Those mealworms again - help

[goblinsly]

Hey everyone,

I am looking for an easy way to produce a LOT of mealworms.

Up until now i always put bettles into a single container, left them there a good month and put them to another clean container. It is too much work.

I was looking at those mealworm ideas where u put 1 bin on top of another, glue a mesh and you have a system where small mealworms drop through the mesh.
In this idea you put oatmeals on top of the mesh. I tried this idea a while ago and sadly it didnt work. After about a month i saw no small mealies anywhere, i went through oatmeal and didnt spot a single egg ( which is impossible because usualy i can spot an egg in the middle of a flour 8) ). To me it seemed like they simply either a) didnt lay any eggs or b) ate them. I was thinking that maybe on top of that bin i would put small containers with flour ( it seems they like to lay eggs into tiny substrate more then into pieces like eatmeal ). At least now there is no problem with moisture because i managed to make a container with water crystals but protect it enough soo they cant drag crystals into substrate and create a big moldy mess !

Ok i am counting on your ideas. I need tons of mealworms to be produced ASAP. Also if you have any hints on how to force them to pupate faster i would be glad to hear it. Its soo easy to force supers to pupate ( isolation ) but with mealies its strange. Right now i just sifted out the biggest of them and put them into seperate container, hopefully this way i can pick pupae out before a million of small bastards eat them alive !

 

[EnookiMacek]

Hey..

Umm..So I'm breeding mealworms too.. I have tons of them right now..
The thing that works is: lots and lots of vegetables..fresh veg every day if possible..I use just carrots and salad because otherwise I've always had mold problems -.-..
I've never tried the mesh system although I'm planning to try it very soon..
You just have to put in lots of vegetables for the babies and eventually they'll start falling down through the mesh when they'll wonder around the container..And you probably just didn't spot the eggs.. They are actually hard to spot in the substrate because of their kind of neutral color..They're probably there..You just didn't notice them .. (my first time around with the mealies looked like this: I separated the beetles after a month and then checked the entire container and saw NOTHING..I checked it daily for a month or two then and I still didn't see anything..then I finally figured out that in the beetle container there already were babies..And they were eating the pieces of carrots and stuff..And so I put the veggies in the first container and in a month I spotted hundreds of little mealies..So they'll actually survive all that time without a water supply but will start growing exponentially if you give them veggies..Maybe you haven't been feeding them enough veggies ?)

Why are you using water crystals? I don't think they are necessary.. Just put lots of veg in the beetle container..And they won't start eating the eggs..

About the pupating: just put enough veg in the container and check it on a daily basis..Maybe even twice a day or more..And separate the pupas into a different container..

That's how I do it and I've had lots of success this way :wink: ..But you should remember from your first time round that it takes time to start a successful colony..

 

[goblinsly]

Thank you for your reply, gotta love it, "veggies" is always the answer hehehehe, actualy made me smile ( which honestly isnt easy since its 1 am and i am learning for my computer college :twisted: ).

I am using water crystals because as far as beatles are concerned, water crystal gives them moisture and basicly i only have to change it once every 2 weeks while if i were feeding them vegies i would have to check it everyday. Also what happens if i give them potato or carrots, they walk around it and get flour and stuff on it and therefor it dries off before they can eat it. Soo i end up with whole carrots full of flour. And well, carrots arent for free. I only have this problems with the bettles, worms will eat veggy even if its almoast dry.

I am happy that u will try the mesh idea soon. Maybe we can together find through testing the best system for them. I do tons of modifying of stuff. For instance for dubias right now i have a watering system with crystals that in theory ( in theory cause i never tried it soo long ) should give them water for 1 month with no babies drowning ( meaning i can go sit on a tree for a month and come back and dubias wont be thursty ).

My idea soo far was, get a mesh, put oats and bettles on. On all sides of container put little boxes with various grinded stuff ( like flour, grinded bread, grinded oats, etc. ). This is just for bettles to have a choice, for instance, maybe some bettle likes to "stick it" into grinded stuff. Also its harder to eat eggs if u put them into flour and they get flour all around, maybe they dont know the tasty egg is inside the not soo ohhh flour. Ok soo they lay eggs there. How to get them out of this little boxes full of flour into the rest of the box with oats ( soo they can fall through the mesh ) ? Well veggies. Veggies and water crystals are in the middle of the box. Soo when they get thursty there is nothing inside little boxes of flour. Soo they leave it to get a bite of salat. They do and when they are full they want to relax and accidently fall down through the mesh.

Thats all i got soo far.

 

[EnookiMacek]

Well yeah veggies are always the answer in such cases :mrgreen: :mrgreen: ..I actually read what I wrote to you now (cuz I wrote that in the middle of the night cuz I was also studying for an exam XD) and it really made me laugh XD..But yeah it really does help if you put in more veggies XD..There's never enough veggies!! :lol: LOL
I give them just veggies anyhow..And I change the veggies once a week..(because I'm away from home during the week and my mom doesn't want to feed them :roll: )..And when I get home I usually find 4 dead beetles (out of a colony of 200)..And they died naturally (they weren't eaten or sth).. And I've got lots and lots and loads of little mealworms..So they actually won't eat each other if you change the veggies once a week..Oh and make sure you place egg cartons in the bin..That way you make it more "space-y" for them..

I don't get why you're using containers in the container..They'll lay eggs everywhere from my experience (I once didn't separate the beetles from the pupa for like a month and they laid eggs in the bin even though there was no substrate..)..

I think you should just make a basic mesh system: beetles, oats, mesh..And just wait it out..You should start worrying about not having babies after two months..One month is just on the edge and maybe that's why you didn't see any of them YET..

 

[goblinsly]

I want pics of your mealworms asap !

 

[EnookiMacek]

I'll take a few pictures tomorrow

 

[goblinsly]

You do that ! And while you are at it, check my profile, like, my location. :wink:
ps: gave my mealies salat and carrot. Tomorrow they are getting some cabbage. :lol:

 

[EnookiMacek]

Oh my god you're joking :shock: ..
Did you just change that :lol: ???
Cuz I seriously didn't notice that before and it seems very unlikely..
Oh my god ..Also I don't get why I'm still tipping in English ..
(it seems appropriate though )

 

[goblinsly]

Unlike in out country, laws and rules apply here ( proff enough that i indeed am from where i said i am ? ). Soo anything but english will result in a quick buttkick !

I am happy to report that my mealworms got some more veggys today and i didnt get any complains yet ! I also bought 1kg of water crystals soo i dont suppose i will run out of them any time soon. I made a few calls also, i am trying to find an iron mesh of different hole sizes ( i need 1 mesh of 1x1mm hole sizes, 2x2mm and 3x3mm also ) but it seems like most things its impossible to find anything. I will need this iron mesh for mealworm system idea ( i insist on the mesh being iron...plastic mesh WILL get eaten ( already did ) ). Also i need it to sift out mealies when i want to size them. Any idea where to get this material is welcome.

 

[EnookiMacek]

It was actually more of a joke.. But I didn't know that so good to know 8) ..

Amm..I was looking for the mesh too..I couldn't find anything useful but I gave up after checking three stores because I don't actually have time for trying new things right now :roll: ..

But I had this idea: find an iron fence..With just the right sized holes..Or maybe find an actual sieve and cut out what you need..Also I think that beekeepers might have something that could be useful..But I haven't checked on that info yet..

Good you just keep feeding them the vegetables..I still don't think that the water crystals are necessary in breeding mealworms..But do tell how it goes ..

P.S.: I didn't forget about the pictures, I'll be posting them as soon as I find my cable :lol:

 

[goblinsly]

I dont think water crystals are necesary either but since i use them i dont have much bettle death anymore, before they were dying like crazy ( well lets be honest, compared to superworms they suck. 80% of my pupae die ( black and smelly ) and bettles die FAST. Supers are like 9/10 succesfully become bettles and they live for months ).

And now back to water crystals, they are cool if ur lazy and forget bout bettles for a while. Bettles die faster then worms. My superworm bettles once died cause they didnt have water crystals ( they dried and it was like, very small amount of em, now they have like 20 more soo it will never dry). I found like 15 out of 20 dead, it was like nooooooooo. Anyway, water crystals are a good backup if ur lazy or happen to die or something.

About the mesh...might be worth calling some of those ppl who do those meshes. Not sure if they will sell small amounts....

 

[EnookiMacek]

I've never had such problems with my beetles oO..They live long..I have very little die offs..
You're probably right about the mesh yeah..Tell me if you find something useful though :wink: ..

Btw: What do you use to separate your supers? I'm trying to breed them too and this time I used just plastic cups which I covered with a piece of a plastic bag and made holes in it..But I'm really trying to find empty toll boxes or sth that I could get because putting them in cups takes too long..Do you know where to find that maybe? Or like a box for making ice with a lid on it or something ..

 

[goblinsly]

At first with supers i just used plastic cups. Since they were to high for them to climb out they made holes in them.
Now i just use plastic cups used for storing rolls of camera film.

 

[goblinsly]

When i wait for pics that long, i bump big time !

 

[EnookiMacek]

I'm really sorry!! I'm having technical difficulties :lol: ..I've got a new phone and I don't really know how to upload the pics from it yet :roll: (for some reason the computer doesn't recognize it).. And we don't have a working camera atm :roll: ..

I haven't forgotten about the pictures though!! I have them on my phone.. I'll try and convince my boyfriend to try and upload them on Friday (he'll probably know how to do it XD) .. Really sorry about the delay..

How are your guys doing?
My mealies started pupating..And they're not even fully-grown yet :| ..So I'm getting these really small pupas lol...