Interested in starting a BSFL bin. Info?

[Weeg]

Hey everyone! Recently I've become interested in starting a Black Soldier Fly Larvea bin. I think its a great way to reduce food waste, and get some good grubs to feed back to the birds.
I watched this video, and from the looks of it it doesn't seem to complicated.

My basic under standing, is you need a raised bin with a ramp. Once you get your larvae, you use oatmeal as bedding, (I want to say I saw someone on a thread that was using dry oatmeal, which is better?) than food scraps and cardboard after that. Then they start to populate from there?

My biggest question, is there a specific way to do it so that it doesn't attract house flys and horse flys? We have enough of those as is, and definitely don't need those populating in my bin. I'm sure the chickens wouldn't mind the larvae, but I sure don't feel the need to have more of those little buggers flying around.
Also, in the video he has a second bin underneath, what is that for? Is that so a couple of the adult flys can lay eggs in there, and that bin doesn't get fed to the chickens? That bin acts as a breeder bin to keep the population going?
Lastly, after your first batch of larvae matures, you obviously want to leave some adult flys so that they can keep the population going. A) How do you let some of them free I guess. The ramp leads into a bucket for the chickens, so do you let the first few crawl out so they don't go to the chickens? B) How do the adult flys know to come back?

Thanks for the help everyone! I feel like this would be a great addition to the setup.

 

[ashcons]

I've got BSF's here natively. Right about now throughout summer, if I go poke around the quail poop piles or our compost, I'll find thousands of BSFL. They're supposed to release a pheromone that deters other flies from hanging around the same area and I have noticed that flies generally only show up if the quail poop pile takes on a bunch of moisture.

A) How do you let some of them free I guess. The ramp leads into a bucket for the chickens, so do you let the first few crawl out so they don't go to the chickens? B) How do the adult flys know to come back?

A) as long as there's a crack they can escape the container(s), the flies will take off to do their business.
B)They seem to hang around the area they were hatched, so I'm sure they'll do their business and the females will be headed back to lay eggs on your corrugated cardboard to repeat their cycle. If you have a local population, they'll find their way to the buffet the same way they find their way to any food source.

I'd imagine if you have native BSFs, you would just get your system set up and running each spring and let nature do the rest.

 

[Weeg]

I've got BSF's here natively. Right about now throughout summer, if I go poke around the quail poop piles or our compost, I'll find thousands of BSFL. They're supposed to release a pheromone that deters other flies from hanging around the same area and I have noticed that flies generally only show up if the quail poop pile takes on a bunch of moisture.



A) as long as there's a crack they can escape the container(s), the flies will take off to do their business.
B)They seem to hang around the area they were hatched, so I'm sure they'll do their business and the females will be headed back to lay eggs on your corrugated cardboard to repeat their cycle. If you have a local population, they'll find their way to the buffet the same way they find their way to any food source.

I'd imagine if you have native BSFs, you would just get your system set up and running each spring and let nature do the rest.

Thank you! This is helpful.
I don't believe we have any native BLSF here, so it might take a bit longer to get a population started.

 

[ashcons]

In that case, you'll need an to build out an enclosed system for them. You can buy larvae from Fluker, though I ran into issues with them last summer where the last 2 batches I ordered died or were DOA.

For your enclosed system, 2x2 pine, pocket screws, and fiberglass window screen stapled over the framing would keep the flies in place with room to fly out and do their business before laying eggs. Just add a door to the compost container or access to the container so you can manage the compost/food/moisture part.

Other challenge would be temp control if you're looking to do something year-round without external input of more larvae each spring, but I'd be tempted to go low tech and just look to someone else to restart my population each year.

 

[LastMinuteLizzee]

I just recently discovered bsfl in my compost tumbler and have been basking in all the online info I can find! I was concerned the tumbler action would harm reproduction (I don't spin as often now that I know what they are) but I keep finding the tiny ones so apparently they have been able to make the 1/4" air holes work for their reproductive process. I haven't decided whether to move them to their own bin so I can reclaim my tumbler for compost production.

So let that be an encouragement to you! I'm in Central Texas so they are native to my area and they appeared during the blistering triple digit heat we've been getting.

 

[Kayla's Lunch]

If you do this, please post your set up and how well it is working. I am wanting to try something like this.