Johannes

I used to get the BSF larvae out of my worm bin and feed it to my beagle, who acted like they were snacks. The dog’s no longer living (old age and having to be put to sleep after an accident), but do you know if there are pathogens within the larvae? Thanks.

I have a complicated question and this may not be the right venue to raise it in; perhaps someone could direct me to an extension agent with more farm-specific information. I chose this blog because I could find you, and because you do seem to have some hard information, which I respect.

I am a small farmer in Massachusetts. We rotate our animals on pasture all summer, but the winter confinement period is a good 5 months long. By next year, we expect to have a 5 month buildup of manure from 4 500 pound hogs and a 10-15 pigs, 300 laying hens, 4 cattle, and 20 goats and sheep. This manure will be mixed with a lot of carbonaceous bedding (less for the hens, since we have a collection area under their roost), and the plan in the spring is to scrape it out and put it in a couple of 8x12x4′ high compost bins, which could be insulated and covered with a film greenhouse cap. During the summer, there is a good deal less stuff to add — monthly chicken guts, maybe, and weekly additions of 8-10 buckets of coffee grounds from a nearby restaurant, occasional cleanouts of the hen’s range house. I would love to turn the winter’s manure into a high-protein feedstuff for the chickens and pigs, but the challenges I wonder about are these:

1) sourcing enough larvae or eggs to make a dent in the pile early in the year. 1000 larvae for $36 would be pretty exorbitant by the time it made much difference.

2) keeping a dormant colony of larvae through the winter. A compost pile of the size mentioned does not freeze solid in the winter, even though temps do not get above freezing outside for about three months straight. Microbial action usually keeps the center around 60-70; however, that little microclimate is surrounded by a block of ice. It might do better insulated and covered with greenhouse film; haven’t kept temperature records of that system yet. However, outside temps wouldn’t be ideal for the little guys from October through May (eight months!), so any reproduction which occurred during that time would have to be in the greenhouse/composting shed. I could probably keep a bush in there — what else do they need?

3) irregular supply of feedstuff. I basically have a really big pile once a year. I could wait a few months to spread it. Could I put a relatively small number of larvae (say, 50,000) in a big pile of poo that has already been either frozen for a long time or microbially composting for a couple of months, and just let them reproduce until they’ve et it up, or would they be unable to eat older material? Tell me more about the problems with overfeeding.

Thanks for your time.