Farm maintenance

I've worked on several of the drawers during the past two days.  I cleaned the two drawers of mature worms and harvested some.  I've had some baby/injured birds to feed and am still putting some worms outside for the wrens that I've released.  I've got a pretty wide gap between the mature worms (some of which are turning into pupae) and the next drawer, in which the worms are pretty small.  I need to reduce the gap between worm sizes, which I should be able to accomplish by sifting out the eggs more frequently.

I'm posting a picture of two beetles, who look like they're making babies!  I saw these while I was picking out another batch of dead beetles.

Beetle dieoff

Two nights ago I noticed that there were quite a few dead beetles in my beetle drawer.  I've picked out a few in the past, but this was the first time I noticed very many.  Some were headless and some just didn't move.  I picked out about 1/4 cup of them by hand.  Occasionally I thought there was one that wasn't moving, and after he got into the "dead beetle" container, I noticed movement so he went back.

I don't know how long they are supposed to live, but I just looked back and saw that my first ones were "born" in late November and early December.  That's a pretty good life for a beetle!

Today I cleaned one drawer and also combined my first two worm drawers.  Most of the worms in those drawers are getting pretty mature, and I have harvested a lot from those drawers.  Many of those are morphing into pupae now.

Harvesting and sifting

I spent time this evening working on three drawers.  I cleaned one drawer, harvested worms from another and sifted my beetles.  

My neighbor wants to start her own farm, so she came over to see what I'm doing.  I gave her about two cups of worms to feed the bluebirds and wrens in her yard.  That would cost a lot at the bird store!!  They're easiest to harvest when most of the bedding has turned into frass, and you can just sift the worms out.  I've found that if I sift the frass two more times after the first sifting, I save most of the tiny worms that went through the first time without having to pick them out with tweezers.

It's only been two weeks since I last sifted the beetles, but now I have so many that I think I should do it more often than I've been doing.  I'm going to give my friend some beetles to start her farm so it won't take so long to get worms.

I've looked at the dates on my drawers, and have found that it takes about two months from sifting until there are worms that would be considered "medium".  I can see movement (barely) in the drawer that I sifted two weeks ago.  

It seems as if these drawers are progressing really fast now!  For the first few months, I thought I'd never get anywhere!

Keeping records

I had to clean one of my most active drawers again last night.  I've decided that these later drawers need cleaning more often because they have lots more worms in them.  That's probably because I have a huge number of beetles now.   I've got to give away worms or start selling them!

I'm showing a picture of the mealworm record that I finally got around to doing.  The sticky notes were getting messy!  "Sifted" means I started a new drawer by sifting the beetles out of their bedding.  "Cleaned" means that I sifted the worms out of the frass and added new bedding.

Traveling and cleaning

My worms have recently returned from a 1500 mile trip from North Carolina to Boston and back.  I was a little worried since these drawers are more shallow, and I was afraid that the stopping and starting of the vehicle would shift the bedding and let the worms or beetles get too close to the top so they could crawl out.  Since I now have six drawers, I really need the more shallow drawers, though.  I put wide shipping tape on the front of each set so the drawers couldn't slide open.

I sifted and cleaned two drawers of worms and gave them new bedding before we left.  I took some fresh wheat bran with us, and I did have to clean one of drawer again while we were at a campground.  Since it rained a lot and we spent more time than usual sitting in the motorhome, I didn't have trouble finding time for that.

I've got more worms that I know what to do with now, and lots are turning into pupae.  The worms in my drawers are more uniform now.  If I sift the beetles out about every three weeks, they seem to make worms a pretty uniform size.

I don't have enough to supply our wildlife clinic, but have more than I need to feed my outside birds or the babies I'm raising.  I've given some to my neighbor for her bluebirds.

When I sifted the beetles tonight, I found a couple dozen dead ones.  I've found a few before, but am really surprised that I went this long before finding more dead ones.  I didn't think they lived this long!

I finally made my chart showing which bin was sifted and cleaned when.  Hopefully, it will help me plan and figure out what works the best.