Black Soilder Fly Larva

It is that time of year again and even though summer brings lots of heat and challenges around the homestead it also brings BSFL. I have done these in the past on a small scale and mostly just removed them from my composting worm bins but this year I am looking to up production on a larger scale and produce a good amount of food for my livestock. I intend on feeding around 100 fowl from chickens, ducks, geese and turkeys with a combination of BSFL, mealworms, composting worms and of course small amounts of grain and fresh fodder to balance their diet but the BSFL is intending on being a good 50% or more of their feedstock and the rest will be fed to the pigs.

BSFL are a fantastic feedstock supply for many livestock since they are close to 40% protein and 35% fat content. This reason accompanied with how fast the produce and in such large numbers makes a great free feed for livestock especially since they just eat your garbage and they can also be setup to self harvest so you can just go grab a bucket of already harvested BSFL ready for feeding.

The first benefit from BSFL I am getting is the frass. I have done whole post on frass but mostly pertaining to the frass I get from my mealworms but BSFL frass may be a much better frass for making aerated teas due to it is a little more moist making a more suitable environment for bacteria and fungi microbes to grow. This frass will either be added directly to aerated teas, garden beds or my favorite and most used use is feed it to my worm bins. The worms love it and it is a great feedstock for them with the added plus that it is already broken down from the BSFL so it won't heat up my worm bins especially when it is already hot outside. It is also nice that I can feed a large variety of things to BSFL that I don't feed to my worms but still produce a product that can be fed to my worms so they have different feedstock and don't compete with each other but produce for one another.

Another reason for doing BSFL are the quality of the larva as a livestock feed. Anything from small mammals, reptiles, birds, fish and even larger animals like pigs will love them and they are really good for them producing a free feedstock out of garbage. They can also be setup in a bin to self harvest instead of having to do this by hand. This is a great thing because it is already labor intensive enough on a homestead no one likes adding another thing to do every day but with BSFL if your bins are setup correctly you can just walk by and pick up a bucket full of larva ready for feeding. This is GREAT!!!!!

BSF are also fantastic to have around because other flies don't compete with them or lay in bins or compost piles that are established with BSFL. This means having them around can get ride of things like house flies or biting flies that carry diseases. BSF don't carry diseases and don't even have mouths so they don't bite. All they do is lay eggs and produce larva.

Right now I am using IBC totes that I cut in half for bins since it is summer and we have them here in the area already so getting bins started is as easy as taking some from an already existing bin or I just toss wet grain in the new bin and wait a day or so and the BSF will be all over the bin. I still need to add the blocker at the top to keep the larva from crawling out and some PVC pipes ramps for the larva to crawl up and into the bucket. I am plaining on putting up a few greenhouses before winter and will be moving them into the greenhouse with netting to produce an area to keep a colony of flies for the eggs they lay that will be transferred into bins to produce BSFL so I can produce year round. I have even more need for them in the winter when the grass isn't growing and most the bugs are gone for the fowl to eat. I will be moving into more of a commercial setup for the greenhouse but since I have a few free IBC totes they will work great for now giving me 6 bins from the 3 totes producing a lot of BSFL.

The IBC tote also already has drainage on the bottom half which is great because you can use the leachate from the BSFL in gardens, which I suggest you do research on how to use it properly and safely, or around the general homestead in bar stales or pens since it keeps other flies and bugs away

Hope this is helpful for anyone considering doing BSFL for their homestead.