Breeding Insects

[thinkloically]

Hey!

I'm wondering-- is it better to breed crickets or regular earthworms- NOT MEALWORMS(To much work)

Tell me whats best for the quail.

Thanks!

 

[KayByrd]

Not sure why you think mealworms are too much work, but that being the case you'll want to stay far, far away from cricket raising. I've raised about every feeder insect known to man, and you couldn't pay me to ever bother with crickets again. Noisy, smelly buggers that manage to escape despite all you do to contain them, and they drop dead in bunches if you look at them wrong.
If your only choices are earthworms or crickets, definitely earthworms. How many quail do you plan on feeding them to? Earthworms mature and reproduce pretty slowly, so you won't be able to use them as a staple food - unless you start with an awful lot of them and only have one or two quail.
Right now I'm raising mealworms, red wigglers, dubia roaches, and black soldier flies. Mealworms are the best in terms of production and second best in terms of being low maintenance. The dubias are the easiest for me to care for - I give them a couple of scoops of chicken feed and some raw cabbage and carrots and/or potato and then forget about them.

 

[thinkloically]

Hi!

Do you keep like three separate containers or no? I'll take your advice and do mealworms. Just a question- are they smelly? I'm planning on keeping 10-12 quail- 1 male and rest are female.



Thanks!

 

[KayByrd]

The mealworms have no odor that I've detected. Their dry environment helps a lot in that regard, I think. The only moisture they get is some carrots or potato chunks. Just be sure they always have a piece or two in their bins.

I only use two bins now. I used to do three, but I didn't really see a need for a "middle" stage bin, so I did away with it. My "system" works like this:

In a fairly large bin, I have all my beetles and pupae, along with some larger worms.
Every few days - maybe once or twice a week - I take a large wire strainer and scoop up some of the bedding (I use wheat bran and quail/chicken feed "dust") from that bin and shake/sift it over the other bin that is for my feeder mealworms.
The strainer I use has mesh about the size of regular window screen, so it allows the smallest worms to fall through, as well as most of the eggs. This way most of the eggs will be hatching in the bin with the feeders, and can grow out there, but a few will remain with the breeders, so I don't have to worry that I'm depleting my future breeder stock.
Any mealworms I scoop up in the beetle bin that manage to grow too big to fall through my Strainer of Doom are deemed SAVED, and get to go back in the beetle bin to live out their happy little mealworm lives as breeders.
When I want to collect some worms to feed out, I use the same strainer in the feeder bin, shake/sift back into the feeder bin and whoever doesn't fall through the strainer gets fed to the critters.

It takes some time to get a set-up like mine established, but once they get through about two generations, they'll be producing a ton of worms. Just be patient with your first batch, and let them all grow out and turn into beetles.

 

[InsectivoreCo]

I am currently raising Texas a&m meat quail on dubia roaches. I feel you with the mealworms - in 15 years I have always ended up with grain mites, eventually. I go with Dubia because they work and have given me 0 problems with pests, mites etc in the 13 years I've been raising them.
Although I also breed red wigglers (composting worms), they can carry parasites and diseases that are transferable to your poultry. I make sure all of the worms and dried and ground prior to feeding for this reason.

Because most of my quail do not have access to the great outdoors, I rely on Dubia to give them the enjoyment of hunting for their food. They really enjoy it when I throw a large male in, and seem to argue over who gets the wings! They become very "talkative" when they are fed insects.

 

[KayByrd]

Hmm, my quail won't touch a living, adult Dubia. They're fine with the juveniles, but it's annoying sifting through all of them to pick out the little ones.

(This is probably pretty gross for most people, but I throw a bunch of adults in a jar and leave them in the freezer over night. The next day I toss them in an old yard sale blender I keep for this purpose and make a roach smoothie of them. I leave it out for a bit to attain room temperature and mix the goop in with their food. Smells awful, but the birds like it and it's the only wway I can get rid of my excess male roaches.)