How To Breed Mealworms! Mealworm Farming 101 

Thank you very much 😁

That’s what I love to hear! Yup it’s very easy and you can definitely make it a side hustle congrats on your success!

What's the going rate for live mealworms?

So easy that when I released a few in my lizards tank, they dug into the damn styrofoam I had on the bottom of his tank and have survived for months under the styrofoam layer eating nothing but moss and styrofoam I didn't even intend to start a colony, it was entirely inadvertent and I never realized that these little guys can consume just about anything! I wonder if their bodies can break down microplastics and clean up our mess... I'm starting to think that alternating the species into my crop soil every 3-4 years to purify the soil of unwanted micros is feasible!? I think I've discovered another use for the little buggers that might have a huge positive impact on the environment!

@@CriminalonCrimeit might be dangerous for your gecko to eat worms with styrofoam in them, just make sure it’s safe 😀👍

@@ChiefSweetsUniverseis it possible to spend no money on food for an leopard gecko if I breed multiple type of insects?

I’m glad you enjoyed thank you

Happy to help

Yes and the pupae is really the only thing that you have to take care of. Cause the worms and the beetles will eat those

Happy to help

Happy to help

Happy to help!

Thank you happy to help

Happy to help! Yes the worms will eat those pupae fast!

Thank you glad you liked it

Happy to help

Happy to help!

Happy to help! Yeah definitely seperate the pupae and you will be golden

Thank you I appreciate it. You can but as a occasional treat.

Happy to help!

u too cute to be out here making maggot 💀

That too!

Your welcome happy to help

Happy to help

Thank you! I’m not a teacher but I think I’m getting better at teaching the more I make videos 😁

They are pretty neat

Thank you

Sorry my bad it’s aluminum screen you can find it at Home Depot or lowes for windows

After I sift a bin, I keep the frass for a couple months. I sift it every couple weeks and have always found tiny worms. Just keep sifting until you don't have any more worms. I don't know if it is neccassary, but I leave a handfull of oats and a carrot or stalk of celery. You can sell the frass or use it in your garden as a fertilizer (NPk222) Don't forget to where a mask. Some people develop allergies from the dust.

Use whole carrots. They don’t have the juicy outside. I only have to replace oats like once a year.

I've mixed vermiculite with my oats to help prevent excess moisture, lmk if this is a bad idea, also a small fan or breeze can help influence ventilation. It may be getting stagnant.

I use a small temp/humidity sensor that monitors this. Govee makes a decent one and can give you daily to monthly readings on the app

Sounds like you live in high humidity or need more ventilation to both.

Happy to help! No worries everyone overthinks it as well. Yeah you’ll definitely have enough food breeding the mealworms

Will do that’s a great idea!

@@ChiefSweetsUniverse Thank you! I've been binge-watching all your videos. Best channel to learn how to care for bearded dragons. I just recently got a baby bearded dragon and want to give him the best life possible!

@@glorias.2930 happy to hear that glad I could help!

That sounds awesome! I feel like my roach colonies are my pets at this point. Names are great. Beatles is a good band haha. Now smell only occurs from old substrate they don’t smell themselves really. You could use a special mix substrate I think sand alone wouldn’t be good. Peat mixed with play sand at 70/30 ratio would be good.

@@ChiefSweetsUniverse Great, thanks! I’ll try that. 😄

They last pretty long in the mealworm state I’d say about a maybe two months. I don’t refrigerate any of mine

Just basic window screen. Idk the size because I believe all window screen for houses are the same size.

The pupae turns brown and then black before the beetle emerges. That's normal.

Now that is a great question and usually I have a sifter like screen mesh kitchen strainer and just pour it through that and it will catch most mealworms and all the oats usually go through the sifter

That’s a good question mine will take about two months.

They eat the oatmeal. The carrots are just for hydration.

Oh yeah that’s ok as well. You can use many different substrates.

@@ChiefSweetsUniverse thank you. appreciate the helpful video

Yeah you can you can just also leave them if you want. The pupae is really the only things you want to move.

Yeah they can but that is true most reptiles are like na don’t want it. My uromastyx like them though haha

Yes definitely could

I put a bead of vaseline about an inch from the inner top. I sprinkled organic green pea flour in the substrate. The green or yellow pea flour kills the newly hatched mites and the adults get stuck in the vaseline. Voila! No more mites

@@cathyhanley8658 thank you - I pretty much did exactly as you stated after researching the mites and it worked really well. They are all gone now!

They are so nasty. I'm glad you had success.@@shaunneal9981

Happy to help!

Yeah you could totally do that. Sometimes I get lazy and just leave em. You wings get as much back but they will still reproduce

Yeah they can the chickens might not like em as much but they do eat them

Yes 100% but I’m not a fan of it just cause it’s way more dusty

You could also use top soil from Home Depot

@@ChiefSweetsUniverse yeah infact one time i used water on frass and all of a sudden. It turned into soil before my very eyes

😁

No I never have never had a issue however some people do to make sure they don’t get grain mites

Lol that’s crazy! Kind of lucky 😂

@@ChiefSweetsUniverse That's what I am saying! So now, watching more and more videos, I want to maybe getting into selling them locally so I can help sell cheap Meal worms to reptile owners or whatever eats them. I also just made some recent local connections, and I will be seeing them soon and talking about this with them.

Of course! Chickens love mealworms just make sure to breed a lot more than I did in this video haha. Might have to start with 3,000 mealworms cause chickens will eat a lot

I haven’t really ran into that issue but you can get new breeders once a year

thx man @@ChiefSweetsUniverse 👍

Yes they lay them on the bottom

@@ChiefSweetsUniverse thanks

If u use a 3 layer plastic shelf,beetles on top cut rectangle and hot glue screen. Eggs fall to next bin with mealworms then hand pick larva ,place in bottom bin. New beetles are white then brown then turn black..place into top container.

the eggs vaporise, you breathe them in, and they hatch in your lungs

@@cvspvr good to know lol

😂😂😂 they might think it’s cool you never know!

They live a couple months but sometimes they do die quickly

Rainbow mealworms

Yes, I have mealworms that I'm pupating now and they eat them fine.

Grain mites are a thing but I’ve never ever had them

Oh yeah that works

@@ChiefSweetsUniverse Great content! Easy to understand and to the point 👍

yeah but im not a fan of it however it does work

Yes that is very true when they get cold they will not breed fast if at all and will slow growth tremendously

You can sell 250 for $10

That’s unlucky. Good luck on the new start

Mites only come in if too high moisture i think.

Oh no it’s superrr easy haha.

😁

Congrats on the black beetles! So what you need to do is make sure they have access to fresh carrots at all times. Sometimes if it’s too dry they will just die

Thank you 😊

They will still lay the eggs but the worms and beetles will probably eat them if they don’t have substrate

I found using paper (of a sort) at the bottom of the container yield much more eggs. Replaced daily before the Beatles eat all the eggs. I can see where there was once eggs on the paper that got eaten. I estimate I got more eggs in 3 days than all the worms I started with. Note: the eggs are very very fragile and can be damaged very easily

Very nice!

I’ve never seen one fly at all.

@@ChiefSweetsUniverse Im probably just paranoid, but what species are your mealworms? I've read that ceartain species can rarely fly.

I've heard they have wings which are used as a mating ritual, if the enclosure gets too crowded and they can't get food they use the wings to jump and not fly. I may be wrong though!

No wings to fly it's impossible

Yes the black pupae and mealworms means they died. The Beatles will breed tho so it’s good you have those. Did you seperate the pupae form everything else

@@ChiefSweetsUniverse yes, I separated pupa, worms and beetles aftr watching your video. How often do you put in new oatmeal?

@@101Cecilia I put in new oatmeal once it seems they have eaten all done to a powder. Maybe like once every 6 months but if you have a huge influx of mealworms maybe once every 3 months. That is peculiar that they died. Hmm maybe too hot. And you give fresh baby carrots every two days?

@@ChiefSweetsUniverse I prolly didn’t feed them enough, and my house does get a little warm. You’ve answered sooo many questions I had floating in my head THANK YOU for taking the time to respond- AND SO QUICKLY!❤️

Happy to help!

They can most don’t like the taste tho

@@ChiefSweetsUniverse mine does seem to like them

@@ChiefSweetsUniverse I’m also asking because I let my dad take care of my bearded dragon for 2 weeks while I went to a trip, and somehow he let all the mealworms die and there’s only beetles now 😂

@@Johan_FRLN oh no I think they just grew up then lol.

@@ChiefSweetsUniverse i don’t think so, because there was over 400 mealworms, and there’s only about 100 beetles. They probably committed cannibalism as you mentioned in the video

Beetles. It’s what the mealworms evolve into

No they are harmless

It’s really just to keep the pupae alive. The worms like to eat the pupae. Sometimes the Beatles will too but in my experience not that often if at all. So you’ll start losing beetles and it slows down production

I think the beetles eat the baby mealworms a lot less often than the savage worms eat the pupae - that and they lay loads of eggs so while some will get munched, it's making the best of an imperfect setup. I'm using a little (3rd) tub that the pet stores sell live insects in so I can seperate the baby worms and beetles if needed/as a backup.

They will. They don’t like them as much tho

Maybe a week or two

​@@ChiefSweetsUniverseI've got a good handful of pupae already in 1 week (live worms bought from pet store) - but how long do they pupate for before becoming beetles?

You got it! Protect them at all cost! 😂

They do not. So you can keep them in the dark

@@ChiefSweetsUniverse Thank you.