A cricket infestation is no bueno. Aside from managing them in your home and preventing them in and around it, it’s smart to understand where they lay their eggs. This way, you can prevent them even further.
Where do crickets lay eggs? Female crickets lay eggs in a location that is hidden from male crickets who want to destroy them. The temperature of these egg-laying areas ranges between 80 and 90° Fahrenheit. Based on this description, we can infer that crickets prefer laying their eggs indoors. This could include both homes and offices that are warm or well-insulated.
After it has chosen a location for laying eggs, a single female cricket can lay thousands of eggs there. However, the female cricket does not keep its eggs in the same location for too long because the danger of predator males still looms.
Therefore, the eggs are relocated to another part of the original egg-laying location by the female cricket or a completely new location a week after they are laid. The survival chances of the eggs depend on the ability of the mother to hide them.
What are crickets?
Before we get into more detail about where do crickets lay eggs, it is important to describe the origins and physical attributes of the insect. Crickets belong to the Gryllidae family and are related to grasshoppers and bush crickets.
The Gryllidae family comprises of almost nine hundred species of crickets. However, only a hundred of these species can be found in the United States. When it comes to physical characteristics, crickets are identifiable by their antennae, powerful hind legs, flattened bodies, and two pairs of wings. Often, crickets have an antenna that is as long or longer than their body. Crickets can be of several different colors, including red, green, black, and brown.
Another way to identify crickets is through their non-stop chirping. This incessant noise can be heard from the lawn during late summer evenings. The earliest crickets originated millions of years ago and have lived through the Jurassic and Triassic periods. However, they have gone through several evolutionary processes to become the cricket that they are today. The earliest crickets looked very different from the crickets we have today.
Currently, crickets are not an endangered species since there are trillions of them across the world. The size of crickets ranges between one to two inches. However, the average size of a house cricket is no more than half-inch. On the other hand, the average size of field crickets is around one inch. There are some house and field crickets with sizes between 1 and 2 inches, but they are not very common.
Despite having wings, crickets do not fly. The time of the year when crickets are most active is summers. This last bit of information about crickets is for people who have these insects inside their homes: crickets can jump up to twenty to thirty times the length of their body. So, don’t be surprised when you see them on your kitchen counter or your bathroom sink.
What is the lifecycle of crickets?
If you’re interested in knowing where do crickets lay eggs, then you’re likely to be interested in knowing the lifecycle of crickets. After all, it’s all related. The most important piece of information about a cricket’s lifecycle is that it is divided into three stages: egg, nymph, and adult. However, all this begins with mating.
The process of mating starts with male crickets trying to attract their female counterparts; they do this by rubbing their wings together. Once the male cricket successfully attracts a female cricket, the mating process starts. Fertile female crickets can lay eggs immediately after mating. The eggs will be deposited by the mother cricket is any available damp substrate using a tube-like organ called an ovipositor. As mentioned earlier, a female cricket can lay up to a thousand eggs during her life. The lifespan of crickets, both males and females, is 90 days.
The mating process is followed by the egg or egg-hatching stage in the cricket’s lifecycle. The life of a cricket starts in its egg. It takes about 13 to 14 days for the egg to hatch and become a nymph. After this time, the cricket will break the capsule of the egg and make its way out of the substrate. While 13 to 14 is the standard time for cricket eggs to hatch, the incubation time can vary depending on the conditions of the place where the eggs are kept.
According to one study, it will take longer for the cricket eggs to hatch at room temperature. Other studies suggest that it will take 30 days for an egg to hatch at 27°C, between 50 and 85 days at room temperature, and 40-51 days at a temperature of 23°C. However, the most common hatching trend is 13 to 14 days at 30°C.
Nymphs look a lot like adult crickets. However, they are smaller in size and have a few easily identifiable differences. These differences include the lack of wings in male nymphs and missing ovipositors in female nymphs. Often, these young crickets become prey for adult crickets and other insects. A nymph grows by shedding its hard exoskeleton.
Referred to as molting, this process of shedding exoskeleton occurs eight to ten times before the nymph becomes an adult. Each new exoskeleton has a soft and milky white texture until becoming hard in a short time. After just a month, the nymph will start to grow its wings.
Female crickets need to mate with male cricket to lay eggs. They are ready for mating just two days after becoming an adult. They are only two activities that adult male and female crickets partake in: eating and mating. The males make sounds to attract the female, and the female responds to the sounds they like. The adult crickets look for food in order to prolong their survival.
The longer the crickets survive, the more they are likely to produce. In other words, the number of eggs a female cricket lays during her lifetime will depend on how long she lives. Another responsibility of the adult female cricket is finding the right place and conditions to lay and keep the eggs.
More on where crickets lay their eggs
As mentioned in the beginning, female crickets prefer to lay eggs in place, which is not visible to male crickets who want to cause them harm. They also prefer laying eggs in a place where the temperature ranges between 80 and 90 ° Fahrenheit, and most of the places that meet this criterion happen to be indoors.
While female crickets prefer to lay eggs in the above-mentioned places/conditions, they can lay eggs wherever they find an adult male cricket who they are ready to mate with. The crickets’ mating period starts in spring. During this time of the year, adult male crickets rub their wings together to create a chirping sound in order to attract fertile female crickets nearby.
However, there are times when this behavior attracts rival crickets as well. When this happens, the adult crickets present at the site all battle for dominance. The triumphant cricket gets to mate with the fertile female cricket present at the location. But, before the male cricket can start mating with the female, he must ensure that he has gotten all the rights cues from her.
Once the male cricket receives all the right signals, he will perform a mating dance, which can last from a few minutes to several hours. If the female cricket is accepting of the male cricket’s offer to mate, she will mount the mate in order to receive sperm.
A female cricket may mate with several males before deciding which male’s sperm packet to accept. Once this decision is made, the female cricket will lay her eggs in soil or within a plant material; this soil or plant material could be indoor or outdoors. However, as mentioned earlier, most female crickets prefer to lay eggs indoors since the location provides them with the protection and warmth that they require for their eggs.
Although the female cricket will lay or initially keep her eggs in a particular place which she has chosen, the eggs are likely to be continuously relocated until it is time for them to hatch. This prevents adult crickets and other insects from harming the eggs.
While most crickets have a lifespan of 90 days, there is one category of crickets that can live up to two years. These crickets are referred to as mole crickets. Like all other types of crickets, mole crickets also mate during the spring and summer. However, while the other crickets die by the time winter comes, mole crickets go under the ground during the cold season to prolong their survival. They can back out from the ground during spring to start mating once again.
How fast do crickets multiply? Depends upon the species, but the entire life cycle to the cricket is about 9 weeks. After hatching, they take approximately five to six weeks following hatching for sexual maturity, based upon temperature and food. About 7 to 8 weeks after mating, they lay eggs.
Do crickets die in the winter? Field crickets reach maturation at about eight weeks old. They do not survive the winter, as a result if they’re still jumping about when icy temperature levels set in, that is when they will certainly perish.
Credit for featured image to Jean and Fred