Keeping crickets

I've raised crickets.

First you said you were not wanting to raise just keep them alive. I'm not sure what you are asking.

I used to have the same issue of them all dying real fast. Temp unless too cold or too hot *(75 F is perfect) they will survive. I e-mailed several of the cricket farms and they all said the same thing. Only give them corn meal for food. Water for drinking. No fruits or anything else. Crickets cannot live off of a gutload. Gutload before you feed them.

To breed them, put hydrated coco coir in a tub on the warmest side of the bin. If you have gravid females they will do the rest. Take it out in a few days, put it in a good sealed cage/bin, then get it warm to about 80F and they will hatch in 1.5-3 weeks.

I currently breed and raise my own crickets for all of my dragons, it took me almost a year in getting it down right. But I know house nearly 15-50,000 crickets at a time depeding on season. For the most part if you want them to grow quicker and healthier keep them at about 90 degrees year round, pin heads adults and eggs alike all do great at this temp. If the temp gets to low you start to have trouble with humidity sticking to the walls of your enclosure and any higher you will cook them. Crickets that smell died from un natural causes poison, they ate each other etc. As for food I give them chicken feed its the cheapest $13 for a 50 pound bag and lasts me about 3 months. For water and mosture i give pin heads moist paper towel, and larger crickets i use a chicken water bowel with a sponge in it to keep them from drowning., When it come to layeing eggs, i use potting soil that you can buy form home depot keep it damp not soaked, and they will lay their eggs. then spray it every so often till they hatch. In what ever enclosure you decide to use make sure to allow as much open hair space as possible so you get less humitty on the inside which will kill any size cricket.