Mealworms turning into beetles.

[CoolioTiffany]

Ok so I'm going to start to breed mealworms to have some for my Giant leo (if she eats..) so I don't have to keep on buying more and more (not that expensive, but this way I won't even have to spend money). Today after cleaning out the water dishes and doing some cage mainenance, I looked into the mealworm container and saw a beetle. So I thought, "I'm just going to breed my own and see what happens." so there are a few things I want to know on how to keep and breed these beetles. There is also another mealworm in it's cocoon and about to turn into a beetle so if they are the opposite sex which I cannot really tell (I'll just see what happens) I'll breed them.

1- How do I set up their home? Right now I have the one beetle in a small plastic container with some paper towels in it just for now.

2- What do these beetles eat?

3- Do I just put the beetles together and expect to see eggs or is there a certain way I am supposed to breed them?

Thanks for your answers!

[tbowman]

You can put them on oats, with a little lettuce and carrot for moisture. Their food doubles as their bedding. I would put something in there for the beetles to hide under also.

[jglass38]

I swear that Google is your friend..I wouldn't tell a lie...

http://www.wormman.com/mealworm_breeding.cfm

[bamf64]

in my opinion, its better to buy like 500 or 1000 online than breed. i stopped breeding cuz its just not worth it. i buy 500 and put em in the fridge.my freind sells 500 for 8$ shipped on zazzreptiles.webs.com

[CoolioTiffany]

For right now I put an inch of oatmeal for the mealworms' bedding and I also put some lettuce in there for them to snack on. I put like half an inch of oatmeal in the beetle's container with some lettuce and as I can see right now one mealworm is snacking on the lettuce and the beetle is doing the same.

[Jay_Bunny]

The female beetles tend to be a bit bigger than the males. I just use oatmeal for now because I haven't had a chance to go grocery shopping yet. A few years ago I had started a mealworm colony that got off to a good start. Here was the mix I used as far as food.

Oatmeal
Bran Flakes
Corn Flakes
Veggies (potato, carrot, lettuce)

Warm temperatures will produce more pupa and therefore more beetles. I keep my animal room at 75+ and I bought a container of 50 medium mealworms less than a month ago. I now have 12+ pupa and almost a dozen beetles. Mealworms do take a while to get started though. You can look up the exact time period they spend in each stage, but I know they spend several weeks in the larval stage and eggs take up to 2 weeks to hatch.

If you get beetles, put them in some food and leave them alone. If there are males and females, they will breed. Do not throw away the food/bedding! Eggs and very very small larva are living in the food. At first you won't be able to see the worms, they are very tiny. I just dump this food into the worm drawer and let them grow up with the other worms.

[CoolioTiffany]

The female beetles tend to be a bit bigger than the males. I just use oatmeal for now because I haven't had a chance to go grocery shopping yet. A few years ago I had started a mealworm colony that got off to a good start. Here was the mix I used as far as food.

Oatmeal
Bran Flakes
Corn Flakes
Veggies (potato, carrot, lettuce)

Warm temperatures will produce more pupa and therefore more beetles. I keep my animal room at 75+ and I bought a container of 50 medium mealworms less than a month ago. I now have 12+ pupa and almost a dozen beetles. Mealworms do take a while to get started though. You can look up the exact time period they spend in each stage, but I know they spend several weeks in the larval stage and eggs take up to 2 weeks to hatch.

If you get beetles, put them in some food and leave them alone. If there are males and females, they will breed. Do not throw away the food/bedding! Eggs and very very small larva are living in the food. At first you won't be able to see the worms, they are very tiny. I just dump this food into the worm drawer and let them grow up with the other worms.

Thanks so much that is very helpful. I'm using oatmeal for now and it seems to be working quite well. For now I'm just feeding them lettuce since that's the only thing I can find in my house that they like to snack on. Are any fruits good for them like grapes, blue berries, strawberries, etc.?

[Jay_Bunny]

I have used fruit before (when no veggies could be found) and they were things like apple and pear. You want to avoid something with a lot of moisture (nothing like mango or something that literally drips juice) because this will spoil the oatmeal and you'll have to throw it out.

Veggies just provide moisture. I have used broccoli stem too, but many people like to use carrot or potato.

It is a waiting game though. It took me months to get even two containers of itty bitty mealworms. Of course I started off with only a few mealworms (around 100-150). That was also in a cooler environment (70 degrees). The room I have them in now is at the very least 75 degrees, but can reach 80 during a hot day. I get about 3-5 pupa a day at this temperature range.

[Icatsme]

Now I understand that superworms are not the same as mealworms..however my boyfriend decided to breed his own superworms so he didn't have to keep spending money on feeders.

Make a long story short, within a few months two beetles produced literally thousands of superworms. We would give them away to friends and take them into the local pet shop to get RID OF THEM. We didn't even bother with store credit.

Feeding the superworms ended up costing waay more than just picking up feeders periodically.

If you don't have a large need for them, it may not be worth it.

Again, these were superworms and mealworms may not produce as many offspring. I don't rightly know...I'm not a fan of and don't care to know much about things with an exoskeleton.

[CoolioTiffany]

Hmm, that gives me an idea.

Maybe I should breed tons of mealworms, get store credit from Petsmart, and buy all of the things I need for my snakes and everything. That would be a dream come true for me lol.