Breeding your own crickets seems simple enough. After all they’re just bugs, but in all honesty breeding and maintaining a large colony of crickets will end up requiring more work and attention to detail then your gecko’s do. On top of that they smell horrible and make noise 24 hours a day.  For part 1 I will go over the basics of keeping a large colony of crickets. In part 2 I’ll cover the actual breeding process, the laybox, incubation and maintaining freshly hatched crickets.

Part 1
For crickets to thrive in a bin you will need to provide them with a constant supply of  food and water, good ventilation and adequate temperatures(75-82).

Food- Crickets will eat just about anything, but what you feed them ultimately reflects on to what you feed your gecko. They need a lot of protein to achieve quick growth rates. I’ve found dog food works really well as a main staple in their diet. They will slowly chip away at whole pellets, but they eat it much faster if you grind it up in a blender or magic bullet. Once or twice a week you should  give your crickets some slices of fruits and vegetables because like they say you are what you eat and you want your geckos to eat well. For fruits I like to stick with the same fruits you can feed crested geckos. For vegetables I stick with leafy greens and the basics. You should take fruits and veggies out 2-4 days after you put them in or before they get moldy. The dog food can last more then a week as long as it doesn't get wet.

Water- The fruits and vegetables you feed your cricket’s will also hydrate them, but it will not be enough for a large breeding colony. It’s best to have a source of water available 24/7. Flunkers makes a very good cricket water dish with a revisor. You should fill the water bowl with paper towel otherwise crickets will drown/die and contaminate it quicker.  You can also use a small bowl or small deli cup/condiment cup filled with water and paper towel. For freshly hatched and crickets under 1/4” it’s best to fold up some paper towel and give it a mist until it’s damp then place it directly on the floor of your cricket bin. The more paper towel you use then the longer it will stay wet. All paper towel and water should be changed every 3-5 days if it hasn’t already dried out by then. The wet paper towel will contribute to the odour that comes with crickets so changing it out frequently will go a long way when it comes to odour control.

Ventilation- For crickets to survive in confined conditions you need to provide them with very good ventilation. Crickets actually breathe through the pores in their skin so the combination of over crowding and poor ventilation will result in many dead crickets very quickly. The easiest way to achieve this is to cut a hole in the lid, cover it in aluminum window screen(they will eat through fiberglass screen) and secure it with a glue gun. It will provide your crickets with ventilation, but it does nothing for you when it comes to controlling the odour and noise they create. With a little bit of DIY skills you can use a bin completely sealed up if you provide ventilation with 12v computer fans and make some mini ventilation shafts with a few corners. You can also put carbon(used in fish tank filters) in the output ventilation/fan and it will eliminate most of the odour. 

Temperature- Cricket's do fine at room temperature(72-75). Higher temperatures will encourage growth in younger and freshly hatched crickets and most importantly it will encourage breeding in adult crickets. It will also cause them to make a lot more noise which is annoying but technically good. It means they are breeding more. They can tolerate higher temperatures, but I don’t like to let them get over 82. Just like most reptiles, it’s good if you provide them with a warm side and a cooler side. You can achieve this with a thermostat hooked up to a heat lamp or heat pad positioned on one side of the bin. If you use a heat pad you will need to use two thermostats. One probe should be inside the bin and the probe on the second thermostat should be stuck right to the centre of the sticky side of the heat pad so it ends between the pad and the bin. It’s there as a safety to keep it from getting too hot and melting the plastic. Heat pads and lamps are not a necessity. Cricket's will breed at room temperature, but higher temperatures will ultimately result in more eggs being laid.

Inside the Bin- We’ll start from the bottom. On the floor of your bin you can use paper towel or leave it as it is. Personally I like to leave it as it is. I find it’s easier to spot any dead crickets on the ground so you can remove them quickly. Some people like to use vermiculite, but I’ve found it just doesn't make sense if your doing a full clean of the bin every week or two which you should be doing. One of the most important and sometimes overlooked thing is egg cartons. They not only increase your floor space and reduce over crowding, but they also trap and contain heat between them when stacked together. You will also need a small container to use as a lay box(see part 2). If your having problems with crickets climbing the side of your bin you can put a line of of clear packing tape around the inside of the walls and they won't be able to climb past that point(most of the time).


Part 2
To successfully breed crickets you need at least 100 crickets. The more the better as long as you don't over crowd them. You will also need some laybox’s, an incubator and smaller bins/rearing bins. It will require some patience mixed with trial and error.

Laybox- Your laybox should be a mini 5 liter tote/small container. You can use anything really but when we get to incubation you will see why I like the mini tote 5l tote’s. It could be filled with just about any substrate that retains moisture. I’ve found that a 50/50 mixture of coco soil and vermiculite works really well. You could use one or the other and it really wouldn’t make much of a difference. There are two key factors when it comes to the laybox. The substrate needs to stay moist(not soggy). If you have a heat lamp it will require a few mistings here and there but be careful not to mist other spots of the cricket bin. The other important thing is too keep it higher then your food and on the opposite side. If any little bits of food get on the surface of the substrate then it will mold when you put it in the incubator. Putting some mesh or window screen over the surface of your substrate will go a long way. The females will still be able to lay their eggs through it and it will stop the males from eating them. The mesh is not an absolute necessity and without it you will still get more baby crickets then you know what to do with, but with the mesh you will have better results. The eggs are very small but you will see some on the surface and through the side if your laybox is clear. The eggs look like little tiny grains of rice with pointed tips.You should leave the lay box in the bin with the crickets for at least 7 days. It’s good to make multiple layboxes so when you take it out for incubation, another one can be put in it’s place right away.

Incubation- As soon as you remove the laybox from the cricket bin, you should place the it inside a small bin and then place the that whole thing into your incubator. The reason is to contain the crickets when they start to hatch and also keep humidity high. You can use a mini shoebox size tote bin or any small bin which your laybox fits inside. You should burn holes in lid with a soldering iron or drill them for some ventilation(not so much that it will dry out). If your using a mini 5l tote it eliminates the need for a second bin because you can just put the lid back on it, but be sure to put holes in the lid to ventilate it. Incubation can actually be done in just a basic bin at room temperature. You will still have crickets hatch without doing anything extra and just literally placing them in the bin and waiting, but you will have much better results with higher temperatures around 78-80. At room temperature it could take up to 20 days or even longer sometimes for the eggs to hatch. At 80 They should hatch within a week. You should start checking daily after 5 days in the incubator. I’ve found that crickets incubated at higher temperatures grow faster once they are out of the egg as well.  

Freshly Hatched Crickets- At this point you finally have something to show for all your hard work. Once they begin to hatch it can continue for up to a week. Move the whole laybox and freshly hatched crickets into the hatching bin. Your hatching bin should be a shoebox sized bin.  It should be big enough that you can fit your laybox,egg cartons and be able to leave a corner clear for lightly damp paper towel. For ventilation you can cut a hole in the lid then cover it with a fine window screen. I like to use bins that are a bit taller then I actually need and that is enough to prevent any escapes. You should provide them with a little bit of food alongside the water/damp paper towel. Every day or two all the hatched crickets should be moved from the hatch bin to your rearing bin until the day comes that they’ve stopped hatching. Taking care of baby crickets is generally the same as taking care of adult crickets. The only difference is they are much more fragile and susceptible to extreme temperatures.

Rearing Bin- Your rearing bin should be a step up in size. Generally tote bins around 30l work well. This is where the crickets are going to live and grow. It should be set up with food, water and lots of egg cartons. For ventilation you can just cut a hole in the lid and use the window screen method. You can keep your young crickets in this bin for awhile but as they grow and start crowding more they will have to be moved to a larger bin. Once the crickets are big enough to start making noise, they should be moved into a 60l bin at the minimum. The odour they will create at this point will also be much stronger. If neither of those is a concern to you then there isn’t a problem using window screen to ventilate it but making a sealed bin with some computer fans is the only way I've found to deal with it.

Now you know everything you need to know to get started. Just remember that the first few times it may not turn out so well. With some practice, patience and refining your process to meet your specific needs, it will eventually come around to an efficient production line.