You need at least 500 mealworms. I use chicken starter for substrate. You can buy it at a local feed store in 50 lbs bags. I think I paid $12 for it and will last a really long time. Fill a plastic sterilite tub 3 to 4 inches with the substrate and add the mealworms. That is basically it just let them do their thing. You can add potato and apple slices for moisture just make sure that you change them out every couple of days. You can also get a small rack system if you want to seperate the different stages. I am currently using a rack system but I am switching to a tub because I am going to use a UTH. I checked the temperature in the rack and it is only 70 degrees and I want to bump the temp up to about 80-85 to speed up the process.