City of Portsmouth College takes ethical app-roach to animal care!

You wouldn’t think upwards of a thousand creepy crawlies could be a good thing for City of Portsmouth College – but they’re actually helping create a sustainable ecosystem for its animal care centre.

Three colonies of Dubia cockroaches are thriving at the College’s Highbury Campus, as part of a breeding programme that’s saving the College approximately £4,500 a year as they no longer need to buy supplies from wholesalers.

While they’re growing and breeding, the cockroaches kept in optimal condition and fed the right foods – so that they can provide premium nutrition for the Animal Care Centre’s 20 snakes, reptiles and frogs.

Hannah McKnight, Animal Care Technician, began the project just after she joined the College three months ago.

“We were buying cockroaches in from suppliers and it’s quite expensive – it adds up quickly. The good thing is, they are extremely easy to look after so long as they have darkness and humidity, which we can provide, so it was very simple to set everything up and get started," she said.

“There are so many benefits to having our own breeding programme aside from cost. We can ensure they’re properly looked after for a start – when you buy from suppliers you aren’t sure how they’ve been looked after. Ultimately, they each have individual lives, so we want to make sure that we give them a good one.

“Plus, by having a continual supply, with roaches at different life stages and therefore sizes, we have a wider range of choice for feeding. We think we have bred almost 1,000 cockroaches so far, and they’re basically self-sustaining.”

If you’d like to find out more about animal care at City of Portsmouth College, visit our Animal Care page.