Basic Care

Feeding mealworms to animals

If you’re providing mealworms to an animal that won’t eat them instantly (chickens tend to eat them ravenously but reptiles may take their time) you should put the mealworms in a shallow dish so that they can’t burrow their way into the dirt or substrate in your animal’s enclosure and hide.

Caring for your Mealworms

Mealworms are pretty easy to care for. They are easily kept at room temperature; protect them from high heat or extreme cold. The cups I provide them in are generally temporary housing, meant to transport the mealworms from my care to the mouths of your animals. If you have a lot of mealworms and need to keep them longer than a couple days, either the container needs to go in the fridge where they will hibernate, or you should provide them a better home.

They will generally do better in shallow container with smooth walls – plastic or ceramic is best, they can easily climb wood or cardboard. If their bedding is at least 1” below the rim of the container, they can’t reach their way out. The mealworms and bedding should not go thicker than approximately 2” to allow heat to dissipate because large quantities of mealworms can cook themselves.

Food

The bedding added to the mealworm container is bran meal and is food for the mealworms. If you’re keeping them for more than a couple days you’ll want to provide water in the form of a slice of root vegetable such as a piece of carrot or potato. Consider patting the slice dry with a paper towel before placing it on top of the bedding, peel-side down if possible to reduce moisture seeping too much into the bedding. Never provide water directly; the bedding should never get wet. Replace vegetable weekly or as soon as it’s been eaten completely. Remove vegetable if it shows signs of molding.

You may want to provide more bedding than I included, any “-meal” will do, such as bran meal (ideal), oatmeal, or corn meal. You could even use bread crumbs but don’t use flour or anything else that’s very powdery. Tip: You can keep your mealworms in non-medicated chick starter if you can’t find bran meal!

I can provide additional bran meal for mealworm bedding for $2/lb.

Bran sources

I’ve been buying my bran here: https://centralmilling.com/product/organic-flaky-wheat-bran/ $12.21 + shipping (for me) = $25.58 for 25lb

A customer provided me with this link and it seems cheaper but I haven’t actually purchased any yet. She said the shipping was free. https://www.azurestandard.com/shop/product/food/cereals/bran/wheat/wheat-bran-dark-organic/20266?package=CE601 $17.38 (on sale for $13.90) for 20lb

I picked up a 50 lb bag of bran meal at Benson’s Feed here in Carson City for $18. However, it’s a lot dustier than what I received at Central Milling so I’m not sure if I’ll source from there again. I don’t want to lose 2/3rds of my bedding when I sift out the frass so I have to pre-sift it and then do something with the powder that falls through the 1/30” sifter. I reclaim it by mixing it with water, dehydrating it, and blending it up just enough so that it falls through a larger sized sifter but not the 1/30” and that’s just a lot of work to save some money. But I’m stuck with 50lbs taking up half my freezer so that’s what I’m doing for the next 6 months or so.

Please let me know if you find any source you like! Feed stores generally carry it around here because it’s fed to horses.

Black Mealworms/Pupae

Sorry to say it but if the mealworms (or pupae) are turning black then they’ve died. Sometimes they just die no matter how well you take care of them, but if you have a lot of dead then something isn’t right in how you’re caring for the mealworms.

You do want to remove your dead because they can make the mealworm bin smell unpleasant. The other mealworms can and will eat the dead eventually, but they’d rather eat the bedding and veggies you’re offering so they don’t clean up very fast. I just pick out the dead with tweezers and toss the bodies in the compost pile. Don’t worry about getting every single one, you just don’t want a bunch to build up.

Lazy Mealworms

When you notice mealworms just lying on the bedding not doing anything, generally in a “C” or a “J” shape, they aren’t dead or dying; they’re getting ready to pupate. See the next section if you’re looking to prevent this.

Preventing Pupation

If you aren’t using your mealworms right away you may want to prevent pupation to make them last longer. Take the container you’re keeping your mealworms in and just stick it in the fridge (45-50 degrees F). They’ll hibernate for weeks this way. After two weeks or so, bring them back out feed them a piece of root vegetable. Allow them to remain at room temperature for at least 24 hours before returning to the fridge.

Do not put pupae in the fridge. I have heard that storing pupae in the fridge will kill them, but for what it’s worth, I’ve had mealworms pupate as they were put into the fridge and I pulled the pupae out after several hours and they were fine. I have not attempted long term pupae storage.

Oh no, they pupated!

Generally pupae and young/white beetles can be fed to your animals the same as mealworms, but research what your animal will handle before trying as there may be differences in the nutritional value of the pupae.

You can also let them turn into beetles and try breeding your own.

What’s this brown papery stuff on top of my mealworm container?

As mealworms grow they shed their exoskeleton. You can take the container outside and blow on it and the shed skins will just float away. Alternatively you can use a vacuum attachment but you risk vacuuming up mealworms and bedding with it. I use a small hand vacuum as it’s not terribly powerful and I dump the shed skins in the compost pile.

Mealworms will eat the shed skins, but they don’t seem to do it very fast, so I’ve found it generally easier to remove the sheds right before I want to do anything with the mealworm bin.

Mealworm Colors