My Mealworm Pupa Keep Dying 100% of the Time

[Gaige]

I've been asking around quite a lot and tried a number of things but all of the time my pupa come and they just wait and then they wait to long to hatch and start turning brown then black then decide to come out and they only get their legs free, then they just die. Very frustrating and I can't figure it out, is there anything I could do to make this work? I have had to buy them many times and use different methods and none have helped.

 

[Gallo del Cielo]

I've been asking around quite a lot and tried a number of things but all of the time my pupa come and they just wait and then they wait to long to hatch and start turning brown then black then decide to come out and they only get their legs free, then they just die. Very frustrating and I can't figure it out, is there anything I could do to make this work? I have had to buy them many times and use different methods and none have helped.

First of all,

We'd need to know a bit more about how you are raising them. Are you raising them in a single bin or separating them? What are you using for substrate? What kind of vegetable/fruits are you feeding them? How much and how often?

 

[Gaige]

I do separate them, I use oats as the bedding, and I feed them 2 organic baby carrots every time I see the previous ones dried out. I'm thinking it has to do with humidity problem. I'm doing a bit of an experiment and turns out that it might be the new setup actually works and I think it will have a really high pupa hatch rate! So right as of now I think my problem is solved.

 

[shorttimer]

Let us know more details & how it's been working out. I also have mealworms & they're not doing as well as they did several months ago. I have been trying to keep the area at 70 degrees & not under feed them. I had a much better pupa to beetle conversion rate & I'm also using oats as a substrate. I'm thinking I really need to bite the bullet and make a purpose built incubator style environment to keep the temps really stable. I'd love to take a tour of a commercial mealworm farm to see just how they get their massive numbers and what food they're given for said growth. I've read that barley is a better substrate than oats and can be purchased in bulk. I need to look into it.

 

[saraclassic]

My 9 yr old has a huge farm going lol. try not seperating them. I realize why you do and should but when i gave up helping him and left it be, we have pupa and beetles everywhere now. I think that maybe you could just cover the pupa just a bit in the osts and they wont bother them. Worth a shot.

 

[Gaige]

I have tried my method and a little bit of other things and they failed horribly, I'm becoming really sad now and I would really like to know why I can easily get superworm pupa to hatch but none of my mealworm pupa to hatch.

 

[trufadog]

I was separating the pupa because I read that I should separate them. After I separate them, all the pupa seem to stop moving. Are they dead or do they just not move after awhile as they get ready to be a beetle? About 1/3 of my mealworms have turned into pupa....so that means 1/3 will die? Advice?

 

[GodofPecking]

mimic nature. fill the enclosure with mulch. mealworms grow in leaf litter in my yard if chooks cant get to the litter

 

[chrisarvor]

leave them all together put in apples of Cabbage leaves just leave it in there dont wait untill the carrot is dry just throw other bits in there
Do you have a cardboard roll in there (centre of a toilet roll)
they like to hide and lay eggs on there