# General Topics > Food, Feeders, Live, Frozen, Culturing, etc >  Feeder alternatives during quarantine

## Dan

I have always championed the use of live, gutloaded and appropriately supplemented insect prey. However, here in NY those options are now (among many other things) extremely limited. That said, and due to present circumstances, has anyone used any of the Pac-Man bite types of pre made food such as Hikari Pac Attack? My pixie is consuming more Roaches than my colony can sustain long term. Crickets shipped by mail are the option I am presently using, but suppliers are running low and shipping is getting difficult. I am reaching out to other experienced keepers here and I am looking for legit experiences positive or negative. Thank you all -D

herpin man & wardog - thoughts?

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## Cathy

Have you tried or thought about raising your own crickets? I was afraid that we were going to run into these circumstances of obtaining feeders, so a couple months ago I began to raise my own crickets & mealies. The mealworms took off immediately but because of the temps, the cricket eggs took a month to hatch... but now I have a couple hundred baby crickets! Hopefully, they'll grow fast and I can keep the population steady! I also have been breeding Roly Polies and now have several hundred of them but they are still a bit too small for my toads. I'm sorry I don't have an answer regarding pre-made food but hopefully you will find a solution!

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## Jacob

Ive been feeding all my animals freeze dried insects. I only have about 100 mealworms left and i want to use them sparingly, only for my picky baby dragon. I was suprised by how well my toads took the change

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## Cathy

> Ive been feeding all my animals freeze dried insects. I only have about 100 mealworms left and i want to use them sparingly, only for my picky baby dragon. I was suprised by how well my toads took the change


You might want to consider breeding mealies, it's super easy and a lot cheaper than buying! There are a lot of videos on how to breed mealworms. Takes very little space & time! Just need to let some of your mealworms pupate into beetles and they'll begin breeding within days but it will take at least a month before you actually have new mealies that you can use for feeding. I started mine under $10! Just needed to buy a plastic 3 drawer storage container/box & oatmeal, which serves as substrate & food, along with adding veggie scraps like carrots & potato peels! Check it out cause you'll eventually have more than you know what to do with! :Friendly Wink:

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## Axqu

I've been feeding earthworms sourced from my backyard, as well as cave crickets that I catch from my grandma's storage room. Her storage room is absolutely infested and since the crickets don't get in the house she doesn't bother bug bombing, so it works out perfectly. You can make a bug trap out of a 2 liter bottle; cut the top "cone" off, rinse both out really well, put a potato or fruit slice in the main body of the bottle, then invert the "cone" into the main body of the bottle to create a funnel shape into the chamber. Put it in the right area and you'll have more bugs than you know what to do with trapped in the bottle!

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## Eli

> I've been feeding earthworms sourced from my backyard, as well as cave crickets that I catch from my grandma's storage room. Her storage room is absolutely infested and since the crickets don't get in the house she doesn't bother bug bombing, so it works out perfectly. You can make a bug trap out of a 2 liter bottle; cut the top "cone" off, rinse both out really well, put a potato or fruit slice in the main body of the bottle, then invert the "cone" into the main body of the bottle to create a funnel shape into the chamber. Put it in the right area and you'll have more bugs than you know what to do with trapped in the bottle!


its important to remember though that any wild caught insects or feeders poses a high risk of transmitting parasites to your pets. They also may have been exposed to pesticides, which can quickly kill your frog. Personally Im ordering banded crickets from Joshs Frog. You can get 1000 crickets for like 20 bucks, and they last much longer than regular crickets as long as you keep them fed and hydrated

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## MuchoTaco

Earthworms are very filling just add a bit of calcium dust. If your corner store has them

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## Herpin Man

My advice is to order crickets in bulk. It's usually not cost effective to order less than 500 at a time, and for only one frog, many crickets may die before being fed.
However- I have recently started using banded crickets. I really like them. They are said to be more nutritious and have less chitin than the standard house crickets. But here's the best part- they are durable and long lived. I have found that the adults live for several weeks in their bins, with very, very little mortality. There aren't many suppliers yet, but Josh's Frogs has them.
I think you should look into it.

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## Dan

@herpin man, I was able to score a big order of banded crix from Josh’s. Things started to get ugly fast here in NY a few weeks ago due to COVID 19 and almost every online vendor was having issues with stock. Even Repashy products were hard to find online. I’ve fed banded crickets before and they are amazing. Josh’s was limiting large quantities though and they only offered orders of 250 so I had to order two at a higher price.

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## Herpin Man

So you bought 500 crickets, at twice the price of 250? That's one of my complaints about Josh's- they're quite stingy about giving good customers a break. I like the banded crickets quite a bit, but if I had another source for them besides Josh's, I'd switch. 
I did just receive a box of 1000 adults from there, so supply must have improved.

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## Dan

At the time I was happy with whatever I got. After all is said and done though it’s a no brainer anyway since they live forever and don’t stink. Even with shipping they still cost less than local. My original post was a last ditch plea in case I needed to go with Pac-Man bites. Thankfully I didn’t have to.

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