Mealworm Bettles Dying Off

[Bio123]

Hey guys! I'm totally new to this forum. Have any of you experienced your meal worm beetles die a day after they came out of their pupae stage? I keeping hundreds of potential mealworms a day. My set up is a large plastic container with 2 in of oat germ substrate and a screen hood. I put carrots apples and toilet paper tubes in there. Plz help.

 

[xanthoman]

do you also feed your mealworms? maybe your beetles are starving when they first come out of the pupae stage (just speculation ) i am certainly no mealworm expert, keeping mealies is only something i have recently started, i keep mine in whole rolled oats or quickoats, just transferred about 15 beetles to a new container,(just over a week ago ) in a mixture of whole rolled oats and quick oats and over a week later, all but one of my beetles are doing fine, the only difference between what i do and you do is whole or quick oats instead of oat germ and i feed only carrots , i keep them in a slightly warm spot with no additional light, still researching the whole mealworm thing but so far so good. maybe your temps are too high

 

[Bio123]

Thanks for the info! I just bought a can of rolled oats and out them in there yesterday, but still no improvement. I do see about 5 or 6 healthy ones though. The weird thing is, some of my pupae are getting a dark brown color, then the next day they're black and dead. You can tell the difference between the dark brown ones and ones about to turn into beetles. I am really stuck on this problem, and I need this food supply to alternate with my crickets. Again, thanks for the info xanthoman, this forum is way more responsive than reptile forums!

 

[sandrachameleon]

What temperature is it there? Do the mealworms pre-pupating have plenty of liquid via fruit or veg?

 

[Bio123]

The temperature is 78 degrees in my room. Now I have much less beetles dying off because I threw away any pupae that didn't respond to being held or any that were brown. I seems to spread. I'm bummed out because I lost a good 20 pupae or so out of my 50. Before my mealworms pupate, they stay at the top and don't move unless touched. My active mealworms are very energetic with plenty of water from the fruits and veggies I put in there. Usually, I blanch the food before giving it to them.

 

[Bio123]

The temperature is 78 degrees in my room. Now I have much less beetles dying off because I threw away any pupae that didn't respond to being held or any that were brown. I seems to spread. I'm bummed out because I lost a good 20 pupae or so out of my 50. Before my mealworms pupate, they stay at the top and don't move unless touched. My active mealworms are very energetic with plenty of water from the fruits and veggies I put in there. Usually, I blanch the food before giving it to them.

 

[sandrachameleon]

hm. Well I've no ideas for you. Hopefully removing the dead ones will help, if it was some kind of transferable issue

 

[Bio123]

Thanks for the reply!