Mealworm farming

[CluckyJay]

I just balled a piece of clean, damp toilet paper up and put it on the substrate for the babies. Just change it would if you see mold.

 

[WestKnollAmy]

I put carrots in for all life stages and they do great!

Today they got apple and some cantaloup. Yummy.

 

[hannakat]

Quote:

No the beetles aren't eating them. The worms move quickly and coexist well with the beetles. The pupae wiggle when they feel threatened. I've now put isolated groups together to monitor canabilism and have found NONE. Now, when a worm, pupae, or beetle die...that's a different story.

bobbyc1970 ~ Doing the happy dance!!

CluckyJay ~ I still don't recommend wet paper of any kind in the colony. If you want extra moisture, try a lettuce that has been towel dried or some kale. Seems too many people run into problems with that amount of moisture.... just my observations... any you'all know by now that I'll speak out!!

 

[bobbyc1970]

thank you. I am so happy and they are tiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiny.

Quote:

No the beetles aren't eating them. The worms move quickly and coexist well with the beetles. The pupae wiggle when they feel threatened. I've now put isolated groups together to monitor canabilism and have found NONE. Now, when a worm, pupae, or beetle die...that's a different story.

bobbyc1970 ~ Doing the happy dance!!

CluckyJay ~ I still don't recommend wet paper of any kind in the colony. If you want extra moisture, try a lettuce that has been towel dried or some kale. Seems too many people run into problems with that amount of moisture.... just my observations... any you'all know by now that I'll speak out!!
http://smileys.emoticonsonly.com/emoticons/s/spinning-2143.gif

 

[hannakat]

What? You think I posted fake baby wormie pictures?

 

[bobbyc1970]

Ahhh i got to see it.

Checked all 3 bins and all 3 have wormies. YAY. I shook the wire in the top bin and babies fell to the 2 bin. was so cool.

Quote:

 

[galanie]

All I know is, I sure am glad I smoke so I can't smell those stinky wormies!

Mine appears to be doing nothing but I haven't looked super close. I had to "start over" a week or two ago because of the moths.

I had almost no babies because of the moths.
I took out all the pupae and beetles I could, completely removing them from the bedding, then put the bedding out for the chickens to work over. Boy did they have a great time with that!

From now on, I'm freezing every bit of flour or grain I bring in here! No more dang moths!

I put the beetles and pupae in fresh bedding in one tray covered with screening. And there are NO MOTHS in it now! So from here on, it's the one bin method for me just because that's the best way for me to keep moths out of here since individual bins can be covered more easily than the whole drawer unit.

Only time I've ever seen mold in there was when I put in wet stuff like apple w/out enough buggies to eat it.

 

[Germaine_11.20]

Yep, always freeze what ever substrate you are going to use, before you use it. Weevils aren't a good thing to propagate, no siree. Been there, done that. I like the shoebox individual method or even small totes.

I will have to go back and see the other methods you are using on here. Mine eat potatoes sliced in half or carrots and fortunately with the dry climate here I don't have any mold issues.

The worms begin so tiny that your best bet to know if they are there is to just take a large spoon and scoop up some wheat bran (or whatever you are using) hold the spoon still and look for movement. If the bran seems to fall or move then your eggs have started to hatch.

I am trying a new idea and keeping my worms in the chicken coop out of the way of the hens. It is almost always warm in there and the beetles seem to like it in there. It keeps the stinky worm smell out of the house.

I do have a few boxes in the house to harvest pupae for the next batches but I am going to put an old "gorilla rack" out in the coop for the boxes of worms. Time will tell if works best or not but at least I will pay attention to them in there as I am in there everyday. In the garage the poor things got forgotten for months at a time and survive by cannibalism. They make it through winter, summer and no moisture and still survive. I love these guys.

With any attention you'll have nice fat wormies to feed all the chicks.

Has anyone posted about drying the worms for later? I'd like some info on that. Thanks

 

[Cakela]

Got my first pupa thing today!

Or maybe not.

Looked closer... they look the same as the other worms only white and really big. Not anything like the pictures of the pupae I've seen.

Do they just molt? I thought they molted into pupae, but these just look like giant white worms.

 

[Chickangel79]

Hehe look what I found , to The left of the coin