question and idea

[goblinsly]

Hey everyone, long time no see, missed you ! :wink:

I got a question first. As i live in a small place and dont have any other choice but to keep dubias/mealworms/superworms with me, i mean, really close to me, few steps from my kitchen, few steps from my bed, few steps from my working area, etc...i had to start thinking bout what to do with em. And with it i mean a) smell b) allergy.

Its a fact that they even in perfect condition give a mild smell. Well, i dont want any of that. Also, dubias in big numbers are known to cause allergy, even if mild one. Dont want any of that also. :mrgreen:

Soo my idea is this:

Big wooden closet, airtight. 2 holes, 1 on the bottom left, 1 on the top right. The bottom one is smaller then the top one. 1 fan in each hole ( again, bottom fan is smaller then the top fan ), bottom one blowing air in, top one pulling air out. Filter is put over the bottom fan just to make sure no allergens can leave the closet for whatever reason AT ALL ( dust, mites, skins, etc., like i said, for whatever reason, even though fan is blowing the air in, its good to be safe ). What kind of filter ? Well, prolly the one you usualy put over your mouth would be good, i need to buy one like that aswell, and use it everytime i deal with roaches.

Allright, soo to continue. The top hole would be connected with a hole in the wall and that hole goes to the roof and out of the building. The idea is that constant air movement would take most of the smell and particless out of the closet, also the fact that closet will always be a few degress hoter then the outside of the closet will help, hot air moves up, soo since air in closet is hotter then the fresh air that comes inside closet should help.

Ok soo lets talk about this, what do you think ? I deal with computers for many years and i work a lot with cooling solutions....and this closet, if u think about it, is really much like computer case. Bottom fan in, top fan out, .... i think it should work. If nothing else, closet will be airtight as far as air leaving from closet to room is concerned ( the only way air can leave closet is the hole leaving the building ). Soo if nothing else, there wont be as much smell/particles as long as the closet is closed, i will only open it when i feed roaches or take em out to be fed to something...and thats like few seconds every few days.

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Now its time for my idea, errrr. Well lets face it, its both idea/question, just as the previous text.

I love my dubias and my mealies, they are much fun to raise. But both have a few downsides.

- Mealworms are known to die and become very hard. Soo hard that other mealies cant or wont eat them. Well, its not much of a problem but still, why go to waste. And here comes the solution. Dubias love dead mealies ( dry healty ones, not the black stinky ones ).

- Dubias .... almoast perfect critters. But ..... a big colony makes a big mess. Its easy to clean their fecals, since they are soo small, you can use a strainer to get rid of fecals and still not lose any baby dubias. But what about dead skins. Or even worse. Dead dubias, which instead of getting dry, get all moist and stinky....very stinky...even 1 is stinky....and with many many dubias, many will die of old age...many stinky dubias. Well i got the solution. Wait for it...Mealworms ! They eat dubias skins, and more importainly, they eat dead dubias. They LOVE dead dubias. If you make sure mealworms dont get any quality food, they will eat dubias skins for breakfast, and if u make sure they get no moisture, they will eat dead dubias in seconds. Nothing will be left behind exept 1 or 2 pieces of shell that is too hard to eat. How to make sure mealworms dont get any quality food/moisture ? Well, they arent as good climbers as roaches are. Soo its quite simple. A few steep walls, maybe a material like plastic that is gently grinded.....its just a matter of testing.

Soo you ask, why mix dubias and mealworms together, cant they both clean their own cr*p ? They can but they arent very efficient at it. Like i said, mealworms dont tend to eat their dead friends, unless they are soft. Which they usualy arent, they are hard as stone. Their skins arent a problem though, they take care of em. But dead melies are eaten by dubias. And dubias dont really like their skins much in my experience. And they rarely eat their dead friends, only if you deny them food/moisture for a long time, which isnt really what you want, if u want dubias to grow fast.

And last thing, u probably think that mixing mealies and dubias will mess everything up. Well this idea is for dubias only. Meaning, mealies in this colony wont be used for food, only dubias will. And if u use adult dubias, mealies wont be a problem when u pick dubias out, since they are soo big. You still have to have another box for mealworms, cause it will be very hard to pick them out of dubia colony, but thats not their job anyway, their job in dubia colony is simple. They are garbage men and women ( and children ). They clean the roach neighbourhood, cause roaches are lazy punks who just eat and sleep.

ps: in the end....mites.....we all hate them. But here is a thought. Mites contain moisture. Mites are small, but not as small as flour parts. And mealworms have no problems eating flour. Soo why wont they eat mites when they are hungry, at least small mealies who have small mouths and keen eyes ? But in anycase, mealworms should help in preventing or removing mites from dubia colonys, since moisture level on the ground will be practicly zero. And mealies are perfect for this job. They dont NEED moisture. But if moisture is avalible ( like dead dubia ! ), they will deal with it like profesionals.

Soo, if ur eyes are still attached to your head after reading this, please comment !!

Much Luw, goblinsly :wave:

 

[kjinxx2]

Sounds interesting, but I've never actually had a dead dubia go all soft and smelly, they always are hard and dry.

 

[hammerhead]

Have you tried an air purifier? It might be worth it before you undertake that project. Just my thoughts.

 

[goblinsly]

Well that would be an idea and i can still incorporate it into this project. But still some airflow and "bad" air leaving the building is good aswell, cause my place is really small, like 25 square metres, and even without roaches, air is kinda bad. And as far as mealworm and roach idea goes....this way, nothing goes to waste. :mrgreen:

 

[goblinsly]

Just reporting that my closet idea is almoast finished. Today it SHOULD be working. Offcourse there will be some testing and repairing/improving, but the basic idea is as i said, almoast finished. No more smell and hopefully, no more alergy.

 

[hammerhead]

It didn't take you long. I'd like to see some pics when you're done.

 

[goblinsly]

Thats it soo far. I made a hole directly to bathroom. You can see the old fan there aswell, its not working anymore. If you check the picture of the closet u can see a hole on top of it and a "tunel" thingy. I will use it to make a tunel from top of the closet, through the wall and directly into the hole where an old fan is. There will also be a fan on the top of the closet to push air out and a tiny air on the bottom of the closet to bring air in. I will have to be precise. I dont want too much air to leave my apartment cause therefore i will be losing heat and money. But i dont want it to be too slow also, cause therefore air inside the closet wont be clean and even though when closet will be closed i wont smell anything but when i will open it, smell will burst out......

Thats it soo far, hopefully i will soon get more time to continue/finish my work. Computers college kinda sucks in this aspect, gives you practicly no free time. :/

 

[goblinsly]

Almoast done. This silver "tunnel" isnt connected to the hole in the wall yet, it just leads to bathroom. I ran out of time today soo i will connect it tomorrow. I will also probably change the fan. I found it lying in my drawer today and i was suprised as to why would a perfectly working fan be in my drawer and not on one of my computers ( i am kind of fan freak, i luw running tons of fans at low rpm, changing speed depending on different computer components temperature ). Well, it seems it was there for a reason. Its kinda damaged, making noices.....i might try to repair it tomorrow, add some grease but prolly the fan is just near dead. No matter, i have like a million fans around here anyway. But for now, it seems like project is a succes. For now i wont add any fan blowing air inside the closet, even though closet is quite well isolated.

Also update on my "mealworm garbage men" project. Its a complete success. I checked the box with mealies inside and i found no dead dubias and there was absolutely no smell, even though there was a huge huge huge number of dubias inside. Then i checked the other box in which i only have about 200 adults + nymphs from last month or soo.....and no mealies insides. It was a disaster. Tons of dubias dead, they had some white dots on them, prolly mites ( i am still not sure how mites can kill dubias.... ), the smell was horrible. Anyway i filled both boxes with mealies soo it should be OK. Granted mealies will eat some dubias that arent dead, thats for sure. But still i think it is worth it, they are exellent cleaners !

 

[goblinsly]

More pics:

 

[goblinsly]

Tiny update. First of all, i have to say that this closet is a huge success. Ever since i installed it i havent smelled even the smallest amount of stink from all my 1000s of animals. I highly recomend this to anyone having any stinky animals ( i wish i thought of this idea back when i had rats....but then again, i might "incorporate" rats to my system again.... ).

As for my mealworm garbage men and women. They did their job to a point. After that too many of them turned to pupae and roach bodies started to pile and smell again. Also i kinda hated having soo many mealworm bettles mixed with my roaches. But now i have a better idea - superworms. They are vicious killers ! Sometimes i find some roaches who are dead or nearly dead and throw them to my extremely small colony of superworms ( i wouldnt dare to say that there is more then 50-100 ) and BAM, they swarm over them, eating them in mere minutes, leaving nothing but few pieces of hard shell. Now remember. This are the superworms who have loads of good food, consisting of oatmeal and dogfood and also getting vegetables as moisture source ever 2 days. Soo they werent exactly hungry. But on the bottom of roach box, there is basicly no quality food. Roach skins wont get you full, roach droppings wont satisfy your hunger, and why would you climb those huge walls to get to the roach plate where there is loads of food, if the roaches can basicly bring the food to you by eating it, dying and falling to YOUR plate. Also since supers wont be getting any source of moisture, they will atack any newely died roach as soon as he lands ( or sometimes even in midair ) to get the moisture out of him as soon as possible.
Supers wont turn into pupae easily, and if they do, even better, free superworm bettles are sweet. The only problem now is to get a superworm colony big enough for this....right now i have like i said, 100 worms, my production, they are more then 6 months old, i have to be extremely carefull if i wanna make colony out of this. If something goes wrong, my supers die and i have to buy new ones, which i dont like. I like my supers, they have a good heritage.