Idea- same setup as what you have, but after the jump into the goodie bin, there's a declination and an opening and the worms can fall out onto the ground. Place with the chickens and then it's an auto feeder.
At a remote fisheries research station, in Manitoba, we did something similar. Dead fish were put on top of chicken wire. The maggots fell down into tubs. We fed hundreds of hatchery pickerel that way. It was incredibly productive. The only downsides were the smell (minor issue), and we had to put down a bear that became a nuisance. One of my best memories was collecting the spawning pickerel eggs and milt. Best summer job EVER!
I had thought this too but chickens being smart things would just sit there pigging out and the other chickens lower on the pecking order would miss out...if you added a windmill style gizmo with cup that flicked them around that could be fun
I love the simple setup of your black soldier fly bin. Thanks for sharing. Fermentation made simple. 1) Put rain or dechlorinated water in a 5 gallons food grade bucket. 2) Put your whole grains in the bucket of water. The water level must be several inches above the grains for absorption. Cover the bucket with a lid that has holes/ or slightly lift the lid for ventilation. ~ I ferment enough grains for an entire week, and I ferment a new batch in the middle of the week. 3) Sock the grains for three days and stir throughout so that all the grains are fully absorbed. 4) After the fermentation process, store the grains with the liquid in the refrigerator so that it will not spoil. 5) Each day drain the water off a portion and serve it to the chickens. ~Each morning I put a portion of the fermented grains with the chicken feed plus a dash of the DE. The wet grains slightly soften the feed and the chickens love it.
I accidentally made an earwig farm by stacking some old roof tiles, now I use them all the time, every month or so I pick up the pile of 4 tiles and brush off the earwigs into a container and place the tiles back down, I have 5 traps/nests around the garden keeping them off my veggies without Poison and best my chickens love them 😀
Thanks, Jeff! Really appreciate you sharing this. I’ve always wanted to do this but like you, felt like it was a tad tedious/expensive for the supplies. Gonna have to get one of these setup this year
We had a Big back yard (really big); in the big city, had a garden covering about half the yard. We had lots of chickens (76 at the highest count). We bought lots of feed and other things (like crushed oyster shells) but supplemented that in other ways. We let the birds roam through the garden during the day. The garden plants were helped by many bugs being eaten plus the birds did eat certain plants but not too much. The bird poop helped too. We also got old veggies from a local market since they would otherwise toss them out when they are too old to sell. Some stores refused that option saying corporate would never allow it. Seemed silly to me - but whatever…
thank you for your "stupid simple" methods. one thing I've learned in my 59 yrs is that there's a whole lot of people that love to make things difficult/complicated. I'm all about the simplest, easiest, fastest and cheapest way of doing everything, while getting the same or better results than any of the complicated methods. lol that's how I roll. when you're raising/homeschooling 8 children on a shoestring budget you learn these things lol. I'm very happy I found your channel
I honestly think some people build these elaborate systems just because they like to tinker and that's fine but some of us have to much to do to spend time tinkering on little projects. Running farms and acreages is nothing but constant work.
Our black soldier flies breed in an old bath that we use as a scrap/compost bin. It is elevated about a foot off the ground and there's no plug in the drain hole(for drainage): the liquid from this drain goes straight in a bucket and from there goes onto the garden. The fermented seed process is "super stupid simple 🤗 I have two dozen chickens( 2 rosters included) and feed them around five cups of fermented grain per day (without fermenting, I was feeding them up to eight-nine cups) along with garden timings and their crops are always full. Fermenting process: Five cups of grain/cracked corn, wheat, sorghum, a little black sunflower seed, etc in a bucket and cover X2 with water. To start I did this three days in a row and started feeding the first lot on the third day. Nb; drain the liquid from the first batch and reuse in the fourth batch( this liquid is the culture for the lactic acid process to continue your ferment). After you've established the culture, you can cut the batches back to only two, (giving you a forty eight hour ferment) and continually strain and reuse the liquid in the next batch topping up with fresh water to maintain the level of the first batch. I'm in Western Queensland; Australia and our climate never gets really cold; if you're in a colder region, you may need to have three batches to allow for fermentation. It's not rocket science, just give it a go🙏👍
Thanks for this! I ferment my chicken feed and often wondered if I could reuse the liquid. I didn't want it to go to waste so I've just been diluting it and feeding the plants. I'm going to try this instead. I'm sure you do this anyway but I have 3 buckets with holes drilled in the bottom and they fit into 3 buckets without holes. To drain, I simply lift out the inside bucket with the grains and all the water falls into the outside bucket.
Excellent “simple” presentation! Loved it! For years, I’ve been feeding maggots to my chickens right from one of my compost heaps that will grow thousands and thousands of maggots in the warm weather. But I love this bucket method. Never thought of it before lol thank you for this info Jeff!
I hope you did find the easiest way to ferment feed. Again, people try to make it so damn hard and it doesn't have to be. Get a food grade 5 gallon bucket from tractor supply. Put in equal parts feed and water and leave some space at the top of the bucket so it can expand. Stir it all around real good add a dash of apple cider vinegar if you want to, but you don't have to. Stir it every day for three days. Then start feeding it. When the bucket gets a little low, add water and feed again it will ferment overnight because of what was left in the bucket to begin with. It is a never ending bucket. And you only need one bucket. A couple times a year. I completely rinse out the bucket and start new but you don't have to. Keep it stirred and you will do fine. it should be about the consistency of oatmeal. You don't need to leave water on top etc. etc. It is the easiest thing ever.
@@aronbalabs9389 I wouldn't put kitchen scraps in there. Just toss them to the chickens and let them eat it. I have fermented all kinds of chicken feed, including a grower, which is what I feed all my chickens all the time now. In the past I fermented layer feed. I have fermented, pellets or granules. also feed that is more whole ingredients. it's really good for this time of year when it is so damn hot. The chickens get more moisture from their feed.
I have been doing this for 3 yrs... I make a big bucket of feed and water ... and my chickens go to it before dry feed... I started noticing my chickens would eat feed ( dry) if I spilled water in it. Thus started me soaking it.
I've been using this method for a few weeks, since I saw your genius video. Lots of larvae, but none are crawling up the ramp to the top hole. Instead they were wriggling out through (and getting stuck in) my drainage holes. So I just enlarged my drainage holes so they're slightly larger than the BSF larvae, kept the bin at its normal tilt, and put another small bin below the drainage holes. I now have a big pan of squirming gold for my fluffy butts! Any tips on getting them to crawl up instead of down? I'm happy with the way things are working now, just curious if I'm missing something.
Thank you for making this project super easy. I hadn’t given this project a go because you have to spend money getting the sifting equipment,containers and crap that takes money. We’re old and having to tighten the already tightened belt like every one else. Again thank you for making it simple. You just gained a Follower
Thanks for the tip. My chicks are about 8 weeks old now and I'm sure they'd love this idea. QUESTION: How do you keep the raccoons/skunks/possums etc., from tearing apart your grub farm every night?
raccoons , skunks, and possums are an issue for me too. my solution is i put out a trap every night with easy foods. easy foods like a handfull of cat food will be choice over a more difficult to get at souce. but i keep my soilder fly bin in the coop.
I never considered closing the loop on this circle of life by collecting larvae for my hens instead of trapping the flies and throwing them away. Great idea.
Thank You for this information and very simple way to grow larve. Yeah, it drives me crazy to see all those complicated ways that are out there and supposed to be simple. Your way is just what I’ve been looking for
Great video! HEY another guy said to just put some wide slits in the bin filled with scraps. A few drainage holes in the bottom. He claims the larvae crawl up the side and fall out for the chickens to harvest all by themselves.
I love your videos! @jeffgray Question about the fly larvae bin.. I'm new to this stuff, and was wondering how the worms go to the smaller larvae catcher bin. Do they just end up in there naturally for easy removal? Also, do some larvae make it to fly form before harvest? I'd rather them not reach adulthood since I live in a suburban area. I'm thinking about doing this for our chickens but am curious about these two things. Thanks so much!
The worms crawl upwards out of the muck when they’ve reached maturity (ie, ready to pupate). Hence the reason for the slope of the inner tub. When the crawl up, they eventually fall into the hole that’s been cut in the inner tub and they’re caught by the small bin. They can’t pupate and turn into flies until they reach soil. Which they can never do with this system.
Oh my goodness I just tried to watch a video just before this one and had to stop because it was so complicated!!!! Thank you, I prefer stupidly simple!
I love fermenting my feed. I just take a couple scoops, throw it in a jar, put water in and wait a few days. Sometimes I cover it, sometimes I don't. I've had flies lay eggs and it turns into a little larvae snack too. It looks gross but the girls go bananas for it.
very good! We don`t have those fat ones, but the chicken like it. Thank you! And it`s natural food . The fermented wheat is wonderful I make that since I heard that on " chickenlandia" years ago. The chicken get so much nutrition out of it.
I have a similar chicken run! I have 2 coops, because I have a few rooster, head rooster(a bantam), runs our tiny coop, with his little ladies, and then the bachelors and a few younger hens, live in the other. I can't wait to try this, thanx for adding this video!
We saw the video about the grasses, now, this one. Wow! THANK YOU!!! Yes... we just subscribed. Why isn’t anyone else posting these GREAT ideas. We’re very glad we found yours!!!
Y did a great job showing the people's past it's important to do this saves a lot of the new people into thinking they have to go buy feed all the time.
I literally use the food from my quails poop trays. I don't like to try to pick out the good bits of food they fling out. I also don't want to waste the food. So I literally gather a big pile of it, poop and all, and put it in a bin like you do with your food remnants. I mix in some wood shavings or dead leaves and I get tons of larvae. Like you I don't give a crap about what kind they are. The chickens love eating any of them. Lol Thank you for making a stupid simple set up and showing people they don't need to make things complicated!
5-8-23 thank you for this video this is the simplest way I have ever seen. I think people make this complicated because they want to make a video. Your idea is genius so simple. Thank you.
Thank you Jeff. I think I have almost everything on hand to do this! I appreciate you sharing this for us simple folks out here with limited resources!
I bought an old wooden toybox for $5 with the fly bin in mind. I just slid the plastics inside & it sits under a shady tree looking all cute. We've raised thousands of chickens, rabbits, ducks, etc...and you are so correct. Most things can be done so simply. That's honestly how we are designed to function. Man makes things complicated. Thank you for the morning dose of stupid sanity!!❤
I hate hyped stuff and I’m incredibly practical not wanting any fluff or spending an arm and a leg on frivolous unnecessary stuff. I just subscribed to your channel because THANK YOU!! Common sense is lacking so finding someone capable of thinking this way is highly refreshing!
I used your method, but added two flat pieces of scrap wood to go across the top of the bin like your stick and used rubber band to attach cardboard strips to the underside of those scrap wood and the soilder flies are laying a ton of eggs in them. It's worked like a charm, I'm dumping about 2 cups per day of black soilder flie larvae to the chickens!
@alexgarner594 its corrugated cardboard, that has ridges/holes big enough for the black soilder flies to lay their eggs. It's free, so it's what I use.
Jus find some road kill stick it in mesh wire and hang on a tree or stick and the maggots fall of for the chickies , we also did this for feeding fish by hanging road kill from bridges
I am thinking, just the bin set up at a slight slant to drain any water to bottom of slant with a few small holes if needed, a 2-4" hole in the top for black soldier fly access, a horizontal slot at the high end a few inches up from bottom, for the larvae to crawl out, a piece of flat wood like a 1"x4" that would fit in the slot, the larvae would crawl up and just fall in the floor of the chicken coop if it was inside the coop and all you would have to do is put left overs, animal manure, kitchen scraps in it, the rest would be automatic. The wood slanting up extra would be so it would keep above the food for a while. Subbed, like, and black belled. I may put a video of this up on my channel.
I love, love, love stupidly simple!!!!! You just came up on my feed, and I am kicking myself for not finding your channel earlier. Thank you so much!!!!!! I tried the other "stupid" ways with BSF, 😑
I love videos that overcomplicate the simplest thing, they're hysterical. Bullshit boggles the brain, and never is that more true than in the current RUclips universe. This video was a breath of fresh air!
Hi if you use cheap grain and make alcohol then reuse the left overs to make deacons whisky basically more alcohol the remaining left over from the process is super food for farm animals.tye alcohol can run your farm equipment at no cost you can use a solar distiller just a wood frame and plastic rap..if you got a switch car you can run it on the alcohol.if you sprout the grain and feed that to your chickens it makes them grow twice as big it's a super food for them..also if you alkaline there water they don't die as much like 10 percent less death ..have you tried using a fly set up with sewage the flys grow very well ..and removes a contamination problem they can be washed off to feed the birds .
I’ve got a super simple way to ferment feed. Works for us. One container. Overnight fermentation. We use a stainless steel pot with a lid. At night we leave a little bit of previous fermented food behind and mix in 1 part feed to 1.5 part water. When pouring in water rinse the sides. Ferments overnight perfectly ready for next morning. Once in a while reserve some food and wash out the pot well. Maybe every two weeks.
Do you know another thing i saw......when ever there is a dead animal on your farm, place the carcass in a bucket with some holes around the bottom......and the maggots will fall out onto the ground as the carcass rots. I like this idea also....gonna try this for sure.
Used Coffee Grounds is a very good base for BSF and they will occasionally graze on it, so it acts as a backup emergency food source for them. Optional bases: Sawdust or other "browns (aka, fiber)" to act as non-food bedding, so they have a place to get away from the food and keep the temps from getting too high as food breaks down and BSF larvae heat it up. Also it helps some of the food get hidden from the surface, which helps avoid attracting some pests and helps absorb excess liquids. If you give them high fiber foods, the fiber will build up over time for you, but I recommend starting with a fiber source and used dry coffee grounds are the easiest and free from Starbucks. and of course, give them actual food.
This is definitely stupid simple! I had BSF invade my compost tumbler and flourished all last summer in a SPINNING compost bin. I tried to transfer them into one of those semi-complicated plastic totes with PVC pipe, and while I did get a few mature larvae to climb up and out, I never got any new takers to lay eggs in the new bin. I will try again this summer because I finally have chickens, and I do still want finished compost some day! Right now the chickens' favorite place to scratch is under the compost tumbler. I may have to block the area off if I want to get BSF this year.
So if that's the amount you give them every or every couple of days, how would it reduce food costs? It seems just like a treat or desert rather than lowering the cost to feed them.
Yep and then I'm so glad you brought it up man you alright there so many videos on RUclips unbelievable I started reading about it 10 years ago I'm doing it now I dispose of everything into that container they break it down for me I have another container just so I can use that for my chickens..
Good info. Also soak your feed before feeding and you get more volume. Most stores will give you expired greens and produce if you pick it up 2 days a week. Some ask you to sign a liability waiver but most stores will donate them to you. Yokes will be orange when you feed greens!
We have a composting bin that turns. We leave it slightly open. Every few days we dump it into trays and the chickens eat the larvae then we put the compost back.
I have just one question about the maggots; isn’t there a risk of botulism ? I don’t think the larvae causes a problem but I read that maggots is a risk. Any thoughts regarding this? Thank you.
When I was a kid we raised chickens and sold eggs. I remember my dad telling me about a certain kind of maggot that can get in a chickens crop and eat the crop and go up the neck. He called it "limber neck". How do you know if any of the maggots you are raising are "bad" maggots? That was a long time ago, 60 years. Maybe I remember wrong.
Cheers.....I grow mine in an upright 12" PVC pipe set upright set down into the soil with a plate on top and half a cork glued on the to keep the gap. Your hen run is lovely and generous however a couple of shade trees would be generous for your egg queen's 🥂
oh my god... truly this is the best one I found on this subject ...lol...I want to try it but I have a few questions. What happens to the waste, does it decompose and smell bad or dryout... or turn into manure....
90% of what you put in the bin will decompose and turn into maggots. The rest (bones, feathers, etc.) I just toss in the woods. It definitely can smell bad so I keep the bin well away from the house.
Great bread, well done. I prefere to have bread cool down in basket with towel on top of it. If i cut bread while its still hot, the "smoke" from the bread is moist so the bread can dry out. Not sure about this bread though, just an idea. Thx 😊👍
❤ that's what I needed! I saw several solutions, but yours is the fastest and most easy. The only thing i will add is a tube that transpots the worms directly to my ladies.❤
I had forgotten a bag of chicken scratch in bed of spare pickup. It had gotten rained on and fermented some. Feed was in paper feed bag, and when I realized I had forgotten it in bed, it was too late. Soldier fly larvae were everywhere. Wish I'd had chickens at the time because it would have been a feast for them.
Are you using soil with leaves and sticks and debri? i want to make something similar to this for my chickens and a video i watched recommmended coffee grounds. Would I be able to use regular soil sticks and debri?
The flies need actual food scraps to lay their eggs in. I don’t think they’ll lay eggs in soil and leaves. Coffee grounds is useful for attracting BSF instead of just house flies.
Dude, that is stupidly simple. I will definitely try this method. My neighbor wants to do a compost as well and I have chickens so I could get double out of there
I wanted to make a soldier fly larvae bin but all the vids i saw made me not try. think i’ll give it a shot after seeing your video! Thanks! Does it smell bad?
Great stuff..subscribed straight away...I use to complain about the larvae that use to block my worm farm mesh holes until I worked out what they were. I've just got me 3 chickens and guess what I'll be making....thankyou
okay just made mine, ill keep you posted. Took about 6 minutes with stuff i found laying around, plus the tote that I already had. Thinking about putting an egg in there to rot, along with fruit that was already rotting on the ground (sapodilla and early mangoes, im in So Fl) mixed with hay and compost.
Nice! Question: the hole from the scrap bin to the goodie bin….. I assume the larvae don’t crawl in on their own lol what’s Your stupid simple way to get them there? Hand pick? Scoop? Sifter or something? Just curious! Thanks!
They actually do crawl in on their own. Once they’re mature they instinctively crawl up out of the organic muck looking for a place to pupate. Then they fall into the small bin.
Idea- same setup as what you have, but after the jump into the goodie bin, there's a declination and an opening and the worms can fall out onto the ground. Place with the chickens and then it's an auto feeder.
At a remote fisheries research station, in Manitoba, we did something similar.
Dead fish were put on top of chicken wire. The maggots fell down into tubs. We fed hundreds of hatchery pickerel that way. It was incredibly productive.
The only downsides were the smell (minor issue), and we had to put down a bear that became a nuisance.
One of my best memories was collecting the spawning pickerel eggs and milt.
Best summer job EVER!
I had thought this too but chickens being smart things would just sit there pigging out and the other chickens lower on the pecking order would miss out...if you added a windmill style gizmo with cup that flicked them around that could be fun
@@patrickbutler1715 lol... endless possibilities for creative/inventive constructive types.... God bless
@@patrickbutler1715 would make sense then to put up a couple extras to give them all options
Make some drawings and I bet people would make them.
I love the simple setup of your black soldier fly bin. Thanks for sharing.
Fermentation made simple.
1) Put rain or dechlorinated water in a 5 gallons food grade bucket.
2) Put your whole grains in the bucket of water. The water level must be several inches above the grains for absorption. Cover the bucket with a lid that has holes/ or slightly lift the lid for ventilation.
~ I ferment enough grains for an entire week, and I ferment a new batch in the middle of the week.
3) Sock the grains for three days and stir throughout so that all the grains are fully absorbed.
4) After the fermentation process, store the grains with the liquid in the refrigerator so that it will not spoil.
5) Each day drain the water off a portion and serve it to the chickens.
~Each morning I put a portion of the fermented grains with the chicken feed plus a dash of the DE. The wet grains slightly soften the feed and the chickens love it.
What is the point of this I've never heared this I own 10 chickens please explain
I accidentally made an earwig farm by stacking some old roof tiles, now I use them all the time, every month or so I pick up the pile of 4 tiles and brush off the earwigs into a container and place the tiles back down, I have 5 traps/nests around the garden keeping them off my veggies without Poison and best my chickens love them 😀
I love how genuine this guy is literally only watched 2 videos this one and the one on how to get tall ryegrass in your pastures and I’m subbed now
you're not the one who thinks like that :) and yes I'm subbed and tryıng to watch all the videos :))
yea me too. Those are the exact videos I watched and subscribed for.
Thanks, Jeff! Really appreciate you sharing this. I’ve always wanted to do this but like you, felt like it was a tad tedious/expensive for the supplies. Gonna have to get one of these setup this year
planted rye in a back 40 plot last year, bastardo rats got all the sprouts, will watch vid. God bless
Can you post the link to the ryegrass video? I'm not seeing it on his listing.
We had a Big back yard (really big); in the big city, had a garden covering about half the yard. We had lots of chickens (76 at the highest count). We bought lots of feed and other things (like crushed oyster shells) but supplemented that in other ways.
We let the birds roam through the garden during the day. The garden plants were helped by many bugs being eaten plus the birds did eat certain plants but not too much. The bird poop helped too.
We also got old veggies from a local market since they would otherwise toss them out when they are too old to sell. Some stores refused that option saying corporate would never allow it. Seemed silly to me - but whatever…
thank you for your "stupid simple" methods. one thing I've learned in my 59 yrs is that there's a whole lot of people that love to make things difficult/complicated. I'm all about the simplest, easiest, fastest and cheapest way of doing everything, while getting the same or better results than any of the complicated methods. lol that's how I roll. when you're raising/homeschooling 8 children on a shoestring budget you learn these things lol. I'm very happy I found your channel
I’m proud of you for being a mother who homeschools and homestead. If no one has told you, you’re doing a great job
Agree 👍
Your children are the future of this country.
Thank you for you service.
I honestly think some people build these elaborate systems just because they like to tinker and that's fine but some of us have to much to do to spend time tinkering on little projects. Running farms and acreages is nothing but constant work.
Our black soldier flies breed in an old bath that we use as a scrap/compost bin. It is elevated about a foot off the ground and there's no plug in the drain hole(for drainage): the liquid from this drain goes straight in a bucket and from there goes onto the garden.
The fermented seed process is "super stupid simple 🤗
I have two dozen chickens( 2 rosters included) and feed them around five cups of fermented grain per day (without fermenting, I was feeding them up to eight-nine cups) along with garden timings and their crops are always full.
Fermenting process:
Five cups of grain/cracked corn, wheat, sorghum, a little black sunflower seed, etc in a bucket and cover X2 with water. To start I did this three days in a row and started feeding the first lot on the third day. Nb; drain the liquid from the first batch and reuse in the fourth batch( this liquid is the culture for the lactic acid process to continue your ferment).
After you've established the culture, you can cut the batches back to only two, (giving you a forty eight hour ferment) and continually strain and reuse the liquid in the next batch topping up with fresh water to maintain the level of the first batch.
I'm in Western Queensland; Australia and our climate never gets really cold; if you're in a colder region, you may need to have three batches to allow for fermentation.
It's not rocket science, just give it a go🙏👍
Thanks for this! I ferment my chicken feed and often wondered if I could reuse the liquid. I didn't want it to go to waste so I've just been diluting it and feeding the plants. I'm going to try this instead.
I'm sure you do this anyway but I have 3 buckets with holes drilled in the bottom and they fit into 3 buckets without holes. To drain, I simply lift out the inside bucket with the grains and all the water falls into the outside bucket.
Starting with KNF LAB would be a nice way to speed all this up and keep the “mother” concept going
Thank you for this, two years later this is still the most simple way that I've seen to harvest fly larvae
Excellent “simple” presentation! Loved it! For years, I’ve been feeding maggots to my chickens right from one of my compost heaps that will grow thousands and thousands of maggots in the warm weather. But I love this bucket method. Never thought of it before lol thank you for this info Jeff!
I hope you did find the easiest way to ferment feed. Again, people try to make it so damn hard and it doesn't have to be.
Get a food grade 5 gallon bucket from tractor supply. Put in equal parts feed and water and leave some space at the top of the bucket so it can expand. Stir it all around real good add a dash of apple cider vinegar if you want to, but you don't have to. Stir it every day for three days. Then start feeding it. When the bucket gets a little low, add water and feed again it will ferment overnight because of what was left in the bucket to begin with. It is a never ending bucket. And you only need one bucket. A couple times a year. I completely rinse out the bucket and start new but you don't have to. Keep it stirred and you will do fine. it should be about the consistency of oatmeal. You don't need to leave water on top etc. etc. It is the easiest thing ever.
"equal parts feed and water.."
What feed can be fermented? Kitchen scraps?
@@aronbalabs9389 I wouldn't put kitchen scraps in there. Just toss them to the chickens and let them eat it. I have fermented all kinds of chicken feed, including a grower, which is what I feed all my chickens all the time now. In the past I fermented layer feed. I have fermented, pellets or granules. also feed that is more whole ingredients. it's really good for this time of year when it is so damn hot. The chickens get more moisture from their feed.
I have been doing this for 3 yrs... I make a big bucket of feed and water ... and my chickens go to it before dry feed... I started noticing my chickens would eat feed ( dry) if I spilled water in it.
Thus started me soaking it.
I've been using this method for a few weeks, since I saw your genius video. Lots of larvae, but none are crawling up the ramp to the top hole. Instead they were wriggling out through (and getting stuck in) my drainage holes. So I just enlarged my drainage holes so they're slightly larger than the BSF larvae, kept the bin at its normal tilt, and put another small bin below the drainage holes. I now have a big pan of squirming gold for my fluffy butts! Any tips on getting them to crawl up instead of down? I'm happy with the way things are working now, just curious if I'm missing something.
I think we can say super smart simple. Love Jeff’s approach to nature. Much respect.
Yes, work smart so you don't have to work hard!
I have no respect for someone who doesn't provide shade for their animals....
@@kathrynletchford5114burrrrhurrrrr
Thank you for making this project super easy. I hadn’t given this project a go because you have to spend money getting the sifting equipment,containers and crap that takes money. We’re old and having to tighten the already tightened belt like every one else. Again thank you for making it simple. You just gained a Follower
Thanks for the tip.
My chicks are about 8 weeks old now and I'm sure they'd love this idea.
QUESTION: How do you keep the raccoons/skunks/possums etc., from tearing apart your grub farm every night?
didn't you see the rock? 😄
@@youtubeKathy
Yes. 🙂
Do you know how determined wild animals are?
dogs, at least a big one to bite and a small one to make noise.
raccoons , skunks, and possums are an issue for me too. my solution is i put out a trap every night with easy foods.
easy foods like a handfull of cat food will be choice over a more difficult to get at souce.
but i keep my soilder fly bin in the coop.
I never considered closing the loop on this circle of life by collecting larvae for my hens instead of trapping the flies and throwing them away. Great idea.
Jeff. could you build 5 raised beds and fence them off. Then put scraps in all 5 and rotate the birds to a different bed each day?
This is awesome! I have been drawing out plans for a BSF farm and this is perfectly simple and effective!!
Thank You for this information and very simple way to grow larve. Yeah, it drives me crazy to see all those complicated ways that are out there and supposed to be simple. Your way is just what I’ve been looking for
Great video! HEY another guy said to just put some wide slits in the bin filled with scraps. A few drainage holes in the bottom. He claims the larvae crawl up the side and fall out for the chickens to harvest all by themselves.
I love your videos! @jeffgray
Question about the fly larvae bin.. I'm new to this stuff, and was wondering how the worms go to the smaller larvae catcher bin. Do they just end up in there naturally for easy removal? Also, do some larvae make it to fly form before harvest? I'd rather them not reach adulthood since I live in a suburban area. I'm thinking about doing this for our chickens but am curious about these two things. Thanks so much!
The worms crawl upwards out of the muck when they’ve reached maturity (ie, ready to pupate). Hence the reason for the slope of the inner tub. When the crawl up, they eventually fall into the hole that’s been cut in the inner tub and they’re caught by the small bin.
They can’t pupate and turn into flies until they reach soil. Which they can never do with this system.
Oh my goodness I just tried to watch a video just before this one and had to stop because it was so complicated!!!! Thank you, I prefer stupidly simple!
Brilliant! I've never seen a comparment underneath the compost. Absolutely brilliant! Thank you
I have been researching so many of these and yours is far and away the simplest.
Agreed
I love fermenting my feed. I just take a couple scoops, throw it in a jar, put water in and wait a few days. Sometimes I cover it, sometimes I don't. I've had flies lay eggs and it turns into a little larvae snack too. It looks gross but the girls go bananas for it.
very good! We don`t have those fat ones, but the chicken like it. Thank you! And it`s natural food . The fermented wheat is wonderful I make that since I heard that on " chickenlandia" years ago. The chicken get so much nutrition out of it.
Just found you! YOU ARE AWESOME; Your personality, your content, everything! You should have 10 million subscribers. ... Subscribed and sharing :)
Dude. I love your videos. They're informative and hilarious. Its like listening to Jack Black discuss homesteading. Awesome!
Absolute genius. Thank you. I want to try this for my chameleon. Black soldier fly larvae are the healthiest food for them
I have a similar chicken run! I have 2 coops, because I have a few rooster, head rooster(a bantam), runs our tiny coop, with his little ladies, and then the bachelors and a few younger hens, live in the other.
I can't wait to try this, thanx for adding this video!
We saw the video about the grasses, now, this one. Wow! THANK YOU!!! Yes... we just subscribed. Why isn’t anyone else posting these GREAT ideas. We’re very glad we found yours!!!
Y did a great job showing the people's past it's important to do this saves a lot of the new people into thinking they have to go buy feed all the time.
👋as a new person, I can attest that you've saved me a lot of time! Thank you, subbed 🥳
Exactly what I was looking fir!!! Thanks a bunch.
I literally use the food from my quails poop trays. I don't like to try to pick out the good bits of food they fling out. I also don't want to waste the food. So I literally gather a big pile of it, poop and all, and put it in a bin like you do with your food remnants. I mix in some wood shavings or dead leaves and I get tons of larvae. Like you I don't give a crap about what kind they are. The chickens love eating any of them. Lol
Thank you for making a stupid simple set up and showing people they don't need to make things complicated!
5-8-23 thank you for this video this is the simplest way I have ever seen. I think people make this complicated because they want to make a video. Your idea is genius so simple. Thank you.
Thank you Jeff. I think I have almost everything on hand to do this! I appreciate you sharing this for us simple folks out here with limited resources!
I bought an old wooden toybox for $5 with the fly bin in mind. I just slid the plastics inside & it sits under a shady tree looking all cute.
We've raised thousands of chickens, rabbits, ducks, etc...and you are so correct. Most things can be done so simply. That's honestly how we are designed to function. Man makes things complicated. Thank you for the morning dose of stupid sanity!!❤
I hate hyped stuff and I’m incredibly practical not wanting any fluff or spending an arm and a leg on frivolous unnecessary stuff. I just subscribed to your channel because THANK YOU!! Common sense is lacking so finding someone capable of thinking this way is highly refreshing!
I used your method, but added two flat pieces of scrap wood to go across the top of the bin like your stick and used rubber band to attach cardboard strips to the underside of those scrap wood and the soilder flies are laying a ton of eggs in them. It's worked like a charm, I'm dumping about 2 cups per day of black soilder flie larvae to the chickens!
They’re laying eggs in your cardboard strips?
@@alexgarner594 yep
Do you put your bin in the shade or the sun?
@eh6971 it's in the sun...it's partial sun, late afternoon it's shaded.
@alexgarner594 its corrugated cardboard, that has ridges/holes big enough for the black soilder flies to lay their eggs. It's free, so it's what I use.
Jus find some road kill stick it in mesh wire and hang on a tree or stick and the maggots fall of for the chickies , we also did this for feeding fish by hanging road kill from bridges
I am thinking, just the bin set up at a slight slant to drain any water to bottom of slant with a few small holes if needed, a 2-4" hole in the top for black soldier fly access, a horizontal slot at the high end a few inches up from bottom, for the larvae to crawl out, a piece of flat wood like a 1"x4" that would fit in the slot, the larvae would crawl up and just fall in the floor of the chicken coop if it was inside the coop and all you would have to do is put left overs, animal manure, kitchen scraps in it, the rest would be automatic. The wood slanting up extra would be so it would keep above the food for a while. Subbed, like, and black belled. I may put a video of this up on my channel.
How do you keep raccoon, possums, and mice from getting in through the opening?
Zip ties?
I love, love, love stupidly simple!!!!! You just came up on my feed, and I am kicking myself for not finding your channel earlier. Thank you so much!!!!!! I tried the other "stupid" ways with BSF, 😑
You are my type of guy! No tools needed-projects are my favourite kind of projects.
Love how not stupid but simple this is! Thanks.
I love videos that overcomplicate the simplest thing, they're hysterical. Bullshit boggles the brain, and never is that more true than in the current RUclips universe. This video was a breath of fresh air!
nice job. I'm going to make one this year
I came. I laughed. I learned. We are all suffering analysis paralysis, thanks for brining back simple thinking. 😊
Hi if you use cheap grain and make alcohol then reuse the left overs to make deacons whisky basically more alcohol the remaining left over from the process is super food for farm animals.tye alcohol can run your farm equipment at no cost you can use a solar distiller just a wood frame and plastic rap..if you got a switch car you can run it on the alcohol.if you sprout the grain and feed that to your chickens it makes them grow twice as big it's a super food for them..also if you alkaline there water they don't die as much like 10 percent less death ..have you tried using a fly set up with sewage the flys grow very well ..and removes a contamination problem they can be washed off to feed the birds .
I’ve got a super simple way to ferment feed. Works for us. One container. Overnight fermentation. We use a stainless steel pot with a lid. At night we leave a little bit of previous fermented food behind and mix in 1 part feed to 1.5 part water. When pouring in water rinse the sides. Ferments overnight perfectly ready for next morning. Once in a while reserve some food and wash out the pot well. Maybe every two weeks.
Do you know another thing i saw......when ever there is a dead animal on your farm, place the carcass in a bucket with some holes around the bottom......and the maggots will fall out onto the ground as the carcass rots.
I like this idea also....gonna try this for sure.
Used Coffee Grounds is a very good base for BSF and they will occasionally graze on it, so it acts as a backup emergency food source for them.
Optional bases: Sawdust or other "browns (aka, fiber)" to act as non-food bedding, so they have a place to get away from the food and keep the temps from getting too high as food breaks down and BSF larvae heat it up. Also it helps some of the food get hidden from the surface, which helps avoid attracting some pests and helps absorb excess liquids. If you give them high fiber foods, the fiber will build up over time for you, but I recommend starting with a fiber source and used dry coffee grounds are the easiest and free from Starbucks.
and of course, give them actual food.
Dang just found this video, YOU ROCK!!!
I'm a new subscriber! I MacGyver the heck out of everything I can... Love this.
This is definitely stupid simple! I had BSF invade my compost tumbler and flourished all last summer in a SPINNING compost bin. I tried to transfer them into one of those semi-complicated plastic totes with PVC pipe, and while I did get a few mature larvae to climb up and out, I never got any new takers to lay eggs in the new bin. I will try again this summer because I finally have chickens, and I do still want finished compost some day!
Right now the chickens' favorite place to scratch is under the compost tumbler. I may have to block the area off if I want to get BSF this year.
So if that's the amount you give them every or every couple of days, how would it reduce food costs? It seems just like a treat or desert rather than lowering the cost to feed them.
I’ve seen more intensive BSF action, I like how straight forward it is but that’s not enough of an impact on the feed bill.
Thank God for people like you who simplify things for simple people like me
Yep and then I'm so glad you brought it up man you alright there so many videos on RUclips unbelievable I started reading about it 10 years ago I'm doing it now I dispose of everything into that container they break it down for me I have another container just so I can use that for my chickens..
Good info. Also soak your feed before feeding and you get more volume. Most stores will give you expired greens and produce if you pick it up 2 days a week. Some ask you to sign a liability waiver but most stores will donate them to you. Yokes will be orange when you feed greens!
Super simple video, thanks! I just came across your channel and hope you've already posted fermented feed too. Super simple to make as well.
Great video Jeff, new subscriber & new parent of a 17 bird free range flock.
Okay now this is my kind of BSFL farming.
Thank you.
Subscribed!!
THANK YOU!! THANK YOU!! I really wanted to do this for my chicken but it was SO complicated that I never did so this is a game changer!
We have a composting bin that turns. We leave it slightly open. Every few days we dump it into trays and the chickens eat the larvae then we put the compost back.
I have just one question about the maggots; isn’t there a risk of botulism ? I don’t think the larvae causes a problem but I read that maggots is a risk. Any thoughts regarding this? Thank you.
Thanks for that. My question is, that netting is kinda low. How come your chickens don't jump over it? I needed like 8 foot netting to keep them in.
When I was a kid we raised chickens and sold eggs. I remember my dad telling me about a certain kind of maggot that can get in a chickens crop and eat the crop and go up the neck. He called it "limber neck". How do you know if any of the maggots you are raising are "bad" maggots? That was a long time ago, 60 years. Maybe I remember wrong.
Eat the crop?
@@ogadlogadl490 its some organ chickens have
@@nunyabiznes33 TY
Such a specialised insect probably doesn't eat kitchen scraps. But it's worth checking for sure.
Cheers.....I grow mine in an upright 12" PVC pipe set upright set down into the soil with a plate on top and half a cork glued on the to keep the gap. Your hen run is lovely and generous however a couple of shade trees would be generous for your egg queen's 🥂
oh my god... truly this is the best one I found on this subject ...lol...I want to try it but I have a few questions. What happens to the waste, does it decompose and smell bad or dryout... or turn into manure....
90% of what you put in the bin will decompose and turn into maggots. The rest (bones, feathers, etc.) I just toss in the woods. It definitely can smell bad so I keep the bin well away from the house.
@@JeffGray then i guess i may not be able ro do it. There isn't much space. Then again, your idea is actually cool!.Thanks for replying!
Great bread, well done. I prefere to have bread cool down in basket with towel on top of it. If i cut bread while its still hot, the "smoke" from the bread is moist so the bread can dry out. Not sure about this bread though, just an idea. Thx 😊👍
I get a lot in the compost by leaving the food scraps in plastic bags for a while then tip it in the pile. This would be nice to manage them thanks
❤ that's what I needed! I saw several solutions, but yours is the fastest and most easy. The only thing i will add is a tube that transpots the worms directly to my ladies.❤
You had me cracking up at the end. I love simple.
So how many bins and how many larvae you get and how long to produce that larvae. And how much compost used within that time?
Did anyone else recognize he nailed exactly on how many black fly clips there are on RUclips wow that's amazing 😅
LOL, great simple not stupid way to do it. Black fly larva at the feed store are so expensive.
28 dollars for a bag at tractor supply!
Just found your video in my search for growing chicken feed. Great video! Funny, strait to the point and stupid simple. 😆👍
Just subscribed 🥰🌱🐥
I had forgotten a bag of chicken scratch in bed of spare pickup. It had gotten rained on and fermented some. Feed was in paper feed bag, and when I realized I had forgotten it in bed, it was too late. Soldier fly larvae were everywhere. Wish I'd had chickens at the time because it would have been a feast for them.
Do the larva always just climb up then fall in? Mine seem to want to just chill in the compost/food pile
Finally, someone with the same definition of "simple" as me
Are you using soil with leaves and sticks and debri? i want to make something similar to this for my chickens and a video i watched recommmended coffee grounds.
Would I be able to use regular soil sticks and debri?
The flies need actual food scraps to lay their eggs in. I don’t think they’ll lay eggs in soil and leaves. Coffee grounds is useful for attracting BSF instead of just house flies.
You got a sub from me. Keep it stupid simple. I like the way to explain things! Second video i watched and im coming back for more!!
Dude, that is stupidly simple. I will definitely try this method. My neighbor wants to do a compost as well and I have chickens so I could get double out of there
Wow, thank you. Simple cheap effective is the opposite of stupid. Good engineering!
yes your damn right!!! i don’t need BSFL mega condo
Do you add dirt at the bottom or coffee grounds or did you use your food scraps?
Thank you!!!! I’ve been looking for a simpler way to make one of these bins. This is perfectly simple!!!
How sustainable is this? Do you feed your chickens 100% llarve or does it just help to pad the expense of storebought feed?
You are like the jack black of gardening. You are hilarious!
I wanted to make a soldier fly larvae bin but all the vids i saw made me not try. think i’ll give it a shot after seeing your video! Thanks! Does it smell bad?
I gathered the old horse manure, put an old board on top, came back in a week and took the board off. Buggapalooza! The Chickens go wild eating.
Thanks for this. QUESTION: Is it not better to just give the chickens your scraps
Can youdo this in the winter time when temperatures that gets like 10 degrees? Thank you for. All you information
Great stuff..subscribed straight away...I use to complain about the larvae that use to block my worm farm mesh holes until I worked out what they were. I've just got me 3 chickens and guess what I'll be making....thankyou
okay just made mine, ill keep you posted. Took about 6 minutes with stuff i found laying around, plus the tote that I already had. Thinking about putting an egg in there to rot, along with fruit that was already rotting on the ground (sapodilla and early mangoes, im in So Fl) mixed with hay and compost.
How's it working out?
Excellent video. This is what people need to see. You got lost at the end there lmao.
Thank you for this. I've been fermenting for almost a year now.
Wait, I can’t believe I got an “up next” video by you about feeding chickens Japanese beetles. I guess great minds think alike.
I liked your video solely on the fact you accurately told us how many black soldier fly videos there are 😅😂. Made me chuckle cuz its true
This is awesome. I like how it it genuinely easy and cheap, but also genius. Well done.
I like the simple approach.
BSF larvae hatched right in the poop trays of my quail pen. Easy peasy. 😂
Nice!
Question: the hole from the scrap bin to the goodie bin…..
I assume the larvae don’t crawl in on their own lol what’s Your stupid simple way to get them there? Hand pick? Scoop? Sifter or something? Just curious! Thanks!
They actually do crawl in on their own. Once they’re mature they instinctively crawl up out of the organic muck looking for a place to pupate. Then they fall into the small bin.