Black soldier flies: part 2

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Ok, so I needed a new plan to solve some problems. Stink, heat, and more worms. I worked on some new designs and came up with the one below. It did not really solve the stink problem, or heat but it certainly cut down on it and it gave me lots more squirmies. So lets get started.

Here were a few things I knew about the larvae, once fully grown they will look for a place to go turn into bsf’s, aka try to leave the goo pile and if they got too hot, they would leave as well. So knowing this I needed to make it easier for them. I decided I would use one of those large 50 gallon plastic barrels. Why? bigger and cheaper than the garbage cans. There are usually guys selling them on Craigslist for like 10-15 bucks (SCORE!) and if your lucky they may have off sizes they give away. So I researched other plans that have already been created, and found one that fit my needs, but needed some hog on the range ingenuity.

I decided to cover my nose issues, it would need to have a good top of some sort or opening that would hold stink, and let flies in. So in order to cover up stink I realized no top is going to do this. But something else might. I read that carbon will help. Where do I get carbon you ask?……..Hay/straw. Throw a bunch in there and it will collect a portion of the stink. Awesome. Now I just need to create a place for them to lay eggs, and then a place for the worms to get out. So I cut a hole for the top, a hole for drainage, and a hole for the squirms to get out.

After I created this contraption I needed to get the old goo, into the new bucket. Why would I mess with this you ask…not really sure. But let me tell you this. I have a bad sense of smell and don’t mind a lot of gross things…but this…was nasty. Remember all those bony things I put in…they were now mushy black goo, and from what I have read…that was black gold +10 when it came to garden compost. However I was intent on putting that stuff into my new bucket. So I started scooping it out, then some of it splashed on me. WOOOO!! that stuff was thick, and it left a lovely smell on my pants. But after I got it all in there, I waited a few days. And you know what happened, a ton of them buggers came crawling out and bsfl breakfast was served. I just turned some gross stuff like left overs into even grosser stuff, then into amazing chicken food which then translated to some great eggs and some supreme compost.

Now if your thinking about not doing this cause of the stink…well you should anyways. Imagine turning 5 lbs of meat to about a quarter cup of goo and get eggs with a nice rich dense yolk. Totally worth it. They are actually using these larvae to eliminate a lot of waste at some dump sites. That is a great example of permaculture. Utilizing nature and turning scraps to something useable. I find that even my kunekune and guinea hogs will eat them.

So now for the plans of this thing.

Black soldier fly larvae barrel
Here is a side view of my barrel.
black soldier fly
Top of barrel

For the top i just cut out a hole with a drill and jigsaw, then reattached it with some small screws and a piece of strap material. I burned some holes in the fabric and then put the screws threw so it would not start to come apart after awhile.

soldier flies
Here is a view in the top, down to the opening at the front. there is a little catch made of metal going down the middle.
bsfl
Here is a view of the cross braces the catch bucket and the wire that holds the catch bucket attached.

Here you see the inside of the bucket. the hole was at the top of barrel a few inches down. The catch bucket should be strapped in so the chickens don’t knock the bucket off. If they knock it off, then they will just crawl away at night. I just used bailing wire and put 2 small hole in the bucket and then wrapped it around that cross brace.

 

 

 

 

soldier fly larvae
This view is the lid open. I have hung strips of cardboard for the flies to lay eggs.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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