Classroom Minibeast Pets
Minibeasts make for great classroom pets, but where to find them?
What is a suitable classroom pet?
Are they easy to keep?
Where can I get them?
Without going into too much detail here about how to keep them (we are saving that for our more detailed blogs) we will provide you with some short keynotes below, and links for reputable suppliers.
Giant African Land Snails
Snails are incredibly easy to keep, and will ensure the children are entertained for hours.
They require a humid environment in a glass aquarium, various vegetables for food such as squash, courgettes, lettuces (not iceberg) apples, pears, banana, cuttlefish for a calcium source to maintain a healthy shell, and for added protein, a small bowl of body builder protein powder mixed up rather thickly – like stiff porridge.
You can often find a nice range of snails for sale here at Bugz UK
Giant African Millipedes
Similar to snails these are incredibly easy to keep, and will ensure the children will love handling them and trying to count the legs.
They require a humid and at the same time ventilated environment, various vegetables for food such as squash, courgettes, lettuces, apples, pears, banana, crumbly rotten deciduous wood, peat based substrate, and leaf litter to munch on.
You can find a lovely range of millipedes available here at Venomous Visions
Praying Mantids
Praying mantids are incredible fun to keep and watch as they grow and feed on other inverts – it’s a great way for children to learn about the circle of life.
Their requirements are simple – if you plan on keeping an easy species and you can find lots of species, as well as required equipment to care for them here at Unseen Universe.
Stick Insects
Another fun and easy classroom pet.
Easy to keep species are recommended such as the Indian stick insect, or bud wing stick insects as they can tolerate a fair range of environments and their preferred foodplants are readily available year round.
You can learn more about them here in our introduction to stick insects blog
Stick insects are widely available and can be easily found on lie in places such as eBay and in various Facebook groups.