How to cook Wheat bran to stop the devil Flour Mite ?

[RepBex]

Hi i was breeding mealworms about a month ago and it was going great then the evil Flour mite attacked and i lost the whole lot had to steam the carpet etc and bleach and wash 2 plastic draws full of college random stuff so this time i wish not to have them back

how can i go about "cooking" the wheat bran to kill any eggs etc just to be safe ??

will the mealworms etc still eat it even if its been cooked ?
i have a Mircowave and a cooker i can use
any tips ?

 

[Saphira]

you can put diatomaceous earth in with the bran... it is often times used in flour. the below website tells you about it. they aren't the cheapest to get it however. I am not sure if it will kill the worms or not.. it kills the mites... do some looking... I haven't tried it yet.. for this..

http://wolfcreekranch.net/diatomaceous_earth.html

Here is another site.
http://www.earthworkshealth.com/

 

[RepBex]

i was thinking more of cooking it than buying some chemical that might kill the mealworms

 

[Chewbecca]

See, I don't keep my mealies in bran.
I use oat meal, grind the oats (doesn't take long in a blender), and lay it out in the container, then on top of that, I lay Repashy insect gut-load.
I add potatoes for moisture, and my mealies do just fine on it.
I don't have to worry about those god awful bran mites.

 

[RepBex]

them mites was in my oats aswell nobody is safe lol

 

[Chewbecca]

hmm...I don't know.
I honestly do not know. It's what scares me about keeping worms on hand.
I mainly allow my mealies to gut-load for about 48 hours, and then I refrigerate them. But I'm also not breeding them either.

 

[ElapidSVT]

use food grade wheat bran from the grocery store. it is free of mites, as it's intended for human consumption. i get it for 34 cents a pound at winco.

mites can crawl into your containers from your home even if there's none in the bran to begin with. some sources suggest placing the worm bin in a pan of water to avoid this possibility.

Good Luck!!!
ymmv

 

[RepBex]

i did i still got them lol
the current wheat bran is from a health foods shop

 

[Saphira]

i was thinking more of cooking it than buying some chemical that might kill the mealworms

well DE is a chemical and I know it is safe for human and animal consumption..just not sure it is for the worms.

 

[dmuehl]

I microwave mine prior to use. I've not had any issues with either my mealworms or super worm breeders since I started doing that.

The worms have no issues eating it after it has been microwaved.

 

[Saphira]

oops...my post meant to say "isn't" a chemical.