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Mealworm colony troubles

Alex G

Alex G

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Been trying to set up a mealworm colony for a few months now. First I tried them on oatmeal, and had slow progress. Then I was recommended to put them on chick feed, but that molded quickly and I had to trash that colony since I couldn't risk getting my geckos sick. Then I put them on corn meal and had slow progress, and was told that they were not nutritionally sound, either. Then at the suggestion of a friend I put them on peat moss, hoping the more natural medium would make them more prolific, but that molded within a day or two. I am extremely frustrated with having to trash another colony of mealworms. I had been feeding them carrots and fruit scraps every 3 or 4 days, and removing dried up food immediately. I change their bedding about monthly. They are kept in an ambient temp of 80-85 degrees. What could I be doing wrong that's making these supposedly easy to breed feeders consistently mold or grow slowly?
 
I keep mine on wheat bran. if you have a farm supply store nearby, it's dirt cheap. 50lbs here runs $10-15. I generally go through 50lbs in a year with 7 concrete mixing tubs funn of them.
 
I raise and sell a million+ a month.

I raise them on wheat bran and provide them potatoes for moisture two times a week.

The things that will slow growth the most are: Overcrowded, not enough moisture, low temperature.

Do you have lids on them by any chance? Also do you know the humidity the room is?

Forgot to add what stage are you having these problems. Near pupa, beetles breeding, babies?
 
Are you putting water into the cage or box that you are holding them in?

If things are molding, then the humidity is too high or you are putting water in with them.

We are just starting out with our mealworm colony as well, and have told to keep our box of worms in a very dry place, and to never add water to the enclosure.
 
I find mealworms extremely easy to raise, I use wheat bran and chick starter or egglayer mash depending on the price (the chick feed is only a couple dollars more than the wheat bran here and has a lot of nutritional goodies in it). Be sure to get the unmedicated feed! A lot of the chick feed at stores comes medicated and although I haven't been able to find anything that says it's harmful to my geckos, I still avoid it at all costs just to be safe. If you can't find anything unmedicated get gamebird or turkey feed or stick with just bran like some people do.

I raise mine in rubbermaid shoeboxes, I use a mix of 75% wheat bran 25% chick feed. I add 2-3 inches of the mix to each shoebox and then I throw it in my chest freezer for two days or so (I find this kills unwanted hitchhikers like Dermestid Beetles which I probably get from the chick starter not the bran). I then take them out, let them warm up to room temp and toss in a handful of beetles with some potato chunks. If it's cold in the room I'll place a heat pad under the tub to keep them warm and speed up the process. That's about it...

You may be getting mold if you're using a lid because of the potatoes, the dry bedding alone shouldn't be molding on you. I raise superworms in exactly the same way and sometimes there are so many in a tub that along with potatoes sometimes I just dump cricket gel in the tub and they devour it, yet I've never gotten mold. (I do keep my reptile room as dry as possible).
Hope that helps.
 
I used peat moss the first time I tried raising superworms and had nothing but problems with it. Now I raise them in bone dry bedding just like mealworms, I just give them additional potatoes and cricket gel, they don't need a humid environment they just need more water than mealworms do.
 
meal worms

Try using Fluckers high calcium cricket diet. i use that for my mealworms and they seem to love it. i also use it for my roaches and they seem to love it to. why buy many kinds of food one you can just use one kind for all your bugs.

i use it for crickets, mealworms and roaches.
 
Using carrots could help. I found that when I used potato the bedding was smelling like mold. I switched back to carrots after a week and the smell disappeared. I use layer's mash, pellet form. I'd use wheat bran if I can find it in 50lb bags...
 
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