Mealworm farming

[1MrsMagoo]

I just ordered 500 small mealies from ebay as they're not far away from my town, and I figure they'll arrive safer? I do live in a warm climate, but I still feel like I'm a bit too late in the season to raise enough mealies to feed my chicks any time soon (might take a few out to feed 'em for fun, but that'll reduce my production, eh? LOL) Oh well...

The small ones will take longer to get to the beetle stage and begin laying eggs. I'll tell you what, the chickens know the whipped topping bowl I use to bring the meal worms out for them on sight: I get mobbed before I make it half way to the coop. They will love you for raising these!

BTW-the ones I purchased from GrubCo arrived in perfect order without even one dead worm. I was very pleased with the purchase. They only have small and medium ones available right now. I also have ordered from Armstrong's Cricket farm (got both crickets and meal worms) and got good service from them as well.

 

[cluck-cluck]

LOL, well, I figure it's the same as the way that my parents got the dog to play with me, put a pork chop around my neck. Gotta make friends with the birds somehow! LOL

 

[yo burrill]

Haa haa haa they way to any animal/ person is through their stomach I guess!!!!

 

[trifecta]

Forgive me if this has been answered previously as I haven't gone through all the pages. I set up my boxes about 6 weeks ago. I have mostly darkling beetles at this point and have had beetles for at least 2 weeks now. There is one lone straggler of a mealworm waiting to pupate, but everything else is beetles and pupae.

I am still not seeing any signs of baby mealworms yet and am afraid the adult beetles may be eating the eggs. Is this a common problem? It seems that just as many people comingle their worm stages as separate them- I didn't know if there was something else I should be doing to help them along, or if I need to separate out the adult beetles and put them in a new box.

If you do separate your life stages- how frequently do you pull out the adults to keep them from eating the eggs?

 

[onafixedincome]

Patience is all you need, honestly. It only SEEMS like forever before the substrate starts to move. I scoop up a handful from deep in a corner area and then watch the bran very closely for movement. A few flakes shift, then a few more...and about a week after that, the bin explodes.

The beetles generally don't eat the eggs, far as I can tell, provided they have enough moisture.

 

[Gypsi]

Set a tiny bit of apple peel in there and see if waves develop

 

[trifecta]

Ok, awesome. I have been checking their food source daily to make sure they have plenty to eat and are not picking off the younger stages. I will be more patient

 

[mychookschick]

I just got to witness a worm morphing into a pupa! And I got pics!

Watch it come out as the pics progress!

 

[bobbieschicks]

I just got to witness a worm morphing into a pupa! And I got pics!

Watch it come out as the pics progress!

So cool!

 

[mychookschick]

I thought so! I knew that they were all starting to morph (and this is my second generation) so i was picking a few our multiple times a day, so they they wouldn't get eaten, and I saw the head of this one, and when I pulled it out, it still had skin! I was shocked! LOL