Superworm (Z morio) beetles dying

[Texas Blonde]

So I started a Superworm colony, and have had problems with my beetles dying off very quickly. I have no problem getting the beetles, its just keeping them alive that I can seem to manage. I have a thriving meal worm colony, with over 300 beetles, and untold thousands of worms. I set the Superworms up exactly the same. 1/4 of the cage is dry peat, and the rest is a mix of oatmeal and different food stuffs. There is a shallow dish with some water crystals, and they get fresh veggies every day. But every day another beetles dies. The room they are in stays a rather warm temp, roughly 80*F. Is this too warm? What am I doing wrong? Id really appreciate some tips!

Oh, I got these beetles from Petsmart bought worms, so I dont know how healthy they are to begin with. I have another 80 worms isolated right now, from worms bought from Flukers. They have all pupated quickly, and seem much healthier.

/Sky

 

[ZephAmp]

Make sure the beetle's enclosure is bone dry, with one distinct moisture source.
I keep my beetles in a $1 plastic shoebox with 1/2" of baking flour/chicken feed/oatmeal and a small piece of egg crate on one side. Every few days I check to see if the previous moisture source (usually a small piece of carrot) has been consumed/dried up. I keep this container right over my lizard tanks so a good 4/5's of the container gets heated well above 80.
I started with 12 beetles in September and now have over 500 large superworms.

 

[Rowdy Hotel]

I've read a lot of articles saying the superworm larvae need to be kept moist or they'll start eating each other and dying and what not but I haven't found any of it to be true in my experience. I raise the superworms the exact same way as my mealworms. I add 4-5 inches of unmedicated poultry mash to a sweater box (or a shoebox if on a smaller scale) and I chop up some thick potatoe and carrot slices on top. The beetles like to hide (unlike mealworms) so I give them some eggcrate and some paper towel rolls, I keep their bins bone dry. I change out the potatoes every other day. I like to crowd the bins with as many beetles as possible, sometimes a hundred or more. After a few weeks you'll see tiny mealworms on the undersides of the carrots and potatoes, just keep changing out the potatoes for them when they dry or are eaten. One they start putting on some size they eat the mash surprisingly quickly. Once they get big for extra water I make some water gel crystals and just dump them on top of the bedding, they eat it so quick that it doesn't have time to mold or anything. At this point I cool them down and start feeding them but I do give lots and lots of them away.

Also, when using petsmart or store bought worms I like to place them in a container with some unmedicated mash and carrot or potatoe so they may eat for a few days before I isolate them for pupating. A greated number of them should morph out into beetles this way.

 

[jmarcian@mix.wv]

i have question. (sorry to hi-jack your thread) I have 1 superworm in a pupae stage. how long does this stage take. it seems like he has been in it forever! it is still alive, just wondering how long it takes.

 

[Buspirone]

Its been forever since I raised Zoophobas. I recall my first generation of beetles had the highest mortality rate. I think dehydration stress during the larva and pupation stages was a contributing factor but I also saw a good bit of the beetles killing each other as well. All of which diminished significantly with my second generation of beetles that were from the worms I raised myself. Don't put beetles together until they are black rather than the dark reddish color they are before they completely harden up.

I used 4 plastic shoeboxes to hold a substrate made of rolled oats, gerber fortified rice baby cereal, some wheat bran and a handfull of ground up dog food per box. Moisture source for the larva was either yams or yukon gold potatos. I used baby carrots, apple or orange slices for the beetles. I rotated the beetles themselves between the different boxes for about 2 weeks to lay eggs.

I used loosly wadded up newspaper in each box as hiding spots for the beetles.

Pupation trays were utility boxes from home depot you would use to sort screws or other small parts. Each cell had a half inch of peatmoss. When I initially separted the worms to their own cell I would also give each one a sliver of carrot. I tried to keep in the dark initially as much as possible since I wasn't sure if light would delay pupation or stress them.

The worms I raised myself were much livelier, bigger and had a darker coloration than the ones initially bought to start the project. The healthier worms went into pupation faster and it was slightly shorter time for a beetle to emerge. It got to the point I had so many worms I didn't know what to do with them.