Furry worms with the crickets?

[Peter Lacey]

I've been buying crickets for nearly a year now and occassionally find furry worms in with them. Does anyone know what these are? and are they safe to feed to the Ts?

[Nicola Dolby]

Haven't a clue what they are but my Koh Samui munches them like they're caviar!

[Tom Forman]

sounds like some kind of caterpillar.

Tried googling it but all I could find was this site selling cooked tarantulas as snacks, yummy

http://www.thailandunique.com/toeat.html

If you have a picture someone will be able to identify what it is.

[patsyking]

Furry worm

Is this what you mean in this pic I just took? I h ad one with my crickets and was also wondering if I could feed it to my T's but decided to keep it and see what it grows into. As you can see it has shed its skin and now its all hairy.

[Colin D Wilson]

They're Carpet beetle larvae (probably Dermestes lardarius), they are used in cricket breeding farms as they eat dead tissue and so clean up any dead crickets, old skin etc.

[Peter Lacey]

yep that's them Patsy and thanks for identifying Colin. I guess they must be safe food if the koh samui likes them so much.
thanks folks, you've satisfied my curiosity.

[Phil Rea]

As Colin says, they're likely to be Dermestid beetles (although I'm not sure if the cricket tub ones have ever been formally identified by a specialist - Dermestidae sp. 'cricket tub' LOL ). The larvae of some species are actually utilised to strip flesh from bones in museums and the like, just to give you an idea what they can be used for!

You can feed the beetles to spiders, but I'd be cautious feeding the larvae to anything that couldn't overpower them very quickly because they can be vicious little things.

[Colin D Wilson]

-Dermestidae sp. 'cricket tub' LOL ).

Cracking idea!! heh heh , i have a friend who has a maggot farm and he always uses what he terms as the "more common" beetle so i'm just offering this D lardarius as the most likely...might be wrong...often am!!

You can feed the beetles to spiders, but I'd be cautious feeding the larvae to anything that couldn't overpower them very quickly because they can be vicious little things.

Yes, quite true, i should have really mentioned this.

[Peter Lacey]

You can feed the beetles to spiders, but I'd be cautious feeding the larvae to anything that couldn't overpower them very quickly because they can be vicious little things.

LOL, yeah Ive noticed that by the way they go up to the crickets and take a bite on their legs as if to say "are you alive, yep, next"

[Oli Dodds]

Lol Peter, I think this is the best post you've ever made! (No, really)!
Ive been wanting to ask this question for SO long, but it has never actually occured to me to ask it on here LOL.
Anyway, great question, and great answers guys- Colin, Phil; thanks for the information lads!
Take care,
Oli

[Nicola Dolby]

Thanks for the advice about their aggression, I wasn't aware of that. Still with my Koh Samui they don't get much of a chance, its one look and then crunch!

[Andrew Ferguson]

I'd noticed one of these hairy critters too. It seems to have moulted once or twice as there are skins in the cricket tub and it seems to have got a bit larger. So, I thought I'd see what happened if I placed it in Smiffy's box. Bearing in mind the comments about its behaviour, I thought I'd keep a watchful eye out.
Now if I can digress just a bit please. Last night our family went to the pub for our dinner as we couldn't be bothered to cook and wash up afterwards. Anyway, I had a lovely rib eye steak with blue cheese on it. Then a chocolate sundae surprise thing with profiteroles and chocolate fudge cake in it and oodles of cream on top (How do I stay a trim 72Kg? ). Anyway, I wolfed it all down. Delicious.
Kind of reminded me how Smiffy reacted to the hairy larvae thing!