then it ends up that... ⁓ started eating the plants in the tank because it didn't have what I was feeding it before. it's starting, I was starting to, yeah, two holes in my plants and I didn't think it, well, didn't realize it was, the was that broad for that species. So it's a lot of... My knowledge base for this has been obtained through trial and error. Because there's not a lot of information out there right now. This is still like a relatively young hobby, So it's, you gotta be careful with what you're adding to your tanks sometimes. Or you have to be, you to take the to make sure you have feeding methods ensure that the getting the food when you give it to them. And that the feeder is not just walking around the house doing what it wants on own time. Frograck: Sure, Let's stay on roaches. We'll move into sort of my questions about culturing. Other than dubia, what's a species of roach that you think hobbyists like myself could pick up and give a try at culturing? Jordan: Because you're in the US, you have so many more options. I'm genuinely jealous. ⁓ Red runners are a great food source. They like it really hot. They only get to the size of roughly a house cricket. They're soft bodied. Yeah, that is definitely one I... Frograck: Okay. Right, right. Mm-hmm. Jordan: highly recommend people look into. And because they're such a high heat species, it's like if they get out, you really don't need to worry about it. Frograck: Mm-hmm. Jordan: What for Canadians, government has been, they're very restrictive ⁓ what exotic insects they will allow people to use. With some justification, it's like you don't want it getting out and becoming a agricultural pest. But the fact that you guys can keep tropical roaches in the Northern States and not have them be a problem, but suddenly if the word Frograck: Right, right. They're... Yeah. Fear of agriculture, yeah. Jordan: used in Canada, the government thinks that it would be an issue. But just recently, they it was less than three ⁓ ago, maybe, that legalized disco approaches. So for Canadians, that's a big one that we're excited for. Frograck: Okay. Right. So Canada and Florida are all about the discoid roaches. Jordan: And it's actually it's funny you mentioned Florida because Because discoids have been used for so long that a lot of the ⁓ the in in both America and in Canada now Has they're hybridized and so these These discoid brooches are so closely related to death head brooches and parabolicus and some other species that basically like versions of discoid brooches that in the course of ⁓ using them feeders we just end up being hybridized. when ⁓ you hybridize a species that gives it Frograck: Okay. Jordan: hybrid bigger. You're giving it genetic diversity, that's a plus. When you hybridize between species, that's when you start coming to problems because, you know, in some aspects it might be good. So ⁓ you ⁓ a horse and a donkey, you get ⁓ a mule, stronger, but also infertile because it doesn't have the same chromosome number. Frograck: Mmm. Jordan: And so. you these hybrid roaches, the issue that is really coming up is that they are very slow, slow growing ⁓ also ⁓ breeding, the fertility is impacted. And so there is company down in the States called Roach Crossing where the ⁓ owner actually went to ⁓ ⁓ two locations in Florida that these these discord roaches got out and established feral populations and it was so early on it was before all these other these other roaches were brought in that hybridized and so they ⁓ it's almost like a time capsule of these these purebred populations ⁓ yeah he he went and he collected them Frograck: Right, right. Jordan: I believe the one was a resort called Banana Bay ⁓ resort ended up being demolished and I think that it might have ended up leading to the demise of that feral population. yeah, he ⁓ away those ⁓ individuals and those ⁓ So have both hybrid discoids and purebred discoids and there is a difference. The... The one variety, Redlands, much faster. The other one, Banana Bay, has great fertility. The hybrids seem to have the worst of both worlds. And so it's, ⁓ we are ⁓ towards better feeders, I feel like... The discoids almost kind of flopped a bit when they first came on the scene here because the ⁓ imports were genetic trash. It took months to get a generation and that's too long a practical feeder insect. Crickets, you can raise... Frograck: Right, right. Jordan: two or three generations of prickets in that amount of time. So, it's unfortunate, but there's also, there's no perfect fear insect. And so that's why it's important, like the key with, with... Frograck: Yeah. Jordan: Creating a good diet for your animal, I'd say, ⁓ tied to the diversity of what you're feeding it. You just feed it one thing, you're not going to be checking off all the boxes for it. It's like, you can get close with some feeders, but then not enough. So think that for an ideal situation, you want as much diversity in the diet as possible, as practically possible. Frograck: For our Canadian friends listening who do have access to discoids as one of their few options, how are they different? ⁓ me, I can't visually tell the difference between dubia and discoids, ⁓ as nymphs. But just because they look the same, do you keep them the same? Do ⁓ sort of culture them the same? How would you set up like a small home, you know, DIY culture of discoids? Jordan: So because the discoids are a longer lived species and they are very similar to ⁓ Dubia. Dubia are a little bit smaller and they culture a little bit faster but there's a lot of overlap. ⁓ I'd say though one of the main differences is that I personally feel that ⁓ substrate to dig in as nymphs. They extensively. Frograck: Okay. Gotcha. Jordan: and having substrate helps keep the humidity high. You need the humidity high if you're gonna do well with the species. A lot of people that are having trouble, it comes down to two major points is that you're not keeping them hot enough. They need 25 to 30, I don't know what that is in American, let's see, over 80, yeah. Frograck: over 80, we're smart enough to do the conversion. Jordan: You guys are, I'm just a simple bug farmer. And then yeah, pair that with the high humidity. like 60 to 70 % humidity. ⁓ so if you're ⁓ that in a bare bottom tank, you're gonna be struggling. If you're doing that with egg cartons ⁓ their hides, you're gonna get mold. ⁓ Frograck: Okay. Yeah, that's gonna go bad fast, yeah. Jordan: And so I keep my discoids almost... like pets. They're not pets. They don't get, well, some of them get individual names. But no, no, they are in tanks that actually have like bark and substrate and they get fresh fruits and vegetables. I don't keep them like I would crickets or there's certain insects that you can cultural. culture in a more sterile environment like fruit flies. But for other ones you're going to want to mimic, you're going to want to add a tank that makes it look like it's a pet. keep it nice. And you that the animals are less stressed and when you this applies to anything, it's less stressed it's going to do better. Frograck: Right. Yeah. Jordan: And so yeah, my discoids, like ⁓ the leaf litter, leaf litter is in all the tanks because even if it gives them something to chew on, gives them something to hide under, the more naturalistic setup I would say for ⁓ is where you're going to get better returns than if you try to raise it like it is a... Frograck: Right, right. I imagine keeping in a higher humidity culturing tub for discoids. People probably don't like that because then it's difficult to harvest large quantities all at once to feed a whole bunch of ⁓ nymphs of same size since they're in substrate. Jordan: That's true. It does take more effort to harvest. I don't have a good counter for that. It's going to be a little bit more work. Now you can get screens, which actually is my method, is I just screen them out. honestly, you don't need that kind of a screen because the nymphs are at least... Frograck: Okay. Yep. Jordan: quarter inch, maybe little so, I guess they'd probably be a little bit smaller than that even. But your substrate can go through a screen and it's small. ⁓ And it's yeah, you're gonna have to them out, but. Frograck: Right. Jordan: They'll be, your survival rate goes up when you have substrate. Yum. because of the lowering of the stress. The more, sorry, go ahead. Frograck: Yep. do you, ⁓ ⁓ what do you like to feed your roaches? ⁓ what, when you're culturing roaches, I imagine you're giving them a really good complete diet. eat almost anything. what, ⁓ what do you, ⁓ in your routine for feeding all your roach colonies? Jordan: of the keys is that they need produce. I don't give roaches access to water. Insects drown in a small amount of water. It's one of my beef with crickets. You can have crickets in room size enclosure. ⁓ I used to work on cricket farm too. It's part of where I got the hate. is ⁓ and there were these these troves that they had where they would give them the water and it's literally just a very very very small amount of water going down these troves and crickets would just die they would just drown in it and it's like you can yeah you can put a tiny film of water in a cup in a far side of the room the cricket was just i don't know they're drawn to it it's like they just need to get in there ⁓ Frograck: Yeah. Jordan: So a large portion of the moisture requirements obtained from the diet and you need to have fresh produce. Like you mentioned, brooches aren't particularly picky. If you want to seem go nuts, yeah, you give them a little bit of protein. And they'll, they eating fish flakes. That's like roach crap for them. different, the proteins, sorry, be. ⁓ a very large portion of the diet, because now actually we're finding that when you feed roaches too much protein, they sequester it as octalic acid, and that can actually gout in your cat of animals if you feed them high roaches. it's important to, and that's another reason why you should culture your feeders at home if you can, is you don't know what they Frograck: Okay. Jordan: what the feeders have been fed before they came to you. So, ⁓ on what a nutritionally improved is, but we don't know what they're feeding it. And so just got to go on their word. ⁓ And I just recently found out about the effects of feeding too much protein to roaches and the negative consequences it has for your pets. ⁓ Frograck: Interesting, yeah. Jordan: Now I'm sure there's other aspects of... in the same vein, that we don't always know the consequences of... feed of what we do, actions of what we feed our animals and ⁓ it impacts them down the line. Frograck: Right, yeah, there's so much more to learn here. right, ⁓ on from roaches. I think I'd like to try culturing peanut beetles. I think I have some in a tub of Red Runners. They're a small dermisted beetle of some sort. So I ⁓ think I isolate them and give them a try. And the reason I like it is because if I can, and maybe you give me some tips, if I can find a efficient way of harvesting peanut beetle larvae, Jordan: Hmm. Frograck: They're nice and small for like metamorphosed newts and fire-bellied toads, which even sorting out and finding the smallest mealworm is usually too big for them. So tell me about culturing peanut beetles, and especially if you have any tips on how to harvest the larva. Jordan: Absolutely. yeah, beetles, great choice. Very like great nutritional profile on those. And they do have a little bit of a lower chitin than yellow mealworms. So also another plus. What makes me smile lot of the time is that because of their common name, a lot of people seem they're like, they need peanuts. And I'm like. They don't actually need... You're making expensive feeders by... What I find for peanut beetles is they will do just fine on rolled oats. Keep them dry. Frograck: Yeah Jordan: And have literally just raised my peanut beetles on oatmeal before and then the best way to harvest them is I'm all about the screaming sieve. If you use a substrate that ⁓ oats, then it is relatively simple to get a decent amount of larvae falling through that, whatever you use sieve it out. because the larvae obviously are smaller than the diameter of a rolled out and then if you have a bunch of frass that comes through with them, well then just get a fine sieve, the frass applies through, you keep the worms and then rub it through mother's brother. Frograck: Gotcha. Nice, okay. Cool, do they need any, do they need moisture? Do you throw a carrot in with them the way that you do with mealworms? Jordan: While they do, they'll mob it ⁓ you put in a carrot, they don't necessarily require a carrot because one of the neat things about these beetles, and mealworms too as well actually, ⁓ beetles in general are able to sequester moisture from the air. And so I've kept generations dry. They don't need source of moisture like that. Frograck: cool. Jordan: However, they do a little bit better if you do provide a carrot. Mind you, you have to keep it, the setup that you're raising them in, very ventilated. As soon as moisture into that substrate, then you're asking for mite problems. Frograck: ⁓ sure, can see that, I can imagine that, Jordan: Because that's one of the things that I've had to deal with over the years is like... You know, I'll defend the name of mites for the good ones, but like, green mites are just... They're awful. I wouldn't wish on an animal. It's like, and yeah, you know, it's like, ⁓ once you see one, the next thing you know, you'll see billions. They just, they cover every surface and they're awful and they're just like, even if they're not directly hurting my animals, Frograck: Yeah, real nuisance, right? Mm-hmm. Jordan: they are definitely causing problems just by all the numbers. the one way to keep away from mites ⁓ becoming problem is keep your down. So yeah, you can add a carrot or you can add a chunk of potato if you want because that will improve the longevity of the adult beetles. That'll improve the amount of eggs that the female can produce. you make sure that like, yeah, keep that ventilation high. Because you're obviously gonna keep the temperature up as well because... Frograck: Okay. Jordan: while they can breed and survive at normal room temperature, they do a little bit better if you give them a little bit more heat. But yeah, obviously heat and moisture, that's a dangerous combination sometimes. Frograck: gonna get pretty gross in there, insect I have a question about is mantids. They can make an okay feeder as a feeder insect. Obviously like the hatchlings right out of the uthica might be appropriate for certain animals. But I've tried, now I've never tried to culture, I know people keep mantids as pets and probably reproduce them in captivity, but I've only ever dealt with them by just finding uthica in the wild, usually in like August and September and bringing them inside. But must be doing something wrong because I do not get good hatch rate from wild collected mantid uthica. Do you have any tips on that? Jordan: Okay, so I guess first I should say, while I offer Utica, I don't breed mantids. It's a fair amount of work. And so the amount of work that goes into breeding them successfully would sort of negate their usefulness as turning those insects into feeders. But wild-collecting uths, yeah. Frograck: Mm-hmm. Sure. I bet. ⁓ yeah, great. Jordan: That's a good food source right there. And especially because, you can control the situation right off the bat. know, it's a technically a wild collected feeder, but you don't have to worry about pesticides or any of that. When you hatch out the youth, when the eggs are in the youth, you don't need to worry about the humidity quite as much. But when you are hatching them, you need to make sure that you do have the RH up high enough. because mantids, any that small, desiccates ⁓ super ⁓ And so I find the best way to hatch out these oots is ⁓ usually get like a 32 ounce deli and then a moist paper towel in the bottom and then put the ooth ⁓ and then. Frograck: Right. Jordan: Usually if you're keeping it at room temperature, you're gonna see something in between between three and six weeks usually The humidity is absolutely key when you have hatching because as soon as that oothe opens, then the nymphs are depending on the air humidity. Before that point, whatever foam, the female sprays around it, that's ideal insulation. So I would say ⁓ increase the humidity and you might see a slightly better hatching rate, but it's also dependent on the fertility. whether the female actually got to mate before those eggs. so it's, I have a really good spot to get these ouds. It's like, it's between three vineyards. So the bird bangers keep the ⁓ from to the adult mantis ⁓ and like, it's a mantis mecca. They love it there. And the very, very high fertility in those ouds. Frograck: Nice. Right, right. Cool. Cool. ⁓ you know, where we live, we get pretty extreme winters and the, the oaths make it through the winter and hash out in the spring. If I understand the natural history correctly is a cold dormancy required to get an oath to hatch. Like if I, if I collect some in like September, does it need to experience cold or would I be able to just bring it inside and hatch it in six weeks? Jordan: From my experience at least, so I've never tried to hatch it without the winter diapause or winter rest. Although from my experience, some species don't actually require it. Northern walking sticks, which are the only species of basmid that we get up here in Canada, sorry, one of two, there is another one. But anyways, that species, if the eggs, are warm long enough the babies inside just are like well I guess I guess we'll hatch and so ⁓ will hatch without that diapause requirement it's just they don't synchronize with their brothers and sisters it's they all just sort of pick their own best time to go out and a ⁓ there are with not having that diapause in there in that it You just, you have a random age stratification. With mantids. I believe that at least some cold period is required. don't know how long that period has to be. So another example, like Sacropia moths and other species that are adapted to northern climates, they do require that cold period in order to successfully complete their development, which I'm ⁓ speculating may be to the ooths. Now because they are a species that ⁓ is an introduced species, they may be a little bit more flexible in their requirements. Usually the minimum ⁓ of winter rest a lot of species require from my experience is about eight weeks. That's like domestic silkworms. Frograck: Sure. Jordan: and I would probably, again, speculation, would think that the mantids are probably similar to that too. ⁓ You can go out and collect an ooth in December. It's probably been cold long enough for it that you'll get a hatch, but maybe that's another thing that I would consider if you're looking to improve your hatch rates from the ooths you collect. Frograck: Yeah. Jordan: may just make sure that they have that full amount of... of cold ⁓ to trigger that hatch. Frograck: Yep. At least a few weeks of it. Yep. So when I think about tree frogs, I don't even know if I'm right about this. I imagine maybe some of their diet comes from ⁓ caterpillars, but the same token, so many caterpillars have defensive mechanisms that make them unpalatable, whether it's like the little hairs or, you know, bright colors and ⁓ poison and But to solve that problem, we have a domesticated moth. you know, domestic silkworm. So deep dive me into the, like, where did silkworms come from? Why are they domesticated? And then maybe transition to their life cycle before we start talking about them as feeders. Jordan: sure. Silkworms were domesticated in China. were, these are the ⁓ source commercial silk which as a ⁓ for making clothes it's like yeah that was one of the, what's one of the best you can get back then which is why it was ⁓ so ⁓ closely guarded. The Chinese, the emperors would execute anyone who was trying to remove the eggs from China. And so it was, I believe, some Tibetan monks at one point ⁓ eggs out of China in Holodat walking staffs to get them to the outside world. these moths have been so extensively selectively bred that they have, most people are familiar with the all white version which is one of the typical signs of domestication is the animal loses its camouflage. But we've also bred them ⁓ to have colored which I find fascinating. worked with varieties of silkworm that naturally ⁓ golden silk, that spin ⁓ silk, that spin pink silk. It's, fascinating how many different varieties of silkworm are out there. Most people are only familiar with the one that's commercially used as feeders, but there are... hundreds and hundreds of varieties in China and and closer you get to an animal's domestication origin the more varieties you're going to find But broadly speaking we have bred it so that the moths don't fly Now now female moths being flightless in in their adult stages is not uncommon amongst the wild species but the males being being flightless is not because the males go find the females emitting the pheromones and mate with them and we took care of that and we said no no no don't we've got you covered and the males don't fly either the wings barely give them lift move around ⁓ Frograck: Yeah. Jordan: because their abdomens are so fat. beyond that, we've made it so that, domestication isn't just physical changes. There are behavioral and physiological changes that happen where the, anyone who's kept a caterpillar, if it runs out of food, the caterpillar's gonna go that entire container looking for something to eat. And if you have it in a big cage, going to ⁓ that whole cage looking for its food plant. Silkworms don't do that. Silkworms so domesticated that you can keep them in an open tray. They won't further than six inches looking their food. After that, they just throw up their hands and they give up. Well, I guess there's no more ⁓ Frograck: Guess I'm gonna die. Jordan: Yeah, that's basically it because once capillars stop eating, the clock starts ticking and it lights out if they don't get fed soon enough. And so it's the equivalent of... cattle and ⁓ horses don't jump the fences. We've domesticated them so that don't have that urge to escape. Just there. And so ⁓ these are the insect of cattle. They don't go for their food. They expected to be to them. So it's amazing that Human beings have alongside animals for so long that we become interdependent. We use them for ⁓ obviously silk, is an amazing material that not only soft, it's waterproof and ⁓ it's got many good qualities to it that I see why ⁓ there was interest creating a stable, dependable domestic supply of that. I guess it always going off on a slight tangent here. ⁓ The domestication process has just fascinated me because when you look at the wild version of things and you think to yourself, as early human beings looked at that and thought to themselves. Frograck: That's right. Jordan: I bet we can turn that into something that work alongside with us. the only ⁓ that people tend to selectively breathe for early on is its tolerance to human beings. Can it stand to be around us? And with like, they've done domestication experiments with foxes ⁓ in Russia. I'm sure if you've ever heard about... experiment but it's fascinating in that the researchers only picked for foxes that weren't afraid of them or aggressive. They picked up for people friendly foxes and then traits like floppy ears, ⁓ coloration, curly tails, like things started happening to ⁓ foxes that they weren't they weren't selecting for but just by shrinking that gene pool and just selecting for Frograck: Right, right. Jordan: foxes that want to be around people, start seeing neat traits start to crop up. that's, I've always just found that fascinating that you, and the that we did with insects ⁓ and done it with so many different species is, I think, just of neat. Frograck: So before I took an interest in silkworms as a possible feeder insect, I actually became aware of their food source, the domesticated mulberry tree, because I do sort of ⁓ some agriculture type things, big garden, big orchard. ⁓ And in the world of what's known as permaculture, it's ⁓ people who just looking at all sorts of plants and ecosystems and how to create, you know, not mono crop agriculture, but how to create a type of agriculture where there's a lot of symbiosis going on between different plant clades and even wildlife. And mulberry trees can play a really good role in a permaculture orchard. ⁓ they also are known as a fodder crop because they're very palatable to things like goats and ⁓ the leaves can even be fed to pigs and the leaves, what got, you know, homestead type people so interested in mulberry trees, isn't just the, the little fruit is great. ⁓ can eat mulberry berries. kind of cool that it's a full-sized tree that makes an edible sweet berry. But so can your livestock, you know, just put chickens under the tree and they'll clean up every berry. And then the leaves are high in protein. So it's like, it's an amazing, very versatile, ⁓ tree and the reason the tree is so versatile is because of domestication and selective breeding over thousands of years for the silkworm industry, not for any other sort of agricultural endeavor. And so I thought it was really interesting that you in your own experimentations and processes, you're dealing with mulberry trees and silkworms together. Jordan: Absolutely and it's it's interesting Well first speak to it's like yeah Mulberry is ⁓ it's it's a plant in that it's it's very nutritionally It's a high nutrition plant. It does really well. It grows it can grow in in absolute crap conditions Like even old industrial sites, it's like mulberries just coming up and the, ⁓ settlers who first came here when they, they were, building America and Canada, ⁓ creating as nations, like they, they brought over Mulberry on purpose because they're like, we're going to create a North American silk industry. yeah. And they in the future, they're just like, ⁓ yeah, Mulberry, it, it'll be great. Frograck: Mm-hmm. Jordan: grow everywhere and then we can feed our silkworms easily. ⁓ Frograck: And then they got distracted by gold. they all became panhandlers. Jordan: ⁓ yeah. Okay, gold has had a lure. ⁓ Frograck: Yeah. Jordan: It's and so it's and I guess they we didn't really foresee it's like oh we'll be making a lot of our clothes out of like polyester and petrochemicals and stuff it's like so that that tree that initially was um a good thing that we wanted to establish here in North America um is now the villain because there there was already a mulberry tree that was here red mulberry Frograck: Right, right. Right, right. Jordan: And the problem with that is that it wasn't being cultivated by people here. because of that, it's not quite as hardy and it's as robust as white mulberry. That's from the old world. So excuse me. And then it's just like, the fruits are dropping everywhere and they're staining my driveway and this invasive plant is just taking over all these spaces. And because not as many people are farming silkworms now, those dreams sort of fell a little bit flat. so it's... it's sad because the hero lived long enough to become the villain so these mulberry trees are everywhere ⁓ and guess part ⁓ my with my project is it's just like if you can't beat them, eat them Invasive species, yes, they are a problem because when they're introduced to an ecosystem they're not native to, they don't have those controls, they don't have limits. And that leads to things getting overpopulated or them eating more than what they're supposed to or displacing other things. So, well, of the best things to do is, why don't just cut these down? ⁓ And I'm not removing the roots so it keeps the soil structure, but when I cut it for the leaves, I'm opening up that space underneath it for other plants to now grow and also I'm feeding my caterpillars because ⁓ silkworms only eat mulberry. And like that... That's ended up with me able to, mulberries everywhere. They are, ⁓ and one has a problem with you removing them because, ⁓ like said, we don't need them anymore. ⁓ So this project is just like, it was just, it was so obvious. It's like, well, why don't I raise silkworms? Because, well. Frograck: Yeah, yeah. Jordan: the one of the main components of the artificial diet that I'm creating, which is ⁓ part of the Mulberry Adventures is I to try and create that diet here. And so it's taking an species ⁓ and we're controls for it now. We can't expect. I don't know, in my opinion a lot of the time if once something's here long enough, does a way to adjust itself so that it becomes part ⁓ of web. It's sure when you were growing up you heard the same thing I did with purple loose stripes gonna be the only plant in swamps one day ⁓ it's gonna take over everything and like well that ⁓ didn't up really happening because we we end up bringing controls and like over time Ecosystems will will find a way to balance themselves out. ⁓ Sorry, but go ahead Frograck: So. Yeah. If I was just, I was just going to join you on the tangent of invasive plants. if people think, if people think invasive, like reptiles is a hot topic, invasive plants is pretty fascinating. Cause ⁓ you said, most of the invasive plant problems we have were started by the colonizers of North America. So ⁓ pretty, we're many genera, we're many generations removed, from the introduction. And so we're just dealing with the follow-up and the consequences. One example where I live is black locust trees are technically an invasive species in my state. ⁓ the state ⁓ just a few years ago, banned them. And like, how do you ban a tree? Well, they banned commercial propagation and like, you know, they don't want landscape purposely propagating them and selling them to homeowners as ornamental trees for their house. Jordan: Hmm. everybody. Frograck: but like the cat's out of the bag. But what I've noticed about black locust trees, they ⁓ grow on ⁓ banks in So there's river that I live close to, a big major river that ⁓ empties out the Atlantic. And if you down stretches of it, many, stretches of it are very pristine. Northern New England, beautiful, ⁓ tall, mostly white pine forests right along the riverbanks. But every time you get close to industrialization or city centers, all along the riverbank is black locust. And I think it's because of, you know, the soil had been destroyed at some point by humans and the black locust is a pioneer species that came in to fill it up. And then the only other place I see it is along railroad tracks for the very same reason. they plowed the beautiful Northern New England forest build a railroad. I don't have any objections to that. And they put down gravel to make sure that the forest wouldn't encroach, but the black locust tree can encroach, because it can find its roots in that gravel bed. And so, you know, similar to like ⁓ white mulberry, it serves an niche that isn't necessarily that bad and you sort of only have to look at it, well, is it actually being destructive to the natural ecosystem? And other times it can live symbiotically with the natural ecosystem and like you're pointing out, we can find uses for it. Jordan: guess part of the thing is that ⁓ black locust is a legume actually ⁓ so it that nitrifying bacteria that it can actually ⁓ that it soil quality because like you're saying this tree is able to live where others can't and is to take advantage of poor nutrient soil because it has that ⁓ ability to Frograck: Right. Jordan: to gain the nitrogen. Now, with black locusts, it is native to North America. so problem I have with, ⁓ I think the term invasive species gets thrown around a lot these days, and it justifies us doing things to animals and plants ⁓ we wouldn't find acceptable. ⁓ Frograck: Yeah, to fix nitrogen. Jordan: in most circumstances for others. So it's like... It... And I understand why people can feel animosity towards these and introduced species, which do often do better in certain circumstances than the native species because these... the invasives tough. They only become invasive because they can put up with a lot. Frograck: Right. Right. Mm-hmm. Jordan: And so, you can hate on them because they're doing well and other species aren't, but that overlooks our role in altering the ecosystem so that there is much more limited space now and we've impacted that space. So early on, it's even... The native populations in North America historically helped spread black walnut because that was a good food treat for them. So black walnut was brought much further north than it naturally occurred. It didn't normally grow this far north into Canada. ⁓ a more southern species. so in my opinion, ⁓ species has a fixed range. Frograck: Sure, sure. Jordan: And human beings, I guess, have this idea that it's like, only we could get back to ⁓ way things used to be. And it's like, ⁓ don't think we ever can. And so, yeah, there's a bunch of species that we don't think of as invasive. Dandelions? I didn't that. Or, yeah, plantains. a bunch of species we don't think. Earthworms ⁓ aren't native to Frograck: ⁓ yeah? Mm-hmm. Jordan: The glaciers have been going this far, but earthworms also have a, they can be good in the right situations, but they can also have a negative impact in other situations. It's like when you introduce them to a forest that didn't have these, these super decomposers, cause like they do break down organic waste really well. Frograck: No kidding. Jordan: So then you went from a forest with layers and layers of duff and litter to one that now is, it's much less than it used to be, historically speaking. Obviously that has an impact on the native fauna that lived in that space. Can we go, ⁓ can we back to what it used be? I honestly don't think we can. ⁓ Frograck: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Jordan: And so when you have species also invasive. that just means it wasn't there originally ⁓ and it's there and causing problems. So, black locust trees, who's to say if human beings weren't even on the scene whether they would naturally eventually get up to expand the range up here ⁓ as did? In Canada... Frograck: Right, right. Jordan: We have barred owls that as the climate's gotten warmer are now making their way westwards. We also have another species that's related to it called spotted owls that are in BC, that are endangered species. And they're smaller than barred owls. can't, ⁓ when go toe to toe, barred owls win every time. And so ⁓ for little while, I'm not sure if the program's still there, but like. Frograck: Mm-hmm. Yeah. ⁓ Jordan: we were shooting barred owls to prevent them from reaching BC. And it's just how long are you going to try and do this ⁓ save the spotted owl? it's like, yes, barred owls will negatively impact spotted owls, but you also want to know what else impacts them? Cutting down the Old Growth Forest where they nest. Frograck: Gotcha. Wow. Yeah. Jordan: It's like, house had destruction. We're not building less because of the spotted owls, but we'll kill other species so that we can buy 10 more years. Like I said, calling something invasive gives people justification to treat it less than they would... I don't know. Frograck: Hmm. Interesting. Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. Yeah. And I don't claim to know what's morally superior here. It's fascinating to think about. If at the end of the day, the important thing is that an ecosystem has owls in it, then maybe just let the barred owls do their thing. ⁓ then we would somehow feel, humans somehow feel responsible that we've ⁓ done disservice and an injustice. Jordan: Yeah, it allows for action, but... Right, it's. ⁓ Frograck: and damage to the environment by possibly being the cause, ultimately perhaps we were the cause of the spotted owl going extinct or something. And so we're just trying to maybe do damage control over the effects we have on the environment. Jordan: It's at a certain point, it almost feels like a little too late. And like, I don't want to be flipping and just be like, well, you know, all species go extinct eventually, which now. ⁓ Yeah. so I'm not advocating for like, ⁓ you know, just introduce species to wherever. ⁓ Frograck: Yes, so let let humanity run amok. Yeah. Right, right. Jordan: As human beings, we have a responsibility to be stewards of the environment. That said, important to recognize that keeping the last two Northern white alive, you're not going to rebuild the species ⁓ from two individuals. just won't. ⁓ And then, ⁓ like you said, looking at functionality as well, because would you rather have ⁓ Frograck: Yes, especially if they don't have suitable habitat. Jordan: No owls ⁓ introduced owl that functionally does the same thing ⁓ the spotted owl. And I'm not, ⁓ not to diminish the spotted owl going extinct, regardless what role we play in that. But it's it's being a little bit pragmatic about the situation and ⁓ I know. Frograck: Yep, all right, fun tangent. Thanks for indulging me on the plants. Let's crank out the husbandry at each life stage of a silkworm. So, just for the sake of the conversation, assume that I bought some silkworm eggs from you or from another vendor. What do I do with silkworm eggs? Jordan: So first thing is that eggs are the overwintering ⁓ of the silkworm. And so they will come, you want keep them cold before you hatch them. ⁓ and that a species that does require ⁓ the winter in order to hatch. ⁓ The eggs hatch without a cold period. And so, Frograck: Okay. Jordan: If you're not hatching them right away, you need to keep them cold. Or if you're hatching them, know that at room temperature you're going to have emergence at around 10 and 12 days. Once the silkworms hatch out, they're absolutely tiny. And when you're about hatch the eggs ⁓ and ⁓ when they're very young, very important to keep the humidity appropriately high, but also recognize that insects drown super easily. so one of the little tricks when you are hatching the eggs of any moth or butterfly is that when you have it in a container, no holes in the container to start. And to any humidity, Frograck: Yeah. Jordan: you need to do it with your breath. so you just crack open the container and, The moisture in your breath is enough moisture to the humidity high enough for the eggs without actually creating water droplets which would drown any of ⁓ new hatched caterpillars. ⁓ so once they hatch out, Frograck: Okay. Jordan: You want to wait for probably about 24 hours before you offer them their first meal. They've had the yolk in the egg to sort of like sustain them up to hatch and then after they hatch their first meal is actually the eggshell. Nature, know, waste not want not ⁓ type approach. When you offer them their first ⁓ meal, ⁓ prefer offer it actually the first thing I give them is usually a bit of artificial chow because when you offer them leaves, Frograck: Cool. Yeah. Jordan: the fresh cut leaves are still respiring. And if you are not very careful with how much you offer them, then you're gonna get humidity buildup. Because the key with raisin silkworms is ventilation levels. So we went from newly hatched, no holes in the lid. Then, a couple days later, you're gonna want a couple more holes, you're gonna want a put some holes in that lid, but not too many because small insects desiccate super quickly. so you get your ventilation correct, the amount of food you're offering them, and then the frass. When they're just tiny, you don't need to worry about that. That's barely dust. The whole growth period of the silkworm is completed in just over 30 days. The amount of growth that happens in these animals is just astonishing. It's like they are getting thousands of times the size that they were when they first hatched. And so you're calibrating the amount of food you're giving them because the caterpillars do best when they have Frograck: Yeah. Jordan: constant access to food. And then the other aspect is waste management. And so as the caterpillars get bigger, you start offering more food, increasing the ventilation, and then you can get the, and then you have to do something about the waste. So like I said, at first, it's not really an issue. But as they get bigger, as all animals get bigger, they create bigger poops. And so... That's when you want to start moving them onto screens so that the frass drops right through. Makes for easier cleanup. And also you can remove the food a lot easier because with that increasing ventilation, you're also making sure that the mold's controlled. Which is, I guess, the three trifectas of raising your silkworms, the ventilation, the food and the waste management. The waste management is important because mold is a number one killer of insects. If you want to call any killer, that's mold. And domestic silkworms have an awful immune system. If you sneeze on them, it's like, I guess I'll get new ones because they just do not take any bacteria. Frograck: Right. Thank Jordan: contamination they handle mold. And frass humidity and ⁓ nutrient rich it's like that's a recipe for mold everywhere. And so ⁓ it's very to do the clean out. Frograck: Mm. Right. Jordan: The cleaning out is just as important as the feeding. ⁓ Frograck: Yep. What's a good temperature to let them grow at? Jordan: I'd say they do just fine at room temperature. They don't need any supplemental heating. ⁓ Frograck: Okay. All right. They're not, they don't need, they don't need it to be hot. Okay. Jordan: And that's especially important when you have the eggs. Like you don't want to keep them too hot. Keeping yeah. ⁓ If comfy, they're comfy. Frograck: Okay. When does a little batch of silkworm worms grow out of a like deli cup? Do you ever move them up to something bigger? Jordan: Yeah, I'd say so after about, usually by the time they're in there, so each growth stage a molt, ⁓ I'm very, I'm not how familiar you with insect biology and stuff, so I'm not gonna start throwing out terms, jargon. An instar is the ⁓ stages in between molts, And so by the time they are ⁓ on their third instar, Frograck: Okay. Jordan: They've gotten some length to them now. You can even start for certain varieties if you're raising like, I have tiger silkworms, which are the black version or the all dark version. And then I have zebra silkworms. Once they start getting big enough, you can start seeing the coloration on them or they get to a decent, once they're over a half inch, then you should start moving them to trace, you still want that humidity to be kept on the higher side, but you do still want good airflow. That's important. It's like, just because you keep something humid doesn't mean that you don't provide ventilation. It require a little bit more work, obviously, because it's easy to just keep things stagnant and humid. ⁓ But that's, ⁓ Frograck: Mm. Jordan: That's when you run into problems with mold. So it's like as they get bigger. Sorry. Frograck: If they were in, if they were in like plastic shoe boxes or plastic sweater boxes, do you need a lid at all? Like, are they going to climb out? Jordan: No, you don't need a lid. I have raised them in plastic shoeboxes because it's easy to just do different lids for each stage. like when I first start it's so when they when they get to that second and third instars you start putting holes in the lids and then by the time they've grown to say like a little over an inch then you can start doing Frograck: No. Cool. Jordan: half screen lids and then by the time they're they're they're bigger than that it's like you don't need lids and the lids were just to keep the humidity in the the worms literally they they don't go anywhere it's been a bit of a surprise for I like I didn't start with silkworms I started with other caterpillars and so it's just like if I didn't have a lid on them and you don't have food for them they'll just go looking for food Frograck: Gotcha. Right. That's you said. Jordan: But the silkworms are literally just waiting for you to bring it to them. Frograck: Okay, and so I have white mulberry trees on my property. So if I'm doing this in season spring, summer, fall, or spring and summer really, I could do this by just picking leaves every day and throwing some leaves at the worms. That would work out okay. Jordan: Yeah, absolutely. And I prefer to the fresh leaves because it the mortality lower, actually. ⁓ The naturally should eating leaves. We've just ⁓ them long that we know what we... We've studied them enough and they're readily available enough to human beings that we've figured out how to make the artificial diet. Frograck: Mm-hmm. Jordan: which does use the leaves as a component, but... can never mimic nature. You can never do better than nature. Frograck: Give people, obviously if you buy the artificial diet you don't have access to the trees or you're doing this in the winter time when the trees don't have leaves on them, just, obviously the package of artificial diet has instructions on it, but just give people an idea of what they might be getting into. If they've never done this and they wanna give it a try, how do you prep the diet and how often do you have to prep the diet and what is it like feeding it out every day? Jordan: So the diet usually is like it's fairly, simple in its preparation. some aspects you have to remember ⁓ that it's, soapworms, like I said, awful immune system, so you want to make sure you're prepping it clean. You're ⁓ washing your, you're putting in clean containers and you're washing your hands and you're taking precautions to make it as clean as possible during the preparation. you often just add water. Frograck: Mm-hmm. Jordan: to it, it has to be hot enough that the agar in it can gelatinize solidify. Once you have sort of added the to the diet and mixed it enough the consistency is good, you let it set and then cool it and then at this point you can... cut it up into portion it and then the part is storing it correctly. So ⁓ in refrigerator it can store for months. Sorry, in freezer it can store for months. In the refrigerator you're looking at weeks ⁓ and at room temperature you might have it for a couple days. And so ⁓ at that point you're dialing it into the number of silkworms you have because silkworms won't eat dry diet. Once it dries out, gets all crumbly, they'll just turn the nose up at it. ⁓ If it's too wet though, then won't feed it on it either because it's not anything that it can really bite into. So that balance is important. Frograck: Mm-hmm. Gotcha. Jordan: But once you have it prepped and you have it stored properly, it's just a matter of porcing it out at the right rate make sure your silkworms always have food available but don't have so much food that stuff goes uneaten because uneaten food just becomes moldy food and then mold becomes dead cap. Frograck: Right, okay. All right, and so for most of us, we would then, if we have success this far, we're just gonna be feeding out caterpillars when they're at the right size and buying more eggs. But if we want to try to get them through the pupa stage ⁓ moths, is there anything we have to do to make that happen? Jordan: So it's important when, so if you're trying to do the full of a silkworm, once they become large, and talking full grown caterpillars, silkworms need somewhere to spin ⁓ their cocoon. And you'll see become more active than they ever were ⁓ at any point in life so far. Frograck: Yeah. ⁓ Jordan: they'll start looking for somewhere to make that cocoon and they need anchor points. and so the best thing, like traditionally they, they give them branches and stuff and then the caterpillars would, would, make their cocoons within, a ⁓ set of ⁓ so that I all just tie off, on those points another, another fascinating thing silkworms is like, Frograck: Mm-hmm. Jordan: The cocoon itself that they make, that's spun with one continuous thread. when you're making commercial silk, you have to kill pupae inside. Because when it emerges, the caterpillar needs to, or the newly emerged moth, spits an enzyme that melts away a window for it to emerge from that cocoon. Because otherwise it would be trapped. And by doing that, the ⁓ moth ruins singular thread. Now it's a bunch of threads. so commercially, yes, they ⁓ will throw the cocoons in ⁓ boiling water. Frograck: Right? Yeah. Jordan: And won't go into that, because that's another tangent. then they'll remove the pupae and use that as food for chickens or people food themselves. I haven't them yet, but it's a ⁓ sizeable bite. ⁓ And so ⁓ if just raising them to breathe them, then you let the adults. Frograck: Gross. Yep. Mm-hmm. Jordan: emerge and if they are in the presence of each other the females will be emitted in pheromones that just drive the males wild and mating happens with much no effort on your part as long as the sexes are together and then it's important to have a surface ⁓ the female to lay her eggs onto. If you just have her in a bare container she'll lay her eggs but then you have to ⁓ get those eggs Frograck: Okay. Jordan: off that surface to refrigerate ⁓ their overwinter period, right? And so it's usually easiest if you give her ⁓ paper towel ⁓ ⁓ ⁓ cardboard or some surface that you can easily manage for to lay those eggs on. And there will be ⁓ hundreds eggs. Insects are, that's like a game for them. It's just like, just do lots. Frograck: Gotcha. Right. Jordan: And so yeah, you will have lots of eggs and then the key to overwintering them successfully is to make sure that they don't dry out too much. the fridges are really dry. They desiccate everything that goes into them. It's ⁓ Frograck: Mmm. Jordan: So whether you're overwintering pupae inside your fridge or you're overwintering eggs, you need to make sure that the eggs stay humid. Now that's different than that you don't keep them wet. If keep them wet, they'll just get moldy and then mold. Frograck: Yeah. Jordan: By keeping them humid, you give them all the moisture they require so that they don't dry out and desiccate, which just leads to death as well. So you want to do sort of a two-container system. Bigger container, wet paper towel on the bottom, smaller containers inside with holes in the lids that just have the eggs on the surface they were laid on. That way they stay humid without being on a wet surface. Frograck: without touching the wet paper towel. Yep, okay. Cool. Jordan: So yeah, that's... Frograck: Cool. All right, yeah, that touches based on all the life cycles. I'm planning on trying it this year. I wanna see if I can get silkworm culture down myself, at least for the summer months, you know, when I have mulberry leaves available. So that'll be cool. Jordan: It's definitely easier when you have the leaves available, that's for sure. As I'm finding out myself, because the diet is more than just ground up dried leaves reconstituted, as we spoke about earlier. So yeah, the leaves, you're gonna get the best survival rates, you're gonna get the healthiest solgrams. It's important to remember though that... Frograck: Yeah, right. Yeah, yeah. Jordan: make sure that they're clean leaves so that you don't want bird poop all over them and yeah you don't want them to be dusty where you collect them like if you are someone like me who doesn't have mulberry right in your backyard or on your property that you don't collect it from like like because it grows everywhere it's tempting it's like ⁓ it's on the roadside it's like it's probably not the best quality and then if it rains yeah and if rains make sure you pat Frograck: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Dust and pollutants. Jordan: Pat the leaves dry. You don't want to be feeding them wet leaves because that will also lead to bacterial problems that causes issues as well. Frograck: Gotcha, cool. All right, well, we've been talking for quite a while. I feel like we're just sort of scratching the surface about a couple of various insects topics, it's a whole world in and of itself, insects and nutrition. So thanks for joining me for today's conversation. Where could people in the audience find you online if they wanna follow you, if they wanna ask you some questions, or if they're in Canada, if they wanna shop with you? Jordan: I have a website ontarianvertfarm.com but we're also on Instagram that's got lot of shorter videos showing my stock and some of processes and a lot of the insects that I work with as well as we're present on Facebook and I have a YouTube channel as well that I plan to be doing a lot of. I'm going to be uploading the whole mulberry adventures. Up till this point, up there ⁓ soon, also the ⁓ two, putting the artificial diet from the mulberry that I've been collecting this past season. yeah. ⁓ Frograck: Cool. Cool, yeah, that's fascinating. I'll be following along to see how you accomplish that. So cool. Well, I will put all those links in the show notes for today's episode. Thanks Jordan for joining me. Guys, check out Ontario Invert Farm. I would really love to hear from the audience. If you guys have any experience culturing an interesting or less common feeder insect, tell me about it. Or maybe you just want to share some tips and tricks on how to do it better. You can find me on Instagram, froggrac, or email me at froggrac at gmail.com. ⁓ That's it for today's show. Thanks for listening. Tune in next time. Jordan: Thanks for having me Joe.