First off, just want to say that I found a plant based chick feed, and so far the roaches I've fed it too really like it.
So I think that'll be my dry food for them here on out.
I will just try and say this as respectfully as possible, since we are all friends here, but I personally feel it's improper to enforce your dietary preferences/ideology on animals of any type. That's my opinion on this topic and absolutely NO insult is intended.
That said you may want to try tofu, soy and various nuts for the protein aspect of their diet.(maybe chunky peanut butter as a treat?) But considering they do so well on normal dog or cat food, I see no reason to switch. (Though maybe you can switch to vegan roaches that naturally consume more plant matter in their diet)
But if your keeping Eublaberus prosticus please do not deny them their insect prey that they need to truly thrive.
(This is referenced in Orins for the love of roaches book AND preying mantis book, in which he mentions he uses his colony of orange heads to humanely euthanize mantids that molted or suffered a sever injury, as the large colony nearly instantly devours them.)
I partially agree, however I'm just not comfortable buying cat or dog food anymore for my bugs, when they can do just fine on plant based diets, it's just not something I can do anymore.
My cat, sad as I am to say it, seems to be getting old, so I'm pretty sure I won't have to buy cat food for her either for that much longer, so I'm trying to stop using it for my bugs as well so I can finally stop buying animal products all together.
I know lots of people use chick feed for their roaches already, not because they are vegan but because they use their roaches as feeders, and supposedly roaches fed dog or cat food can give lizards or other vertebrates gout. So that's what I'm using now and they seem to like it.
I don't have any Eublaberus, but I would like to point out that E.posticus, while bloodthirsty buggers that will devour soft bodied or wounded invertebrates when particularly hungry, thirsty or low on other sources of protein, don't actually
require insect prey to survive and grow. They do just fine on cat or dog food, fruits and veggies and probably chick feed too.
They'll definitely swarm vulnerable invertebrates when they have a chance though.
While on the subject of insectivores though, I have no problems feeding my centipedes, spiders, and other insectivores other bugs. Mainly because I raise my feeders myself and know that they are in pretty good conditions and I strive to give them "good quality" lives, (unlike the cows, chickens and pigs in most of the food industry). Plus, it helps keep my colonies from overcrowding, which can actually do a lot of harm to my roaches' health, (like with my surinams, I don't have anything that will eat them right now, so they got overcrowded).
Also, it's natural for centipedes, spiders, etc., to eat other, live insects, so I can justify it more, (though I admit it's still far from a "natural setting"). However, roaches normally don't eat other animals, unless they are in quite a state of decay, and even then they'd mostly scavenge invertebrates in the wild, not vertebrates, so feeding them dog/cat foods is not natural at all. A plant based diet is
technically more like their wild diet, so since I can, I am switching them to one.
Hope none of that came off harsh at all, not trying to push my morals or beliefs on anybody here, just explaining what I'm doing and why I'm doing it.
I was interested to read Taffer's correspondence with Professor Kunkel, talking about oat protein and so on. This is a kneejerk reaction not backed up by personal experience, but I'd be tempted to go with oats as a staple.
Otherwise, I'd parrot Tleilaxu and ask if there's anything in the vegetarian/vegan repertoire that'd suit. Pulses? (Might be a lot of faff if you have to soak and boil dried beans every time) Nuts or seeds? A quick search suggests there aren't many that are actually higher in protein than oats. One's sunflower seeds with 21-24g per 100g, and I know you can buy the kernels ('hearts') in whatever quantities as wild bird food. I can only see pumpkin seeds with more protein than that at about 30g per 100g.
I have both lying around. I tried some pumpkin seeds with dubias, out of curiosity, and they seem to go down well. Disappeared quicker than oats or fruit, anyway. I'll try the sunflower seeds next.
Neither's cheap, whether compared to oats or not, but cut with the latter...?
Chick feed seems to work great for roaches, and there are some completely plant based brands, so that's what I'm using currently. It's corn based, like most dog foods, and has quite a bit of protein as well!
Thanks for the suggestions though, appreciate it!
