Superworm Beetles aren't laying eggs

[Thomas Barnes]

About 3 months ago I had the idea to start breeding my own superworms. Things seemed to be going pretty well, until the beetles never ended up laying eggs. I added 2 egg collectors to the enclosure. After a month of finding nothing, I made new egg collectors and replaced the old ones. Still nothing. I bought my superworms locally, from CountryMax. My egg collectors are made out of cardboard, and I did check the substrate in case they had decided to lay elsewhere. Nothing. I'm a bit confused. I have looked everywhere online, and I can't find anything relating to my situation. Maybe it's where I bought the worms? Are they somehow sterile? I feed them carrots, and they have hiding places. I do not use a heating pad, but my room tends to stay in the mid 60s. If anybody could try and help me out here, I'd love to get another opinion. I honestly don't know where to go from here.

 

[MissSkittles]

Hi. I’ve bred supers before so maybe I can help. This is how I did it. I had at least 12 beetles since I have no idea how to determine their gender. I kept a small piece of egg crate for them, which they do like to hide under. I kept them in a critter keeper with wheat bran bedding. A few times a week I gave them a piece of various squash, carrot or Repashy Bug Burger. I basically did nothing else to them. I kept them in the same bin, same bedding and changed nothing. All they do is eat and mate. Often they’ll all be in some bizarre ball of mating. I believe they lay their eggs on the floor of their bin. I didn’t think they were reproducing for the longest time as I didn’t see any babies. They are so incredibly tiny though, that for quite some time it’s almost impossible to see the individual babies. Look closely for the bran bedding to be moving when you disturb it. About every 4-6 weeks or so I moved the adult beetles to a fresh bin of wheat bran. I continued to place small bits of low moisture food in the first bin for the tiny babies that I couldn’t see. Eventually they grew large enough to be visible and they would eat all the bran and it would be replaced by their poos and would need to be moved to fresh bran. I rarely washed the bins…just dumped out the old bran/poo and added fresh…just in case there were still some eggs to hatch.

 

[JacksJill]

I have heard the adults will cannibalize the eggs or young if they find them. I kept mine in a layered bin system. Beetles in the top layer separated from the bins below by metal screen. The lower bin had bran in it for the larvae to fall into. The breed better when warm. I got better results in the summer than the winter.

 

[absolutbill]

I've raised them before and my guess is your room is too cold. You may have eggs, but they are microscopic and taking longer to hatch due to the temperatures. I'd try a heating pad and just give it some time. It does take a little time to get started, but once you do you won't have to buy worms again. FWIW, I've never separated out the beetles from the eggs until I could see babies moving around. At that point I'd pull out the beetles into another container and let them keep going, and just raise up the worms in the bran that they were born in. Good luck!

 

[Lindasjackson]

Interesting!

 

[MissSkittles]

I have heard the adults will cannibalize the eggs or young if they find them. I kept mine in a layered bin system. Beetles in the top layer separated from the bins below by metal screen. The lower bin had bran in it for the larvae to fall into. The breed better when warm. I got better results in the summer than the winter.

If only mine had eaten some of their babies! I had hundreds of supers if not more.