Meal worms are EXPENSIVE! Tips for growing my own?

[sarastamand]

I have chickens and fish that I feed meal worms too, but they are rather expensive! Even when buying in bulk. Is it worth growing your own? Does anybody have any experience? What does it consist of? I live in New England, can they survive our harsh winters? Btw, we still have 3 feet of snow where I live! But if I take a 10 minute drive down the road, there is no snow. Spring is coming... right?!

 

[TheAmundsons]

Following because I agree!

 

[paneubert]

You would need to raise them indoors. They do need it pretty warm. So if you have a spot inside your house that is heated to human comfort temperatures then yes, it can be worth raising your own. The cost is all in the beginning. The maintenance is very cheap.

 

[RadiantJay]

It’s super easy.

Recipe:
- 5 gallon bucket
- Fill 3/4 with pine shavings
- Live Meal worms
- 2-3 sweet potato or regular potato cut In half, long ways
- half cup dog food
- 1/4” or 1/2” hardware mesh fabric cut slightly larger than bucket opening
- 1 medium rock

Place shavings in bucket, add meal worms, place dog food and potatoes to top of pine. Ensure potatoes are placed skin up. Cover bucket with hardware mesh, place rock on top of mesh.

Tips: keep in warm dry area. I live in CA and mine is outside all year even when it slips into the 30s in winter. No issue. In the northeast, you may need to move into garage in winter or somewhere that is not negative 100C and under 4’ of snow.

Keep dry - if the pine gets wet, replace it.

If you get heavy ammonia smell or any other funk, put the gloves on and get it cleaned and refreshed with new pine.

Easy cheesy, get your worm on!

 

[Ol Grey Mare]

Very worth it to grow your own. I use a bin system, bed with wheat bran and hydrate with carrot.

 

[TheAmundsons]

@RadiantJay dont the mealworms get down into the shavings then? How do you get them out to feed to the chickens? That sounds like a pretty easy setup!

 

[RadiantJay]

@RadiantJay dont the mealworms get down into the shavings then? How do you get them out to feed to the chickens? That sounds like a pretty easy setup!

Hi there. Great question and yes it’s a breeze! My neighbor and long time Meal work junkie turned me onto it because I too was once buying mealworms.

Answer: as long as you have the sliced potato on the surface of the shavings, the worms and bugs will be lingering around the surface because they use the taters as a source of moisture. If you lift a tater or two, there is usually plenty of worms for snack time. If they run from you, they can’t get far with their little half legged bodies.

We also use the worms to feed blue belly lizards in our yard, my 6,4,2 yr olds love feeding the lizards with them.

 

[WindingRoad]

I have chickens and fish that I feed meal worms too, but they are rather expensive! Even when buying in bulk. Is it worth growing your own? Does anybody have any experience? What does it consist of? I live in New England, can they survive our harsh winters? Btw, we still have 3 feet of snow where I live! But if I take a 10 minute drive down the road, there is no snow. Spring is coming... right?!

It better be. LOL. I have about 2.5 feet here in west central Maine. It's going fast though. Thank God. There is another thread here all about raising meal worms. It's about how expensive they are and morphs into raising them as an alternative.

 

[RadiantJay]

Very worth it to grow your own. I use a non system, bed with wheat bran and hydrate with carrot. View attachment 1719660

That’s large scale commercial worm farming. Very nice!

 

[RadiantJay]

Hi there. Great question and yes it’s a breeze! My neighbor and long time Meal work junkie turned me onto it because I too was once buying mealworms.

Answer: as long as you have the sliced potato on the surface of the shavings, the worms and bugs will be lingering around the surface because they use the taters as a source of moisture. If you lift a tater or two, there is usually plenty of worms for snack time. If they run from you, they can’t get far with their little half legged bodies.

We also use the worms to feed blue belly lizards in our yard, my 6,4,2 yr olds love feeding the lizards with them.