Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Bill, as previously mentioned:
1 and 2. There is no increase in flies in or around the house. They stick to a good food source and have no reason to go elsewhere.
4. Sowbugs, Wood Lice and Pillbugs is their other names. Wiki it Bill.
5. It tends to attract both. Blowfly maggots are much larger as mentioned previously, with the same nutritional breakdown, so both are a good fish feed source.
And again, if the whole process is kept aerobic, very little smell.

Here you go Bill. Bit more info on the famous Slater..

Slaters (also known as Sowbugs, Wood Lice and Pillbugs) are in fact not insects, but crustaceans, being more closely related to prawns, crabs, and lobsters .

They are one of only two species of crustaceans that have adapted to living solely on land, although they still need to live in a fairly moist exterior environment. They do not bite, sting, or are known to transmit diseases, nor do they infest food, clothing or wood and are scavengers feeding on rotting vegetation and animal matter.

Being crustaceans, they probably have a good nutritional value for aquaponics, but I'm not sure about breeding them in any large quantity. Would be great if someone has worked out how to though.

And yes, the possum I picked up last night I made sure it was very much dead before I touched it.!

I dropped a dead trout in there yesterday, and today it is infested with maggots and there is very little smell.
I so far dont have a huge amounts of maggots dropping in my container but I am hoping they will start to increase. The actual food is literally swarming.

Another question Tony, you are keeping the maggots in flour and freezing them when you have too many, but how long will they stay alive for in the flour? I seem to remember keeping them in the fridge and pulling them out when going fishing, but how long can they sleep in the fridge for?

I have not been on here for quite some time and as the pics show I have set up my maggott factory and while there are some eggs in there nothing seems to be moving as yet, and not much smell if any, need to get the walkway down closer to the ground though, should have cut the drum the other way really or used a wider shorter container so I can get road kill in it, if I ever get the nerve to pick it up Dont seem to have slaters around here or would do some trials on them for fish tucker

Nice one.

Fish frames breed huge amounts of maggots.! They will make very short work of fish. Much faster than meat. Once the food source runs out, they should make a break for the uphill walk in search of more food. As you have had some come crawling out already I would expect the rest to follow b/w 2 - 7 days. But don't put too much else in your container as the fish can make it anaerobic and then smell quite quickly. I learnt that the hard way with an admix of possum, wallaby, fish, and shucked abalone.!! But I just emptied that lot after 8 weeks and it was still producing up until 2 days ago.

And the HFLM will easily last several days quite happily in the flour and in the meantime clean themselves out thoroughly. I have not put them in the fridge though as they don't last that long, but rather they just hang out in the collection container and flour until they are popped in the tank The ones I put in the freezer are just excess I don't need for that week.

Actually Erik, on the fish frames... Tonight I cleaned the bucket out after 8 weeks as mentioned.

In it was a total of 4 possums, 3 shucked abalone, 1 wallaby and a total of 4.5kg of fish frames from a spear fishing trip.

Out of sheer curiosity, (as one does) I went through what was remaining of the tangled heap before tossing it in the garbage - which smelt nothing worse than mild fermenting grapes.

Apart from mostly fur, a few long and rib bones, several groups of vertebrae, the abalone shells, a few teeth, and some claws, would you believe that there was NOTHING else identifiable...! No fish heads, scales, fins, bones, hide, or the like was to be found.. The little suckers must eat just about everything given time..

Anyway, I thought it was pretty groovy..

Good info. Should have tried looking it up online. When I get back home, I'll try my hand at making one and post how it works in cool/cold GA, USA winters. Will have to use it to feed the chickens though. Just let them fall into the Ford hubcap that I use as a feeder pan!

some pics ...

Nice, simple design KE - I like it

Yeh very nice..!

Two things though..

1. It appears very wet inside? Maybe a cover over the food inlet to stop water from getting in the pipe and from the HFLM from crawling straight out. I'd say you've lost some already going by the streaks up the side of the up-pipe in pic 2.

2. And a cover over your collection container, again to stop water / moisture from getting in. Once the HFLM drop into the flour they won't crawl out though but it'd be good to keep it all nice and dry.

Thats a good idea KE14

It is very wet in there, but it's not from the rain as it's been in a fairly sheltered spot under a bush. I might have to think about what I've been putting in there.
I didnt realise that they could climb a vertical pipe until I had a look this morning and saw a few going over the top.

Always interesting to read what people are up to on here...

what if u set it up right above your FT then they can just drop straight in idea for a auto feader maybe

Yeah Deegsta, there are two or three people on the forum hanging roadkill directly above their FT's so the maggots fall straight in - Jessy and Baton Rouge Bill are two that come to mind.