Mealworms... my story. Almost impossible not to raise them!

[Nifty-Chicken]

Ya, my problem is that I'm pretty impatient, so waiting for the whole cycle to complete and begin again is difficult for me. If "a watched pot never boils" then a watched mealworm never becomes a beetle and never lays eggs and the eggs never grow.

Kinda the only way for me to raise them is to be able to forget about them and come back after they are all done.

 

[Gallo del Cielo]

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That's the best way to do it. Thanks for the kind words about my page folks, I appreciate it.

 

[werecatrising]

I agree about it taking awhile to get going. I first got chickens last July. I started a colony a couple of months later hoping to have worms for the winter. I got frustrated and gave up on it. Several months later I found the bin I had set aside. It was loaded with babies. Now I have actually been maintaining it and have several bins going. I will be set this winter!

 

[Nifty-Chicken]

I hate to say it, but I really don't have time to be sucked into taking care of them or thinking much about them. That said, I like how self sufficient they seem to be.

Maybe I'll keep the experiment going and try to remember to add carrots from time to time.

Keeping the bin full of bran, oats, etc. is easy, but what is the absolute max days you think I could go between adding any additional carrots and keep them alive?

All mine are the same ages so if I was inclined I might even try putting some in the cold to slow them down so I can have different ages going all the time. Do you think a bin with many different ages / stages will be more or less self sufficient than most of them all being the same age / states?

 

[cherylcohen]

I still have some from your last visit...probably a different age group. Want some? Happy to share

 

[Nifty-Chicken]

haha... I guess it's worth a try since this is all just an experiment anyway.


The best thing: Worst case they die and I still just feed them to my chickens (sorry if that sounds heartless)

 

[Gallo del Cielo]

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I used to maintain up to 20 colonies year-round. We really needed them only from May through Sept. so they were were neglected in the intervening months. You could easily go three months without feeding; I've seen them survive as long as 6 months without any additional input. The funny thing about the colony is that it will always tend towards synchronization, in other words there will always be periods of banner and bust. You can get around this somewhat by having multiple colonies started at different times. I think the best suggestion I've ever heard was offered by joebryant. He made the smart observation that you could collect the worms when they are in abundance and store them in fresh bran in a container in the fridge. They could keep there for months.

 

[cherylcohen]

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It's fine Rob, just don't give them names

 

[joe17]

What do you use as bedding? Im hooked! I have two of those plastic critter cages and a 5 gallon aquarium. I may buy a hundred from the feed store and let them multiply. I'm trying crickets now!

 

[joe17]

I just googled mealworms and they said that you can use chicken mash as a bedding with potatoes. Is chicken feed suffice? Thats always in supply here