Question About Temperature Extremes

[Frosty]

Boss is Black Oil Sunflower Seed. They grow them a lot up here, and flax as well. Health food stores carry flax seed, some feed mills may carry it as well, I don't know. Meal worms are actually very easy to raise. You can also use meal worm poop for fertilizer. I've seen seed starting mixes that have it. I have a tub in my daughters bedroom that has cereal, flour, stuff like that in it. It's for the mealworms that I found in a closet after I forgot about a back of dog treats that were in there. Now and then I take out some meal worms and give them to the peachick. I just can't hand feed anymore, she bites my fingers when she goes after the meal worm and I am trying to break that habit before it becomes painful.

 

[bdfive]

My grown peafowl often bites me thinking there is a treat between my fingers or maybe they're just seeing if the finger will break loose, haha!! It doesn't hurt. Would a sensitive person I guess or a child. They really don't bite to bite....it's play or wanting a treat. I've not seen my peafowl happier about being fed anything like the meal worms. The grown birds peep like babies when eating them. Do you strain out the meal worm poop? Also do you have to take out those that mature to beetles? It's hot here so I have to keep them in the fridge. Don't know if they'd survive in house kept cool at 75% in the summer. Would they? I'm not much of a bug person so grosses me out thinking of them in the house. We have a garage refrigerator I keep the 10,000 in when I order them. They last for a long time in a dormant state.

 

[Frosty]

The poop all settles to the bottom of the container. I leave the beetles in there, they lay eggs and eventually die. The worms may eat the dead beetles, I don't know but they do disappear in there. The beetles don't fly, so you don't have to worry about that. I put a lid on the container to keep rodents out (mice like to eat mealies, too!), it has holes drilled in it for ventilation. 75%, are you talking heat or humidity? If that's the temp, it's warmer than I keep my house in the winter. If you want to try raising some, don't get the giant mealworms. If I recall, they are fed a diet that makes them bigger but it possibly also makes them sterile. Just get some oats or something and dump a bunch in a tub. They'll keep reproducing. You might be able to just keep them in the garage.

 

[Haunted55]

I don't even know what boss is. Just tried to find picture but unsuccessful. Did read several times that Flax seed is better but it can spoil. Don't know what that is either. I scramble the eggs, they also eat broccoli, carrots, beets, cabbage, squash, actually just about any vegetable there is. I cut it up in our Vita-Mix 5200. Can't think of a fruit they don't like so my peas get quit a variety but don't feed them so much that they don't eat their Game Bird Feed rations.

I'm going to be ordering live 10,000 meal worms this week for about $40 plus shipping. How much trouble is it to breed them? Do you purchase the dried ones locally? Cost?

Regarding heat....I'm now leery of using the heat lamps but only need them for peachicks. It doesn't get that cold in this part of Texas. The wall panel heater looks like a great idea. Electric is expensive here too but water has gone up 72%.

This is what I would do if I were going to use something like this. I would get some of that reflective wrap they have in building supply stores. Even regular aluminum foil would work in a pinch. I would get offsets to mount it away from the wall run the cord inside a piece of tubing or pipe of some kind. I didn't notice if this had a thermostat built into it or not. Me, if it didn't, I would wire a switch to a thermostat to an outlet to plug this into. That way you could set it as low or as high as you wanted and it would only be on to acheive temperature. They also have these little switches you can plug into an outlet and then plug your heat source into and it will only allow it to come on when the temps reach 40 degrees or lower. Might be the way to go. If I remember correctly they are about 7.00 each.

 

[Trefoil]

Do those of you that feed sun flower seed, feed them with the hull on? or off?

I'm going to be ordering live 10,000 meal worms this week for about $40 plus shipping. How much trouble is it to breed them? Do you purchase the dried ones locally? Cost?

Regarding heat....I'm now leery of using the heat lamps but only need them for peachicks. It doesn't get that cold in this part of Texas. The wall panel heater looks like a great idea. Electric is expensive here too but water has gone up 72%.

I bought the freeze dried meal worms on ebay, I believe they were about $12/lb. To give you an idea of the quantity a lb is, they came in a very full gallon size zip lock bag.. But of course on ebay you bid and take your chances. These were big.. They are easy to raise and there is a thread on BYC dedicated to raising them. I use bran, but in a pinch have used baby cereal. I keep my house at about 68º and that's too cold for optimum breeding this time of year.
. According to the website I ended up at while researching the heat panels, it takes about 6watts/square foot to raise the temperature 40º. I think haunted's idea about possibly using a thermo cube would work great. I'm thinking about it.

This is what I would do if I were going to use something like this. I would get some of that reflective wrap they have in building supply stores. Even regular aluminum foil would work in a pinch. I would get offsets to mount it away from the wall run the cord inside a piece of tubing or pipe of some kind. I didn't notice if this had a thermostat built into it or not. Me, if it didn't, I would wire a switch to a thermostat to an outlet to plug this into. That way you could set it as low or as high as you wanted and it would only be on to acheive temperature. They also have these little switches you can plug into an outlet and then plug your heat source into and it will only allow it to come on when the temps reach 40 degrees or lower. Might be the way to go. If I remember correctly they are about 7.00 each.

Using a thermo cube is a great idea, thanks I was a little worried that even if it did come with a thermostat, it wouldn't go low enough and I don't want to warm the coop, I just want to keep it from getting soooo cold. Again, thanks