Meal Worm Start Up

[abraga]

I would like to grow my own meal worms as an occasional treat for our chickens and if I have extra sell them to local fisherman or others in my neighborhood with chickens. I have one of those plastic bins on wheels with 4 pull out tubs. I ordered 5000 mealys...some were for chickens..i left a lot to to Pilate and picked out the pulse and put them in one box. Covered it with paper towels and paper egg cartons upside down. Once the beetles hatched I added bran, oats and chicken feed with carrots, sweet gators. Left them alone for a month or so other than to feed fresh vegs. The newly hatched babies r really hard to see. After a month or so..i moved the adults one level up onto new bedding. Collection is easy as they all congregate under the egg carton..of coarse..i still pick some out by hand..the previous tub is now full of newly hatched eggs. I just keep picking out pupae 4 new adults..and every month or so i move adult battles n2 next container...so i have tubs going constantly with eggs. They take a couple months to reach a decent size to feed. I periodically order a few thousand mealworms just to add new breeding stock to my adults. A double pail method works good to. I like the r drawer plastic bins..i can sit in front and do my thing..mobing bugs from one level to the next. I have 20 egglayers..15 cemanis..and 10 seramas...i go through a lot of meal worms! I have my birds trained to come running for mealys....they r the bedtime treat to...makes it easy to get my ladies in to lock them up ; )

I have been reading and reading about mealworms.

I have three questions for those of you who have been breeding mealworms.

1. Is a plastic bin 12 inch by 24 inch large enough for 5000 meal worms for start up?
2. Will I have enough meal worms to sell a few if I am planning on giving some to the chickens only on weekends?
3. I read somewhere about people developing allergies to meal worms. Has anyone experienced this? I am planning on keeping the bin in the corner of my kitchen but now I am not so sure.

Thanks for your answers.
Diana