Roach Problems (I need help)

[EverEvolvingExotics]

I've had my colony of dubia roaches since September of 2011. I've never had a problem with them producing enough for me. In the last few months I've had an alarming amount of roach death. For awhile I wasn't sure if it was a bad batch of egg cartons or if the roaches were just reaching the end of their life cycle. It's mostly adults that are dying but I have a small amount of sub adult dying as well. It's not just a few deaths either every other day when I change their vegetables out I clean out handfuls of dead roaches. Previous to this I was able to go many months without cleaning because I was told it's best to leave them alone. I'm now changing the egg crates every week to every other week and completely disinfecting the setup because I have tons of small flies/gnats I'm even noticing small maggots, it's disgusting. I'm completely on top of cleaning and don't understand how in literally 2-3 days I find more maggots, flies/gnats, and handfuls of dead roaches.

This is incredibly frustrating because I feed all of my geckos these as their sole feeders as well as my bearded dragon. All the geckos and bearded dragon haven't had any negative effects from this but I don't know what to do. Should I start over and get a whole new colony? If so how do I safely dispose of all the roaches I have? I don't want to get an entirely new colony just to have this happen again. I'm doing everything exactly like the care sheets say.

Any ideas would be great appreciated.

[Chicagoherps]

When my roach bin is overcrowded I get a lot of adult die off. Try to thin out your colony. Now maggots I have never had.

[dillan2020]

I have no clue and this is a complete guess but is it possible it's some kind of parasitic fly that is laying eggs in the roaches killing them and producing the maggots.

[suzuki4life]

first off, your gnats are most likely phorid flies which are common in feeder insect bins. Without knowing what caresheets you are following or about your setup indepth a few things will kill roaches fast

pesticides (are your egg cartons clean?)
mold (mold kills most things quick in confined areas)
high humidity (which can result in mold but humidity alone is enough)
super high temps with no escape also will kill them pretty quick (much faster than cold will)

[bcreptile]

What temps? Need to be 95f+
Tubs? Need dark ones
How many breathe holes? Only need 1

Sounds like not enough moisture, need temps up, not too many holes, and make sure your using water crystals.

Post pictures, and info on temp

[John1982]

What temps? Need to be 95f+
Tubs? Need dark ones
How many breathe holes? Only need 1

Sounds like not enough moisture, need temps up, not too many holes, and make sure your using water crystals.

Post pictures, and info on temp

95F+ seems rather high to me.. I kept mine ~85 and they produced great. I seldom used water crystal either after the first couple years. I found keeping fresh fruit upped my production and made cleaning much easier. I also replaced my lid with screen so humidity was the same as my house, ~45%, with plenty of air flow..

[suzuki4life]

What temps? Need to be 95f+
Tubs? Need dark ones
How many breathe holes? Only need 1

Sounds like not enough moisture, need temps up, not too many holes, and make sure your using water crystals.

Post pictures, and info on temp

95+ is not needed...
dark tubs are not needed
amount of holes depends on humidity

I use water crystals now although years ago I would have agreed with just using fruit.