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Parrothead

One of our Black Soldier Flies emerging from its pupa stage. (Video)

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Parrothead

We had several of the adults to emerge from their shells today. We also added more larvae to the buckets we made for them to safely go through their pupa stage.I look forward to seeing more emerge in the coming days. 

 

As a side note, the compost bin is now "house fly free" of house fly maggots (the small slender white ones). They are no longer present in the composter. Only Black Soldier Fly Larvae are working in the compost bin. So, the BSFL are already doing their jobs! 

 

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mollydooker

So your a proud father again ??

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Parrothead

So your a proud father again ??

 

Yes, dear boy. Once again. Cigars all around!

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scoffer

Since you seem to be the guy to go to when a crash test dummy is required,  how do the BSF manage with eating / breeding in cow manure. I ask this because the brother in law has got someone in the family ( not me ) to sponsor him in breeding cattle, He lives on a very small piece of land and cuts green grass several times a day to feed his herd of 3 animals.  It's not a pretty sight as feeding cattle nothing but green grass results in very liquid shit and lots off it.  If the BSF can digest the cow shit,  I'll get a set up similar to yours and he can feed the lava to the chickens and compost the cow shit much quicker than he currently is.

Edited by scoffer
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Parrothead

Since you seem to be the guy to go to when a crash test dummy is required,  how do the BSF manage with eating / breeding in cow manure. I ask this because the brother in law has got someone in the family ( not me ) to sponsor him in breeding cattle, He lives on a very small piece of land and cuts green grass several times a day to feed his herd of 3 animals.  It's not a pretty sight as feeding cattle nothing but green grass results in very liquid shit and lots off it.  If the BSF can digest the cow shit,  I'll get a set up similar to yours and he can feed the lava to the chickens and compost the cow shit much quicker than he currently is.

 

Short version - I don't know. BUT, I don't see why they couldn't / wouldn't. Everything I read about BSFL tells me they will eat manure.

 

Look at it like this, scoffer. It will not cost a lot to get started with it. The concrete ring was $6.25 USD, locally. A sack of concrete mix was like $5.00 USD. I forget the bricks cost. Then, a bit of sand. So, you could build one for under $20.00 USD, I'm sure, labor included.

 

Then, you will need buckets, similar to what we have, or another way to allow them to dig in so they will be unmolested by predators. They need about two weeks to mature in this state. The buckets standing in water seems to work well for us. And, we just stack the buckets on top of each other. This gives them time to go through their pupa stage, emerge, and then fly away into the trees where they mate. 

 

Show your brother-in-law the following images of the compost bin just after construction, to help him see how it was built.

 

New folder.zip - ZIP format of only the images I posted in the other thread on this forum.

 

If you want / need all of the full sized images of the compost bin, here are all of the images Chan took that day. I uploaded the file to my Google Drive account. It is a zipped file about 23 Megabytes in size. 

 

 

Long version - Not sure about being THE "go to guy". I never attempted to raise these little creatures before in my life. Prior to early 2014, I didn't even know what a BSF was. I believe I originally heard about them from James (jimmyboy), if I am not mistaken? After looking for some time on the internet, I found a guy who lives in Svay Chek. His farm is out that way, anyway. Not sure if you are on Facebook, but you can probably contact him there? (I really hate that site, with a passion.) I say that, because he probably knows more about BSF than I ever will.

 

Here is the information I have for him:

 

Olivier Crusoe Olivier's Facebook Account) is my contact here in Cambodia. Fortunately for me, Olivier's organic farm (Farm Facebook Account) is only about 1.5 hours away from BTB. It was his concrete and brick and mortar compost bin that he showed to Tha, who then returned here and built one identical to it. (I'm tempted to build another one, but not sure I can get away with it here.) You can certainly get the larvae from him.

 

Anyway, with all that said - sorry about being long winded (using a keyboard?), what I have learned is they, BSFL that is, will consume just about anything you give them, including manure. As far as I know, that includes both human and animal excrement. I am just a bit skeptical about feeding feces to them. It's a mental thing for me, knowing I will ultimately be eating what they are going to be fed to - fish and chickens. So, vegetables, fruits, etc., is all I want our larvae to consume. The funny thing is, we cannot produce enough waste (that's us, our landlord, and another couple who live here) to keep the larvae fed. So, Tha brings about 5 kilograms of old vegetables to the house every couple of days, to supplement what we throw in the bin. The vendors give it to us free.

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Parrothead

More hatching every day. Since the buckets they are in are located just outside the apartment, we are starting to see them alight upon door ways, window sills, everywhere - except on our food and drinks!!  :yahoo:  :yahoo:

 

IMG_2852_8x6.jpg

 

On even a more positive note, fewer and fewer house flies are being spotted in and around the house!! 

 

 

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Parrothead

The little white specs on the cardboard, are eggs.

IMG_2850_8x6.jpg

 

Above image, zoomed in on eggs and cropped for closer viewing:

IMG_2850_zc.jpg

 

IMG_2854_8x6.jpg

 

IMG_2856_8x6.jpg

Edited by Paul

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scoffer

Once the BSFL have eaten their way through the goop,  what is left ?

Do you have to further compost it before you can put it back onto the garden ?

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Parrothead

Once the BSFL have eaten their way through the goop,  what is left ?

Do you have to further compost it before you can put it back onto the garden ?

 

No. In my case, they keep throwing wood chips from saw cuttings, in the compost bin. (We don't have a garden here, so I don't use any of it.) But, basically, it looks like what you will see in the following videos: 

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C-zAbzRx29I

 

 

At the moment, I have hundreds of larvae and flies. But, I want thousands, tens of thousands even. I want to be able to throw something in the bin, and it virtually disappear before my eyes. I want there to be so many BSF emerging from their pupae every day, that house flies are too scared to be within a kilometer of my house. :)

Edited by Paul

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Blackeye

That's racist. 

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  • Similar Content

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      Reference Websites:
      http://dailydump.org/learn/troubleshooting.html#BSF
      BSFL Compost Bin
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      Online Forums:
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      http://blacksoldierflyblog.com/forum/
       
      YouTube:
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      I took a video this morning. If you look at this image,
       

       
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      The little guys dig in pretty quick!
       

       

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