MEALWORMS - Raising Them the Easy Way

[chickbird]

Hey,

If anyone is still monitoring this thread... I'm having a go at the mealworm raising, but only about 3 weeks into the project. I have a number of almost-beetles (is that the pupae?), but no beetles yet.

My question is, my carrot seems to be molding the oatmeal - I'm not sure if I should be concerned about this or not. I've replaced the carrot once already when the first one looked shriveled and dry. Everybody in the box seems to be doing mealworm things, but I have no idea if I'm on track or not.

Galanie's comment on covering a barn floor was a little alarming, but I guess I'm only aiming at producing chook treats. Mealworms are about $15 a box here (for about 200 worms I'd guess), so raising your own would be economical.

Thanks!
S'boiled

get one of the large plastic storage containers with a lid from walmart and place about 4 inches of wheat bran about $8.00 for a very large bag from tractor supply, tear open a large paper grocery bag and lay of top of the wheat bran, lay a couple of whole carrots on top of the paper, put your bettles/larvae underneath the bag, the beetles will come up on top of the bag to eat/suck at the carrots for moisture, as the beetles lay eggs in the bran and your worms hatch they will eat the bran , add bran under the paper as needed. clean out the storage container about once a year and start the process all over with fresh bran, there is no need to continuously be sifting and cleaning and they grow just as well. the storage container needs to have some small holes for air and to keep humidity down. keep container in a warm place, as the carrots dry up, remove and replace with fresh, the brown paper on top in my experience prevent the carrots laid on top from molding. in one of the 5.00-7.00 containers you can raise thousands and with very little work, just add bran when needed underneath the paper bage and 1-2 carrots as needed. the bran i add i place 3-4 cups in the freezer or microwave to prevent mites/moths. 200 worms is more than an excellent start, they will turn into larvae and the larvae into bettles will lay many eggs that you can,t see and they will hatch into tiny hair=like worms and grow into larger worms , if your paper bag is eaten, add a new bag to keep your carrots off the bran.

 

[horsegrl]

that is a black soldier fly larvae my chickens love them