So, you're living the wage slave life and want to make a break for it. You've had some half hearted attempts at starting other businesses, maybe even gotten as far as making a website and some e-mail addresses before the whole project fizzled out when you realized just how much money you would need to sink into the business before you turned a profit in 2-5 years.
Well, let me show you something. Black soldier fly larvae are the easiest commercially viable thing to breed, and command a respectable price due to their nutritional profile (Studies will be posted in this thread) and due to them being more efficient at converting waste into biomass than any other vermicomposting method (worm farms, meal worms, etc.). Their excretions are anti-bacterial, so they are clean, and the adult flies have no mouthparts (The adults exist only to breed and lay eggs) and thus are neither disease carriers nor bothersome.
I'll post some videos, papers and general information in here. I've dabbled in breeding them myself, and their properties aren't hype. I'm looking to do this on the side as I've just bought a restaurant and would love to do something with the waste.
where do you breed this shit? need a big space? how much waste are we talking about? how much do you produce and how much does it sell for?
Dylan Martin
OP from other thread here. Going to become a maggot farmer ASAP.
Gabriel Adams
This is a popular listing on amazon, the maggots weight between 4-7 maggots per gram.
So that's about 400 maggots, overconservative guesstimate puts that at 100 grams of maggots for $23 dollars... That's $230 per kilo. Of course, bulk orders and bulk suppliers will offer different rates, but small orders are the best return at the moment.
Find some more prices for you in the interim.
In my experiment, I was able to breed 5kg of maggots in one small 25 litre tub.
I'll find you the life cycle speed and biomass conversion stats.
Once the maggot has finished growing, and begun pupation, it turns dark and journeys upwards. In nature this is so that it can attach to something high up and pupate into an adult, but our use for this is that it makes the BSF larvae self harvesting.
posting in potential epic thread, keep it coming OP
Isaac Moore
alright and why would anyone buy these maggots instead of their cheaper feed? and if they are better what happens when big corps catch up and put you out of business with their mass scale?
Daniel Smith
Literally making me hype for maggot farming
Noah Morgan
Because they increase growth rates for chickens when added as a supplement to pellets. The prices quoted before are for small orders, supplying people who are looking to breed their own larvae. The price given to a feed supplier would be considerably less, but considering you are converting literal waste into profit you can price your competition out.
So, seeing as they are better and cheaper then the only concern is when big corps catch up, and that's the same situation with any start up. Sell up to them, move onto something else, not sure. Maybe diversify into aquaculture, seeing as your feed is literally free. Start selling fish instead, until a big corp catches on.
