First attempt at mealworm farming

[mosse71]

i have raised mine in the same tote for 5 yrs. now. i have never separated the beetles from the rest. they reproduce just fine.

 

[Perris]

thanks mosse71; when I have more confidence I'm sure I'll do that too, but while I'm learning how this works (and how long each step takes in my environment) I think separate baby steps are easier!

 

[Perris]

this morning I moved the beetles into fresh bran, leaving the eggs they've been laying for the last month to grow on. Quite a few had already hatched and grown on into visible mealworms, so 3 out of 4 life stages were present in the one container. There were 3 dead beetles and some bits of dismembered ones, so I guess the oldest members of my young colony are passing on now. I hope to start harvesting by the end of the month...

 

[Perris]

this morning I found my first pupae of the second generation, so we have come full circle/cycle

 

[416bigbore]

this morning I found my first pupae of the second generation, so we have come full circle/cycle

Great thread post !

 

[RumneyRoost]

Yay! So exciting!

I started my first mealworm colony less than two weeks ago. I've got lots of pupae and a couple new beetles.

I started with 1000 worms and just have them in one container. I may move to a two container system at some point.

 

[Perris]

@416bigbore prompted me to take some photos of the farm : the first is the whole thing, sitting atop the boiler in the utility room. Then one of a worm drawer, and then one of the beetle drawer. I have settled down to a procedure of removing the beetles to a new drawer every time I complete harvesting it (and washing of course, between getting rid of the frass left behind by the worms and refilling with fresh bran for the beetles), and picking out any pupae I spot in the worm drawers and putting them in a separate small container I check daily for emerged beetles, which then go into the beetle drawer. I harvest the worms when they are about 1" long.

 

[416bigbore]

Thanks for the great pics Perris. How big in length are your mealworms?

 

[Perris]

You're welcome. They are about one inch long when I harvest them.

 

[RumneyRoost]

How do you guys decide how many to harvest? I'm still a few months from that point, but I would hate to harvest too many and have to essentially start over.