I work at a farm that produces live feed, mostly for pet stores and zoos. I've been working there full-time for a year-ish, amd I have experience with the production of Tenebrio spp. (mealworm beetles), Galleria spp. (waxworm moths), and Acheta spp. (house crickets). This includes every stage of the life cycle: egg + larva + pupa + adult for the "worms", and egg + nymph + adult for the crickets. The "worms" are sold as larvae for optimum nutritional value and trophic return-on-input, whereas the crickets are sold as adults. My job is one of the "dirty jobs" at the farm. Well, everyone's job there is dirty, but I'm one of the ones scooping feed, breathing clouds of bug shit, handling the product and sometimes having it crawl all over us, being swarmed by moths and beetles and flies, and dodging cockroaches. It's not as terrible as it might sound but it's definitely not clean.

This is a throwaway account that I'll be checking as much as I can today and tomorrow and maybe Monday too. I do not do push notifications or phone notifications and I'm not extremely online enough to respond to everything within 5 minutes, but I'll be logged on at least once an hour for this today. I will respond to every single question if I can, it just might take awhile. If you know or have an inkling of what my main is, shh, plz dun dox. After this AMA is complete I may abandon this account, I only made it for this (plus the bit).

To clear a few things up, YES, I have eaten the product, and YES, I do have a deep hatred for the careerist, corporate-ladder-climbing administrative class. Any other resemblences to a similar username are coincidental.

-WwF

  • D61 [any]
    ·
    3 years ago

    Never thought to mix in vinegar, whats the purpose?

    In terms of feeding your chickens… you probably could put the effort into getting them more soldier fly larvae, but would it really be worth it? If the chickens can already go over there and peck at whatever grubs, that comes at zero cost to you. I would say that permaculturally, what you have already is quite an elegant emergent setup, and doesn’t need too much input or guidance from you besides dumping the compost and letting the chickens roam.

    Soldier fly larvae, as far as my wife has read, are easier to propagate in larger quantity than grubs (at least for our setup/purposes) and they're extremely high in nutritional value. Also, she likes to tinker with things she's read about for fits and shiggles.

    Soldier fly larvae retail for like 20 cents a pop, I’m not even kidding. But to sell them you need a certain level of marketing and consistency of production.

    Like... each? or by weight?

    • wax_worm_futures [comrade/them]
      ·
      3 years ago

      I went by a local pet store and I saw the product from my company on the shelf. It was like $3 for a cup of 20.

      I suspect the vinegar is to make sure their pH doesn't get too imbalanced; they produce a LOT of ammonia. It may also inhibit competitors from being able to eat their feed.

      • D61 [any]
        ·
        3 years ago

        Neutralizing the ammonia... that makes sense.