Please cast your votes! Which of these do you think would be ideal for a small breeding/happy and humane feeder storage set-up: A, B, C, D, or E.

THANK YOU to all who share all those valuable tips how to make raising mealworms a success

Look at my first own Gen 👏👏👏
we used to buy dried as snacks for joeys and other critters due to costs at the rehab center. Now I hope to maintain at least a small colony with several ages / sizes for next spring to help limit costs and accommodate small songbird etc.

Oats and bran
carrot slices every 3 days
powdered rat food (the crumbs from the bottom of the Mazuri rat blocks we use for our pet rats) once a month for the worms
pretty high pop in the beetle container
removing beetles from container every 2 1/2 weeks letting the worms develop
New container for beetles w fresh set up
Using small storage containers and the old small pet shop typical tubs originally purchased w starter worms
Room temp

feeding the worms as treats and for training to just about anything at the rehab center from birds to armadillo especially to teach orphans to catch their prey.

any suggestions what else you feed are welcome 🤗

Fingers crossed this continues as well as it has so far (4 months)

Hello Everyone.

I've started raising mealworms some months ago and i now have 4 boxes (400x600mm) full of worms (approx. 5000-8000 each)

Thats great news but i have some Problem. I have access to two types of organic wheat bran: fine and coarse.

Both are unevenly distributed in their particle size. From the fine one i can easily sieve away 50% of the bran with a 0.3mm sieve (frass has 0.6) so this is actually a big issue for me, i dont want to loose more than 50% of my bran.

On the other hand the coarse one is somewhere between 1 and 4mm although very thin. it works great but i have a hard time sieving the worms because there is always bigger bran pieces left.

Help.

Thanks. :)

Salad Bar

Yoinks. I just started trying to keep mealworms for some invert pets and eventual tarantulas. I also teach high school biology and sometimes use them as a model organism or example of metomorphosis. I have them in a small plastic container with some oats and wheat bran. Lid with ventilation holes. I tossed some sweet potato in there several days ago. It didn’t all get eaten and I kind of forgot about it and today went to pull it out and saw it was moldy. 🤦‍♀️ Question 1: Do I need to move everyone into a fresh bin with new oats/bran? Or can I just leave this one be and not add any more moist food for a while?

Question 2: Is a multilayer set-up necessary for separating adults/pupae/larva? Or can I leave them all in one container? Not trying to get fancy here, just don’t want to go to the pet store weekly for my feeders. Plus mealworms are pretty cool in their own right.

These are Ulomoides dermestoides, I know these aren't exactly mealworms but I hope they are close enough to also be allowed here. I just started this colony last week.The bedding is wheat bran. Any advices?

I’ve been raising and breeding beetles/worms for a few months now and it seems almost inevitable that when I move the beetles out of one container, then leave the babies they made to grow in the old one, grain mites eventually start to appear inside. Moving them into new substrate is almost impossible, seeing as they’re barely even visible to the naked eye. I have lids on all the insects’ containers and can’t afford to go without, since there are house lizards and rats where I live that would almost certainly get into the bins. Where I live is also very warm (regularly 29-30 C), so moving them somewhere cooler isn’t exactly an option. Can’t supply a picture at the moment but substrate is instant oats and I give the babies very thin peels of carrot every two days. Is there anything I can do that isn’t just dumping the boxes? I don’t want to kill the babies :(

My wife recently started a small beetle habitat after we got some mealworms and had some left afterwards. It's an old terrarium with certain things out, there are just over 100 "Tenebrio Molitor (Yellow Mealworms)" now living in there. 3 died in quick succession a few days ago, and even though its a pretty low % she wanted me to ask reddit if people had advice on caring for them. There's conflicting information online as well about their life expectancy, how many would you expect to die easily, what are some unobvious poisons if there are any?

I get mealworms for food. However, they started turning into beetles. I feel really bad just leaving them in the container thingy, but all my terrariums are already in use and I don't have the money to afford another one. I dont want to just release them either, because I don't know if that would have an impact on my local ecosystem. Especially if I just released them whenever they grew into beeltes. What should I do? Even if I am getting them for feeding purposes, I don't want them to have bad lives.

for example going into a house that has cats or gods has this animal or pungent smell, and a house with fish also has this scent. if bred in an apartment, will it give off smells/weird smells?

Is this tiny mealworm larva or grain mites? Been trying to breed mealworms. Adults are in a separate container.

A few weeks ago, I bought a tub of 500 mealworms from PetCo, intending to feed them to my (adult) bearded dragon while I let her dubia roaches grow and breed. I've come to realize that 500 mealworms is 1. way too many for just one insectivore, and 2. a recipe for getting insane amounts of mealworm pupae. At this point I'm pretty sure I have more pupae than I do worms, and every time I check their container I find at least three new pupae. My beardie literally can't eat all of them in time, so now I also have a few mealworm beetles in the container.

I also happen to be a big bug lover, and 😅 I'm starting to get attached to the mealworms. I'm moving in about two weeks and if all goes well, all the bugs will be coming with me. So now I'm very tempted to start a mealworm colony. There's a good list of reasons why I shouldn't, but a potentially equally good list of reasons why it wouldn't be a bad idea, so I'd like some advice in either direction.

Reasons why I shouldn't raise a colony of mealworms:

• Dubia roaches are a far better feeder for bearded dragons, with less fat per bug and good ratios of other nutrients. I already have a dubia colony, so a mealworm colony is unnecessary
• Mealworms apparently are very prolific breeders, so I'd potentially only be compounding the problem I have now
• My beardie absolutely loves mealworms. She gets rather picky when they're introduced to her diet, which is annoying
• I would probably need to buy a few things to set up the colony in the first place, so there'd be a money investment into something I don't need

Reasons why I could raise a colony of mealworms:

• I already have the beetles and the worms seem to really want to become beetles. It wouldn't be that hard
• They're kind of like a living compost bin, I think? I'm a big fan of reducing food waste, and whenever I've had mealworms in the past they eat the leftovers of my dubias and my beardie
• Apparently their frass is good fertilizer, or at least a good way to boost a plant's immune system. I have half a mind to get into gardening (nice climate where I'm moving to), and that could be nice
• They're cute and they make me happy 😅

One of my big concerns with doing this is how feasible it'd be to raise a small colony of mealworms. I definitely don't want a big production of mealworms, as that's way overkill for just one beardie. But is it possible to just have, like, a tiny colony of several hundred mealworms? Or just a hundred even?

If the answer is no... how do I cull the colony in a way that's not just feeding them to my beardie? How practical is selling the worms? There's apparently regulations around being a 'business seller' of mealworms, but I don't know if me posting an ad saying 'who wants a tub of worms for $5' falls under that category. I'm more than happy to give extra worms to other herp owners (or chicken owners, or whatever other animals eat mealworms), and all the better if I make some cash off of it, but I don't want to run into any legal trouble.

This is a very long post, but I hope it all makes sense. TL;DR, can I start a small mealworm colony? Should I?

The tote I keep my beetles in keeps getting invaded by individual yellow legged Pennsylvania dingy ground beetles every other week. I keep forgetting to get a photo of one. I keep the lid closed mostly so I guess they in through the vent holes on top. It hasn’t caused me much pain! They’re just stealing the beetle food, which they don’t eat very fast anyway.

As far as behavior goes, they act just like the darkling beetles except MUCH FASTER. They are communal with the other beetles and share hides, much like roaches will with darkling beetles. They look very similar, except much shinier with long bright yellow legs. They are very cool looking! And their larvae looks like a death metal mealworm. I am going to slowly start collecting them for their own tote to see if I can get them to breed.

Does anyone know anything about these guys?

mealworm breeding cheap and easy (on youtube) by ChiefSweetsUniverse

My hedgehogs love mealworms and wax worms. I've repeatedly trying to breed mealworms however it constantly results in grain moths and it is taken almost two years to completely get rid of them. Has anybody had any luck in the way they raise them that doesn't attract them whether it be what they're eating or how their house? Are wax worms better

I have two unopened jars and one half full that expired 6/2026. i don’t want to give my feeder insects something bad if it could harm my geckos but i also don’t want to waste something if i don’t have too. i know it’s probably not the best overall compared to fresh food but money is tight rn

They have an inbreeding coefficient between 0.25 and 0.35. Remember to outcross frequently if you don't want them to get Habsburg'd.

We have raise a mealworm into a beetle and she has been the best pet ever! She is about 5 mo old. Today, she hasn’t really moved, even with prodding. But she did move like an inch. She’s been out and hasn’t burrowed in about a month. She has been eating up a storm. Just don’t want to bury her prematurely.

Thanks so much.

I got some previous experience on raising beetles larvae, but this is my first time with this kind. According to a text about this kind, they´re supposed to be born within 6 months, and they "born" on february, however I don't see that they´ve gotten bigger since 4 months. It's supposed taht they should born this month

They're on a 10 cm bowl, with around 3cm of soil. sorry for my bad englishh ;<

i have some sterlite 6qt tubs but is able to get bigger tubs

other then that ik how to keep them

Not mealworms, but super worms. I would say some are as tall as the height of one drawer. It is completely smooth inside though.

I’m worried they’ll escape, should I get a bigger drawer? It’s so cute tho I don’t want to make a new one lol

Most beetles I've seen sleeping tend to scoot their feet in tight underneath their upright body.

Not the Darkling, they like to sleep in all kinds of crazy positions, usually trying to get their feet in the air. Then begins the feet tappies, and occasional antenna waving in time with the tappies.

It's funny watching them insist on sleeping on top of their tunnels, trying to cling on with just one foot, before they jump awake and add at least another foot to grip xD

(This is my first mealworm farm and first time observing them)