Building A Black Soldier Fly Larvae Bin Using Recycled Materials

In this video, Dan from www.plantabunda... shares with you a newly completed Soldier Fly Larvae Bin built from recycled materials for the urban backyard food forest.
I built the bin using all recycled materials from items that were either free-sourced locally or left over from previous projects. Because I didn't have the exact dimensions of wood that I needed I went ahead and made some custom cuts. After doing some research and viewing several types of bins I decided to go ahead and purchase the DIY plans and the larvae from www.northwestredworms.com. From start to finish it was a smooth rapid transaction with clear-cut instructions and I'd recommend others to do business with them. I'd also recommend that you check out their channel for further instruction and to see what else they have going on. I've also built a redworm bin out of cinder-blocks using a design concept they put out there. So thanks again to www.northwestredworms.com for all your doing and coming from a guy with limited woodworking experience and very basic tools I just want to say that this project was easy to complete. It took me less than a day with me taking my time, and I just want to encourage anyone else who's thinking about it to give it a shot. After the bin is built all that's left to do is to add some compost and some kitchen scraps then introduce the larvae to their new home. I quickly give you guys the walk around and show you how this is going to work. I bought a couple plastic bins at the dollar store and the larvae bin side panels just lift up and that's where you're gonna collect your larvae as they self harvest themselves going up the ramp and falling through the hole. I started layering with what I had on hand, some wood chips and wood shavings to keep the larvae from burying themselves through the drainage holes there in the bottom. I then start layering up their food supply with some kitchen scraps, chicken manure and worm castings with some redworms from my worm bin. I then just gave it a nice soak to get everything nice and moist and I also just wanted to make sure that everything was draining appropriately underneath and everything looked good. After that I headed back into the kitchen and gathered a few more scraps. I got some bread, banana peels, a little rice. The larvae order I received took just a couple business days to arrive, I was very happy with that.The larvae was very much alive and ready to go to work. The last step is to add the spacer underneath the lid so the fly's can come in and out and lay their eggs.
Links:
www.northwestre... (For Bin Plans & Larvae)
/ @nwredworms (northwestredworms on KZbin)

[@donnastormer9652]

I did the same as you! Great people to work with! My bin is all pressure treated and only painted on the outside. I put a 4 inch layer of course wood mulch on the bottom for aeration and it works beautifully! I do keep a bin under it to catch the liquid for compost tea.

[@BlackWarriorLures]

I stumbled onto black soldier flies last summer when trying to make catfish bait (rotten stinky stuff). I had left the cracked open by mistake for several weeks. When I can back it was crawling with these larvae. At first I was disappointed until I went fishing, lol. Best fishing ever!

[@plantabundance]

Nice! So many great uses for the larvae. Cheers!

[@jasonvieira222]

Hahahahah. That's hilarious! Lmfao!

[@warrenlc57]

You have made a really effective video. Thank you so much for sharing this!

[@plantabundance]

Thank you! I appreciate it.

[@josiahkulwa34]

Excellent

[@nicholasnapier2684]

i shared your video with a buddy out in texas

[@addictedtoelf]

Any update on this since? Curious if you were able to fully colonize the BSF to keep laying in the box for a continuous harvest.

[@nicholasnapier2684]

you did a great job on your video

[@mreisma]

Great work. i gonna buy the plans tonight.

[@plantabundance]

Nice! Have fun with the process. Cheers!

[@dougalexander7204]

Interesting.

[@josiahkulwa34]

Great 👍

[@nicholasnapier2684]

lots of fruit will get those bsf moven i use corn cobbs for the bsf fly to lay her eggs ...horse feed alfalfa pellet cup or two to start.

[@sudartosung6047]

you should start from baby larvae or eggs. those larva's you put is an adult, they not much of eating anymore

[@solventtrapdotcom6676]

The objective is to reproduce them. They will sprout wings and lay eggs soon.

[@miller17013]

So I live in central Pennsylvania and I ordered a bin from the design of the red worms one of the smaller plastic self-harvesting ones and I ordered 700 larva about the same size you did and the issue I found was that there was so few of them for this space that they weren't producing enough heat and when the temperatures were dropping below 60 they would go dormant but once moved inside the house in a smaller container they started eating again and then pupated so what I would recommend when starting a bin is to go big from I believe it was pop worms I ordered 10,000 larvae that were in about the same size cup as the one you got but they're super small because they're fresh hatched but they will literally start growing immediately and it won't take long before your colony is taking off the key is to have enough larvae that they create their own heat

[@alcarl88]

Looks great. How does the upainted interior hold up to the leachate? Have you had to replace any of it yet?

[@krystalsteele527]

Wondering this as well

[@elizabethwatson71]

How do you "winter over" your proteins? I'm transferring north and will need to keep the larvae and flies alive through the winter.

[@timothyjoe5343]

Great video!

[@plantabundance]

Thanks! Cheers!

[@AMe-qd8oh]

Do you still have the bin? Any changes you recommend?

[@Lebowskiiii]

Where is the "20 day update"? There isnt any link. Thanks

[@elijahsmommy08]

Still harvesting BSF? Is it worth it?

[@jwwm2]

I'm not sure I understand what these larvae are for. Is it mainly for animal feed? Are they making compost? Do these flies pollinate plants? I never heard of this before.

[@plantabundance]

John Strabismus I'm growing the larvae primarily for the chickens. The larvae are also able to quickly compost down table scraps and things that you can't feed to a redworm bin or put in the compost pile. So I like that I can further reduce my footprint. Perhaps I will add some more info on the video to make it more clear to future viewers. Thanks for the comment. Cheers!

[@alivongkoth9054]

Soft landing on bread lol 😂

[@timothyohliger5888]

Hi Dan, great vid, thank you. Where are you located in the states? I'm in Rhode Island, Zone 6. Curious if you repurchase BSF every spring? Have you tried waiting for flies to show up naturally? Also have you tried incorporating red worms in with the BSF? Thanks!

[@bearthio]

Any update on the bin? Are you going to try and keep the colony going through the cooler months? BSFL are great if you live in warmer climates. Temps are too moderate in my area and I could never get a colony going again the next season. I know the flies are here, but they must be laying the majority of their eggs somewhere else.

[@benjaminboateng979]

This is really awesome but you didn't show us what you made for the flies to lay their eggs because BSFs don't lay ON their food they lay close to it

[@concepto.movimiento]

i want to know how many how many Kg of the fly can be produce on these containers, and which time? Also, i want to know what is the amount of organic matter that u need to use and for which population... Thank you and best regards

[@outlawshinemaker]

better put Velcro strip all the way around the inside top edge of box or they will climb out the sides

[@jascintaireri8225]

I8v0 p0v

[@calmdanger7065]

whats the purpose of having soldier flies around your garden?

[@MrSatchelpack]

They help displace regular pest flies. Most importantly, he larvae are used to feed chickens and fish, and they compost kitchen scraps faster than traditional methods.

[@kenlindner8921]

If you build it they will come no need to purchase larvae to start it off just add produce and or fruit scraps and they will come

[@peace4peaceful]

Yep..if you build it they will come. Nice job. Maybe put some plastic down where the food scraps go...might give more life to your wood. Thanks for sharing your experience.

[@sundancer3625]

Do you remember about how many larva you started with to start your bin? Not sure how many to purchase. Thanks

[@miller17013]

I don't know if you'll catch this reply or not considering it's way past when you ask but I'm doing a lot of research now and I can throw my two cents in based off of my experience I ordered about 700 of the same size larvae and put them into one of the biopod sized self-harvesting containers and in central Pennsylvania when the temperatures drop below 60 at night they go dormant because there was not enough of them to produce their own heat so I ordered from popworms for $20 10000 several day old larvae and put them in a small shoe box and started feeding them until they got big enough to move into the biopod container and they are generating a ton of heat that is the ticket you want enough that they're eating the food and enough that they're actually generating their own heat because while it is only 70 inside my house inside the small container with the 10,000 larvae the temperatures are getting close to 100 and they are eating like crazy and growing and for the $20 price tag it's definitely worth it considering to buy larger larvae you're going to probably pay the same price for a quarter of the amount

[@branojebin352]

u have given a fly open in the lid. will not the worms climb and fall out through that opening

[@DivinityPlace]

Do you know if the flies eat mosquitos?

[@plantabundance]

They would only eat mosquitoes if they were expired. Cheers!

[@DivinityPlace]

Thank you.

[@BeeFlyGuy]

what degree of an angle do the ramps have to be ?

[@plantabundance]

An exact angle is not needed. They just need a ramp so that they can crawl out of the moister. It can be pretty steep.

[@mosesg9998]

30⁰

[@SuperJacky1967]

30 to 45 degrees will do.

[@TravisHoeffel]

how do you keep the larvae from exiting through the drainage holes?

[@plantabundance]

I filled the bottom with wood chips and put the food on top. They don't really burrow themselves until it's time to pupate at which time they escape to find a dry bed which the bottom of the bin is not. I am looking at possibly doing things a little different this year as the drainage holes would tend to clog up though. Thanks for watching! Cheers!

[@TravisHoeffel]

So any suggestions on making a bin? Also how do you get then to repopulate the bin without flying off and going elsewhere.

[@ImASurvivorNThriver]

Plant Abundance What will you do differently to deal with the drainage holes clogging up issue?

[@cecilitaH]

Too complicated 😢