Mealworm bedding/breeding

[Taesolieroy]

I recently purchased a big order of mealies from a local supplier - GeorgiaCrickets, to try and maintain a mass number as well as a renewable resource for myself and my fellow coworkers that also rear reptiles as I only have three geckos. I've been saving the Flukers Orange Cube jars as they empty to try my hand at the stinky process of breeding waxworms too, since I know that the frogs that one of my coworkers breeds might readily take to them.

At best I might get 1-2 generations out of each batch at first for a rookie bug breeder, but I'm hearing a lot of different things used to bed the mealies in.

I've heard usage of oatmeal (dusted), rice krispies, wood shavings (almost a sawdust grade), among the bedding types - which one works best for you and why? I'm testing the mealies out on the rice krispies (plain cereal) bed with some orange cubes for the time being, and it's interesting listening to the crackling you'd otherwise hear when you pour milk in (not to mention the undulation that made me half wish the neighborhood brat came along so I could dare him to put his hand in to find out what was making the cereal wriggle as a kind of payback for his troublemaking). My other reason for asking is which material is easiest to sift (though I don't know how rice krispies can be so easy to sift through for the skins - however considering the activeness of the worms, any skin or carcass would 'float' to the top to be skimmed off..

As far as breeding goes - how do I know when a mealie is about to pupate into a beetle (aside from the pupae form of course, I'd like to be able to anticipate when they start getting to that point), Also do you separate the pupae out of the main bin, put them into a second bin to grow the babies to size or just let them be and sift out the sheds and dead ones?

 

[DrCarrotTail]

Mealworms eat grain so I’m not sure where you read about the sawdust but that doesn’t sound like the best idea to me. I’ve used oat bran, oatmeal and rice crispies. All seem to work equally well (although I agree with you about the rice crispies = I’m just never going to be able to think about “snap crackle pop” in quite the same way ever again…haha). This next go around I may try grinding the oatmeal to a really fine texture so I can sift through the mix for the mealies more easily. I give mine potatoes, apples, kale, and carrots for a water source. They seem to especially like the kale and carrots. I also throw them stale bread and any other grain-based thing I have that isn’t too moist and is headed to the trash (like crackers)

The mealworms lose the ability to move well right before they pupate. If you grab their hind end and put the smallest amount of pressure on it all they’ll be able to do is jerk up and down but won’t be able to bend or crawl away.

They’re super easy to keep and breed. The only issue I have with mine is they need a good deal of ventilation or their bedding gets damp and starts to smell and grow unwanted things.

Best of luck!

 

[GodzillaGecko]

At one point they actually thought the meal worms lived off saw dust. Yeah its true but they don't. They don't even use the saw dust anymore for packing. I've seen them use wood chips though. Which is just as bad. But yeah they did think meal worms ate the sawdust.

 

[Crewdog00]

I use oatmeal which is dusted with cheapest calcium I can find. Works great on my 1500 meal worms.

 

[SC Geckos]

I use the cheapest oats I can find at the store. They do eat the oats but I also use the same powdered food I feed my dubia colony. It is a mixture of dog, cat food, along with fish flakes, and a vitamin/calcium powder. I have had a mealworm colony for about 5 years. I have so many sometimes that I sell some to the local (mom and pop) pet store. I know they use to sell mealworms packed in some sort of saw dust but I have know idea if they still do.

 

[Taesolieroy]

Thanks for all the suggestions! I picked up some carrots after work to add into what I already have. And it's probably a good thing I'm not overly fond of rice crispies ^_^;

Next time I'll probably grind it down to a siftable size and mix it with ground oatmeal for an easier bedding - the store didn't have any kale (typical) :/

The bin I have them in used to house my crickets before I moved them into a 10 gal aquarium , so it's already got a screen installed in the lid for ventilation in a spacious room (basically against the wall of our equipment room next to my room with the crickets)
I'm kinda leery about mixing anything involved with cat/dog/fish food as those often have chemicals that aren't even safe for humans >_> When I was still living in Maine we had a housemate once that had this thing about snacking out of the bin we stored our dry catfood in even after we kept harping on him about health .. and he insisted it was tasty... >_> He was a weird guy overall..
I don't know of any local mom/pop stores in the Atlanta area (where I'm based) but I'll probably put out local ads on places like Craigslist for the excess crawlers to be shipped out to, or to local keepers that don't want to deal with the hassle of shipping.

 

[bubblez825]

Its really easy to breed mealworms. Basically, once you decide what bedding to use, what to keep them in, and what "moisture" to give them, the only thing you really need to do is keep the containers clean of dead stuff and pull out the pupae. Just leave them alone, and they'll do their thing

I use 16qt plastic Rubbermaid bins with lots of holes drilled in the lid for ventilation. I have a 3,000+ colony of worms, with a couple handfuls of beetles. I've been breeding mealworms for about 5 or 6 years now, and have never had a problem keeping them on plain oatmeal(not ground up) with occasionally some ground up grains thrown in the tubs, and carrots for moisture. Occasionally they get some mustard greens and kale, too. I also keep my beetles in a 16qt tub with a thin layer of non-ground oatmeal with carrots for moisture. I hardly ever have any dead mealworms(maybe roughly a handful once a month) and my beetles usually last at least a month and a half before they die. When the mealies pupate, like stated above, they hardly move and are pretty stiff, but still plump and "healthy colored". When mine pupate I just go through and toss the pupae into a small deli container, nothing on the bottom, with a few holes in the lid for when beetles hatch. I just check it every day and when I see beetles I pick them up and toss them in the beetle tub.

 

[Taesolieroy]

What do you do with the eggs/larvae once they hatch in the adults' bin? Scoop out the adults and dump the newly hatched mealies into the main bin? That was my main confusion is how to handle the adults. I'll probably switch to oatmeal when I change this batch out as pleasant smelling as it is for a cereal. I have a feeling this lot might be all eaten before they've had a chance to go to pupae stage. My little one Dani seen in my av (not so tiny anymore! She's over doubled that size with a happy fat tail and personality to boot) kept slurping them down that she forgot to swallow and had to drop her recent catch to sit there a while with her mouth open and figure out whether she wanted to spit up what was in her gullet or swallow it! Once she figured it out she swallowed her load and ate the mealie she dropped without hesitation. Next time I'll probably order 1k to ensure that a number of them reach pupae stage at least >_>

How do you sift the mealies out from the oatmeal though? I had to sit there with a dixie cup and shake out the cereal as the worms burrowed to the bottom before picking them out now and then with a pair of tweezers. A thought crossed my mind to set them up with a more finer powder in the occasions I have to leave and need someone to come feed them - that way it'd be easy for the feeder to scoop up the mealworms needed and divide the scoop between the tanks for easy-quick feeding.

The whole idea behind setting up a mealworm colony was mainly for that reason in the event I have to go out of town for a while, I wouldn't want to put someone bug-skittish through the trouble of chasing and dusting crickets before feeding them to my gecko, and accidentally putting too many crickets in their tank :S It's not so easy traveling with geckos as it is with sugar gliders - at least they can go on a plane no problem.

 

[bubblez825]

I take the beetles out of the container, and dump all my worms into the container with the babies, that way any eggs left can still hatch and I have a clean tub with no eggs to put the beetles back in. Doing it this way, I don't have to switch the tubs every few days when I see more babies, but switch ten every few weeks when the new batch of eggs have been laid and hatched.

Finely ground oatmeal would work too, so you can sift through it; that's really your own personal opinion i just keep non ground oatmeal in there because the dust of the finely ground stuff makes me sneeze like crazy. Its just easier to go through the non ground stuff up top and not kick up much dust and prevent a sneezing fit haha.

I have no problem with "getting dusty" and touching the worms, and it takes a LOT less time to just grab 50 or so worms then "scoop, sift for a while, drop worms into a container, repeat..."

 

[bubblez825]

Switch the beetles every few weeks* not switch ten... That wouldn't do much good.

 

[Taesolieroy]

So you don't really need a deep bedding then? I guess that was my rookie mistake right there ^_^; I put the whole thing of cereal in the 10 gal bin so it's fairly deep and makes a convincing ripple when the worms move - again would've been perfect payback on the brat had he showed up.

With my experience dealing with garlic powder on a large quantity scale at a restaurant for a couple of summers (that stuff BURNS if you inadvertently snort it just right after you forget to not drop it all into the blender at once for coleslaw dressing. I don't personally care for it, but it's a popular side dish at seafood restaurants.), I think I won't be as reactive to oatmeal powder ^_^; Never know though! I may just finely chop it so it's not a complete powder.

Looks like I'll be getting another bin then for the mealies, a shallow one this time as the original bin was deep to keep the crickets contained (I found the colored one to be useful as I could scoop the crickets as they climbed the wall versus chasing them all into the corners for a hopeful snag) and the darkness now lures the worms to the top so I can pluck them off the cereal before I have to do the scoop routine.

 

[bubblez825]

My mealworms bin has around 4 to 5 inches deep of oatmeal it's my beetle bin that's really thin! Makes it so much easier to switch them and stuff good luck!

 

[Taesolieroy]

Hmm, that still puzzles me how you're able to scoop them out and feed them to the geckos if it's unground oatmeal

 

[DrCarrotTail]

I just have to say cause I'm amused - I sifted through mine tonight and was amazed at how much they LOVE kale. I put some potatoes and carrots in there yesterday and today and 80+% of all of the beetles and late pupating worms are crowded around the dried up kale leftovers from last week. Go figure. I might have to go do some research on what the heck kind of mealworm crack is in that stuff.

 

[DrCarrotTail]

Oh and (kick me if I'm misinterpreting) I think Bubblez was saying that she keeps like 80% fine ground oatmeal with 20% whole and then its easy to pick the worms out of the small amount of coarse stuff left in the scoop and worth the bit of picking since there's a whole lot less dust.

I'm going to try grinding up some oatmeal in a bitty kitchen ninja thing tomorrow. Wish me, my kitchen floor, and my dust pan luck!

 

[Taesolieroy]

Haha that does sound funny! I was finding the same with just baby carrots since I didn't have current access to kale >_> I always found the stuff extremely bitter unless it's cooked just right in the pan.

That does make a bit of sense, but I think she was complaining that the dust made her sneeze and she went with unground, feel free to correct us both Bubblez!

Haha! I have that little tiny ninja grinder as well, darn noisy white little chopping machine - will take forever to fill my bin with that tiny thing!

 

[bubblez825]

Nope, the dr. CT has it right, it's all finely ground stuff with the solid stuff up top it jut makes it easier so when I grab mealworms out it doesn't kick up much dust, the solid stuff creates kind of a barrier for the ground up powdered stuff.

 

[Crewdog00]

How long do the Pupae take to hatch into beetle? I have mine in a deli cup like you said, and it's been a few days, haven't seen a beetle yet.

 

[DrCarrotTail]

Time for pupae to beetle depends a whole lot on the temperature they're kept at. Basically lower temperatures equal longer times. From what I gather on the internet shortest time is about 2-3 weeks (probably about 75+ degrees) and the stage can last up to 9 months in the fridge.

 

[CNest]

I had a great colony going when I had leos last. This thread makes me want to order a couple thousand and start building up a colony again. Haha Logical right? Get the food supply up before getting a leo. Haha