Breeding and Maintaining Mealworms....Part Deux

[packer43064]

I got 500 off of ebay for around $13. Got a larger container for the stage one worms and some smaller ones for the other stages.
Will have plenty of food for them with all the bananas and potatoes we go through in this household.

I bought my first batch from Ebay. I had to get a new debit card recently and they shut down my whole ebay/half.com account. Must think someone stole my old card or who knows what....I'm supposed to call them. It's been a couple of months now, lol. 13 bucks, isn't bad. I believe I payed the same.


I've been looking into other things to breed. I've been looking at fruit flies. They have 2 kinds that are lab-made, D. Heidii and D. Melanogaster. They are wingless/flightless depending which kind. They are easy enough to breed in small containers too. They could easily be sold as cultures.

 

[fishy12]

Breed some dubia roaches

And how do you clean your bins out?

 

[packer43064]

Yeah I know, I just wanted something right now that I didn't need to buy everything for and just a little bit easier. I would need a tub w/lid, heat mat(flexwatt?) and the food then egg cartons, the dubias. I just wanted something smaller ATM. That's totally in the plans though, set 4-5 bins up of dubias and I'd be breeding like crazy.

I looked up flour beetles a bit too, but I've always wanted to breed flightless fruit flies. It would give me a reason to finally get a dart frog also with how many I would have going. The same stand the mealworms are on could house them. Also superworms will be here in the future.

I'm going to buy some more food(I have none now) and grind it down(blender hopefully) to a powder or close enough to it. That way I can use a strainer/collander to sift the substrate out and throw it away while not throwing away the mwalworms. The beetle tubs won't matter because the beetles will just be moved to the next tub over and over. The tub I have now with oats, I'll just wait until they all pupate then throw the substrate out after that. Or I can just buy wheat bran which is already a powder and not grind it down. We'll see what I get.

 

[fishy12]

Lemme know how your plans work

 

[packer43064]

I posted some questions on dendroboard, alot really pertaining to fruit fly's. Can't wait for the answers!

 

[packer43064]

2 x Wingless Drosophila Melanogastor Fruit Fly Culture
2 x Flightless Drosophila Hydei Fruit Fly Culture
5 x 32 oz Insect cup and lid (Placon Cup)
1 x Excelsior (10 oz fine)


That's my order of fruit fly's and such. I want to experiment a little to get the hang of it.

 

[ScatMan]

I hooked the Flexwatt up, the temperature on the bottom of the tub was 86F with just the tub laying on the flexwatt tape. This is a little to high, so I put the tub into two more tubs and put a metal grid on the tape so there's a 1/4 inch between tub and tape. It ranges from 79-82F, pretty good to me. I still need a rheostat and foil tape to make it secure and less chance of a fire happening. I don't think metal or plastic can burn into a fire at 120F(the most the flexwatt can get), but still.

you can very easily wire a dimmer switch on to the flexwatt to control the heat. they're like $5-$10 at home depot. it'll save you some loot on your electric bill too! a dimmer switch is usually rated for more wattage than them overpriced pet store rheostats <--(that's a $20 word for "dimmer switch"), in other words: you can put more flexwatt on a dimmer than you can on most rheostats. if you go over their wattage rating, you'll burn them out.

let me know if you want directions, i can walk you through hooking one up. it's painfully simple.

 

[packer43064]

I saw on a website it would be more cost effective to just buy a dimmer switch. Where in Home Depot are they? Lighting? I'll get it and see if I can figure it out, if not totally asking you. I figured it would be like 2 plug-ins with a dial switch essentially. You plug in the flexwatt to the switch then the switch has it's own plug-in then you just dial it up or down. IDK, lol. Never seen one. Are there different kinds(diff watts and such?).

 

[ScatMan]

they're in electrical at HD. you just splice it into the hot lead anywhere on the cord that's connected to your flexwatt. there are different wattages, but i think they start at 600watt and go up from there. rheos start at, i believe 150watt. flexwatt should tell you how many watts per foot they burn, then just do the math to see how many watts you'll need. if you're not (now or ever) going over 150watts, you might just want to buy the rheo for the convenience. but like i said before, it's super simple to rig up the dimmer.

 

[ScatMan]

DISCLAIMER: electricity can be deadly, do this at your own risk, for educational purposes only, blahblahblah...

here, i was bored, lol! hit me up if you need more details.