Raising Meal worms

[Dennis/N.Illinois]

I haven't seen a post on this so I'll make one now. Anyone out there that hosts Bluebirds will usually feed them Meal Worms at one time or another.

You can scrool down to see the instructions if you dont want to read my story on how I got started in this.

Last year was My first years experience with BB's. Lot of things went wrong that year and one was the weather. It was a very cool and rainy summer for us. The BB's nested and laid some eggs. My wife could care less, she thought it was another hobby that would soon pass. After the young were born the weather really took a turn for the worst. No bugs could be found.

What I didn't know was that my wife was a closet BB watcher. Checking on them when I wasn't around. I arrived at home from work one day and the wife was all upset. She dragged me to the bed room where you could observe the BB's and said that the parents haven't feed them much all day and the young were going to starve, "YOU GOT TO DO SOMETHING".

I got my shoes back on and headed to the pet shop. Bought a pack of 50 large meal worms for $5. thinking that should hold them over for a few days. HA... I was back in my car in less than 5 minutes to get more. After spending my paycheck on the little buggers I decided to find them on line.

I received 5000 of them for the price I paid at the pet store. By the end of the BB season I had a few hundred left and wasn't sure of what to do with them, Should I set the lucky ones free Or try to keep them for next year.

After searching the internet trying to find if they would keep for several months in the fridge I saw several sites telling you how to breed them. Wife said great, another nutty hobby. If you still with me heres what to do and its very easy.

BREEDING MEAL WORMS

Get yourself a few disposable plastic storage containers. I use rectangle ones that are around 4"H 10"L 6"W. (round ones are fine also) cut holes into the top for ventilation.

Add about 2-3" of old fashion oatmeal, corn meal or wheat brand, what ever is cheaper.Put in about 100 meal worms per container. (This should net you over a 1000 per container) and put the container in a cool dark locating in the house. Temp of around 60-65 is great but not critical.

Once a week put 2 small "Baby" carrots into the containers. There is no need for any water, they get it from the carrots. Remove any carrots if the get moldy or funky.

Thats it. It takes about a year for a large meal work to go through the stages it needs to.

The large meal worms that you used to start with will turn into a flightless little black beetle,The beetle can't climb the side of the plastic so there isn't any worries of your house being infested by the bugs. The beetles will then breed and lay microscopic eggs which will hatch into tiny meal worms. These worms will eat and then get a hard "Cocoon" type shell only to emerge latter a little larger. As the worms get larger you will notice some fine powder at the bottom of the container under what ever food you chose. This powder is beetle/worm dung and has no odor. Leave the powder in the containers, it will have some eggs still in it yet to be hatched. Allow this cycle to continue until you have worms of the size you need. Use a fine mesh screen to separate the worms from the eggs/dung and store the worms in the fridge for feeding and putting the powder in another container for the eggs to hatch.

Any questions feel free to ask

[Jean Pell]

Dennis, This is the "clearest" instructions I have ever read.

Thanks!

[Evelyn Cooper]

Hi Dennis:

Thank you for the post on raising meal worms.

I am not a big promoter of feeding meal worms except for emergencies or maybe if someone wants to take pictures of the birds.

Meal worms fed to Bluebirds (or any species) on a regular basis and over feeding them to where they don't hawk for other foods is not a recommendation. Meal worms do not have all the necessary nutrients that insects have. Also, the chunky peanut butter and lard stiffened with quick cooking oats and meal is much more nutritious. And, raisins on the side is more like what their winter diet is also.

When I considered feeding several years ago, I did some research on the subject. I read from many experienced bluebirders that if you offer meal worms along with the suet mix and raisins, the Bluebirds eat the meal worms and will not eat the other foods. So, I decided that I would not even start out with meal worms as they are much more expensive and I have other birds I cannot keep away from the feeder. I started out with raisins and for a couple of years that was what I offered. Then, I decided to try the mix and I started out just with chunky peanut butter, oats and corn meal. They really liked it. But, when I decided to add lard to the mix, they went wild. And, I have to say they prefer it over the raisins. I ran out of suet mix the other day and all they had was raisins and they ate them. It was so cold and bad, I guess they needed it really bad.

Anyway, that is my take on it and I think mixing the suet is much easier also than trying to raise meal worms.

Evelyn
Delhi, LA