In recent years, Black Soldier Fly (BSF, Hermetia Illucens) farming has gained significant attention as a sustainable and profitable solution for waste management and high-quality protein production. At the heart of this process are BSF eggs, the foundation of every successful BSF colony. This article aims to provide an in-depth understanding of BSF eggs, from identification and collection to the intricacies of breeding and hatching. Whether you are an established BSF farmer or someone exploring this exciting venture, this guide will offer you valuable insights.

BSF. It all starts with an egg

BSF eggs are the starting point of a highly efficient natural cycle. Once hatched, BSF larvae can consume large amounts of organic waste, converting it into valuable by-products, such as frass (organic fertilizer) and high-protein larvae, which are ideal for animal feed. For farmers and businesses, this process presents a sustainable way to manage waste while generating new revenue streams. The quality of BSF eggs directly impacts the yield and efficiency of the entire process, making egg management a critical aspect of insect farming.

The natural BSF cycle

A female Black Soldier Fly typically lays eggs only once in her lifetime. After mating, she will lay a single cluster of eggs, usually in secluded areas near a food source but not directly on it. Each female can lay between 600 to 900 eggs during this process, releasing them one by one using a specialized organ through a process known as oviposition. Once the eggs are laid, the female fly dies shortly after, as her reproductive role is complete. The life cycle of the Black Soldier Fly focuses on producing a large number of offspring in a single laying event to maximize reproductive success.

The weight of a single BSF egg is approximately 30 micrograms. Initially, the eggs are white but gradually turn yellow as they mature. In the final stages of their development, close observation under a microscope reveals the development of the larvae’s eyes, indicating they are nearly ready to hatch. It’s important to note that the egg itself is the embryo, and the female fly fertilizes the eggs as they pass through the oviposition tube, utilizing stored male sperm from the mating process.

Large-Scale Oviposition

In large-scale BSF breeding operations, guiding females to lay eggs in the desired locations presents a considerable challenge. BSF females tend to deposit their eggs in various unintended spots within the breeding environment, such as walls, corners, or even dead flies, leading to significant egg loss—sometimes reducing yield by as much as several dozen percent.

In large-scale BSF breeding operations, guiding females to lay eggs in the desired locations presents a considerable challenge.

While improvised attractants are often used to influence where females lay eggs, these attractants are frequently homemade, using methods like fermentation or other biological processes. Unfortunately, these solutions tend to be inconsistent and unstable, particularly when scaled up, which can lead to further egg yield losses. Natural fluctuations in egg production further complicate matters, necessitating overproduction—often 1.5 to 3 times the actual requirement—to ensure a sufficient supply of eggs for rearing.

Furthermore, the sensitivity of BSF eggs means that improper incubation can lead to poor hatch rates and inconsistent timing. Once hatched, neonates must be promptly introduced to feed at the correct larvae-to-feed ratio to optimize their growth and ensure efficient feed conversion (FCR). Mismanagement of oviposition, hatching, and neonate dosing can significantly reduce breeding efficiency, negatively impacting overall production performance.

How to Collect BSF Eggs Efficiently

Efficient egg collection is essential for maintaining a healthy BSF colony. It’s crucial to check the traps regularly, as the eggs need to be collected within a few days to ensure proper hatching conditions. Once collected, the eggs should be carefully transferred to a controlled environment, where temperature and humidity can be optimized to encourage hatching.

When collecting eggs, it’s crucial to maintain cleanliness to avoid contamination. A sterile environment helps prevent the growth of mold or other pathogens that could jeopardize egg fertility or the health of the larvae.

How Long Do BSF Eggs Take to Hatch?

BSF eggs typically take about 3 to 4 days to hatch, but this timeline can vary depending on environmental factors. Temperature is a critical factor: the ideal range for hatching is between 26°C to 30°C. Humidity also plays a vital role, with optimal conditions being around 70%. Deviations from these conditions can delay hatching or reduce the viability of the larvae. Farmers should regularly monitor these factors and ensure a stable environment to maximize hatch rates.

Best Attractants for BSF Egg Laying

BSF flies are naturally attracted to decomposing organic matter, which serves as a food source for their larvae. However, certain attractants can be used to maximize egg-laying rates. Well-prepared waste piles that emit strong odors are often the most effective. Common attractants include fruit and vegetable waste, particularly those with high moisture content, such as bananas, melons, and other decaying produce. It is important to strike a balance—while waste attracts the flies, placing the eggs directly on moist waste can negatively impact hatching. Thus, offering dry, secluded spots near the waste is essential.

Challenges in Breeding BSF

While insect farming offers significant advantages, successfully breeding black soldier flies can be complex. Maintaining the right environmental conditions, ensuring a consistent food supply, and managing the reproduction cycle are common challenges farmers face. Exposure to these conditions can lead to a decrease in overall colony performance, affecting not just larvae quality, but also fertility and survival.

Additionally, the breeding process requires specialized knowledge and equipment to ensure optimal outcomes. Many farmers find it difficult to maintain genetic diversity and pathogen control within their colonies, which can lead to reduced larvae quality over time.

The FreezeM Advantage: Simplifying BSF Egg Management

This is where FreezeM comes in. At FreezeM, we understand the complexities involved in BSF breeding, and we offer a streamlined solution for insect farmers. Our breeding solutions allow farmers to outsource the reproduction process so they can focus on rearing and production. FreezeM handles the complexities of large-scale breeding, from egg-laying to hatching, and provides neonates in a live-suspension state, ready to be used whenever your waste feed is prepared. This method ensures that you receive healthy, robust larvae exactly when you need them, without worrying about the timing or the intricate details of hatching.

By outsourcing your breeding needs to FreezeM, you can maintain consistent production without investing heavily in breeding infrastructure. Additionally, this approach ensures that your colony maintains genetic diversity and pathogen control, which are critical to long-term success.

Insect farming, particularly Black Soldier Fly (Hermetia Illucens) farming, is gaining traction as a sustainable protein production and waste management solution. However, managing Black Soldier Fly breeding (reproduction) and maintaining an in-house Black Soldier Fly colony present several challenges that can hinder efficiency and scalability.

This article explores the top challenges Black Soldier Fly (BSF) farmers face. It highlights the benefits of an outsourced or hybrid solution, where buying BSF neonates can mitigate many of these issues.

Challenge 1. Production Stability and Predictability

Breeding Consistency

Maintaining breeding consistency is crucial for the success of BSF farming. Consistency ensures larvae develop uniformly, leading to predictable yields and high-quality protein production. However, achieving this consistency takes time and effort.

Accurate Dosing and Feed Amounts

Accurate dosing and feed amounts are critical to maintaining consistency in BSF farming. Overfeeding or underfeeding can result in suboptimal growth conditions, affecting the larvae’s health and development. Monitoring and adjusting feed levels require meticulous attention and expertise, which can be challenging to maintain consistently in-house.

Neonate Quality

The quality of neonates, or newly hatched larvae, significantly impacts the overall stability of the production. In-house breeding requires precise control over breeding conditions to produce high-quality, synchronized neonates in a consistent manner. Variability in neonate quality can lead to uneven growth rates and reduced yields, complicating the farming process. Furthermore, it can also lead to a suboptimal feed conversion rate (FCR) and, subsequently, to increased feed expenses.

Live-Suspended Neonates with PauseM® Technology

FreezeM’s flagship product, PauseM®, provides live-suspended BSF larvae neonates that can be halted for up to 14 days. Each unit contains a synchronized and pre-counted number of neonates, ensuring high consistency and reproducibility between trays. This technology optimizes feed inputs and enhances feed consumption efficiency, addressing the production stability challenge head-on.

Learn more about PauseM® >

Challenge 2. Breeding and Egg Production

Fly Colony Management

Maintaining a healthy fly colony is crucial for continuous egg production. However, managing the colony can be challenging due to the specific requirements for emerging, mating and egg-laying (oviposition). Flies need optimal conditions to mate successfully, including appropriate lighting, temperature, and humidity. Any disruption in these conditions can reduce mating success and egg production.

Risk of Disease Outbreaks

Like any form of animal husbandry, insect farming is susceptible to disease outbreaks. Infections can spread rapidly in dense populations, leading to significant losses. Maintaining biosecurity in in-house BSF farming operations involves quantitative and quality control to prevent contamination and manage diseases, which can be labor-intensive and costly. In addition, BSF facilities attract other fly species that can contaminate the colony, reducing performance and may lead to safety issues.

Egg Harvesting and Handling

Another significant challenge in BSF breeding is collecting and handling eggs efficiently. Eggs are delicate and require careful handling to prevent damage. Ensuring eggs are collected, incubated, and hatched under optimal conditions is essential for producing neonates with high fitness. This process is labor-intensive and requires precise timing and techniques to maximize hatch rates and neonate quality.

Challenge 3. Genetic Drifts

Inbreeding Depression

A lack of genetic diversity due to repeated inbreeding within a limited population can lead to genetic drifts. This results in weakened individuals with reduced fertility, slower growth rates, and higher susceptibility to diseases.

Accumulation of Mutations

Harmful mutations can accumulate in a closed population over generations. Without introducing new genetic material, these mutations can have a cumulative negative effect on the colony’s overall health and productivity.

Adaptation to Suboptimal Conditions

A closed breeding environment can lead to the population adapting to the specific conditions of the facility, which may not be ideal for optimal growth and reproduction. This narrow adaptation can reduce the population’s ability to thrive in different environments or conditions, making the colony less adaptable to changes or stressors.

The Hybrid Breeding Model

Outsourcing part of the Black Soldier Fly (BSF) breeding process enhances genetic diversity. It mitigates the risks of inbreeding depression by introducing flies with diverse genetic backgrounds to refresh the colony. Regular genetic refreshment through outsourcing keeps the colony dynamic and adaptable, preventing stagnation and maintaining long-term viability. Leveraging specialized breeding facilities’ expertise and advanced techniques like FreezeM’s ensures optimal breeding practices and precise genetic management, resulting in a healthier, more productive, and resilient colony.

Learn more about FreezeM’s BSF Technology>

Challenge 4. Technical and Operational Complexity

Growth Conditions

Advanced Farming Systems

Labor and Expertise

Challenge 5. Scaling Up

The transition from small-scale to large-scale BSF breeding involves overcoming significant challenges related to equipment, environmental control, work protocols, biological behavior, and manpower. Effectively addressing these issues is crucial for the sustainable growth and success of BSF breeding facilities.

Implementing New Equipment

Implementing new equipment is often costly and requires extensive operator training. These new systems also demand numerous dry runs and meticulous calibration, a process that many companies find more challenging than initially anticipated. While reliable rearing and processing systems are available on the market and can be acquired from several suppliers, this is not the case for breeding. In this case, breeding capex is more risky and can result in a higher depreciation rate due to frequent upgrades or installments of new systems.

Stabilizing Growth Conditions

Maintaining optimal conditions for BSF growth is crucial, but in large rooms, this task becomes far from trivial. Inconsistent conditions can profoundly affect growth rates and escalating operational costs, making precise environmental control a critical component of successful scale-up.

Revising Work Protocols

Work protocols that function well on a small scale often need adaptation for larger operations. Many tasks that were previously performed manually must be automated to maintain efficiency. However, suitable automation solutions are not always readily available and may require custom development and adjustment. This transition to automation necessitates further workforce training to ensure smooth operation.

Adapting to Biological Changes

Biological factors also come into play, as insects tend to behave differently when reared in large quantities. This means biological setups effective at a small scale may need to be re-established or modified for larger-scale operations. Understanding and adapting to these behavioral changes are essential to maintaining colony health and productivity.

Advantages of Outsourced and Hybrid Breeding Models

Outsourced or hybrid breeding solutions offer significant advantages for BSF farming operations by addressing critical challenges associated with in-house breeding. One of the key benefits is the separation of breeding and rearing, which highlights the importance of the specialized knowledge and investment required for successful breeding. By outsourcing breeding or adopting a hybrid model, facilities can ensure a consistent quality and supply of neonates, which is crucial for maintaining a stable and productive process.

This approach streamlines operations and reduces the complexities and costs associated with breeding, allowing farmers to focus on growing larvae, improving productivity, and scaling their operations faster and more efficiently. By purchasing high-quality neonates from specialized suppliers, farmers can leverage the expertise and resources of professional breeding facilities, ensuring the long-term health and viability of their BSF colonies.

As the world grapples with the dual challenges of food security and environmental sustainability, innovative solutions are emerging at the intersection of agriculture and waste management. One such promising solution is insect farming.

Insect farming’s circular approach tackles the pressing issue of food waste while providing a renewable source of protein, contributing to a more resilient and environmentally friendly feed system.

For waste management companies, venturing into insect farming not only represents a lucrative business opportunity but also a sustainable approach to waste utilization and food production. Several waste management companies are already at the forefront of the industry, utilizing black soldier fly (BSF) technology to address food waste sustainably.

Veolia, for example, is a global industry leader harnessing the power of BSF larvae to transform organic waste from agricultural and agri-food sectors into high-protein animal feed. Their initiatives in Malaysia and France not only help manage waste but also contribute to sustainable food production by providing an alternative protein source while reducing the environmental footprint of traditional livestock farming​.

Similarly, GoTerra, in Australia, has introduced modular waste management units, known as Modular Infrastructure for Biological Services (MIBs), that utilize BSF larvae to process food waste onsite. Their project at the Barangaroo Towers in Sydney demonstrates the efficacy of this approach in converting high-volume food waste into insect protein and soil enhancers, significantly reducing emissions and supporting the circular economy.​​

Transforming Waste into Value

Waste management companies deal with vast amounts of organic waste, which often ends up burned or in landfills, contributing to greenhouse gas emissions and environmental degradation. Insect farming, particularly the cultivation of Black Soldier Flies (BSF), offers a compelling alternative. BSF larvae can consume a wide variety of organic waste, transforming it into high-value protein and oil. This process not only reduces the volume of waste but also creates new revenue streams.

Key Benefits:

– Waste Reduction: BSF larvae can process twice their body weight in organic waste daily, significantly reducing the volume of waste.

– High-Value Products: The larvae are rich in protein (up to 45%) and fat (up to 35%), making them an excellent ingredient for animal feed, including aquaculture, poultry, and pet food.

Economic Viability

According to Rabobank, the global market for insect protein will reach $9.46 billion by 2030, driven by increasing demand for sustainable animal feed. Waste management companies are uniquely positioned to capitalize on this growing market. By integrating insect farming into their operations, they can diversify their revenue streams and enhance their profitability.

Economic Drivers:

– Growing Demand: The aquaculture and pet food industries are actively seeking sustainable protein alternatives to fishmeal and soybean meal, both of which have significant environmental impacts.

– Cost Efficiency: Utilizing organic waste as feed for insects reduces raw material costs, improving the economic viability of insect farming.

Environmental Sustainability

Insect farming is a highly sustainable practice with a minimal environmental footprint. It addresses several critical environmental issues, including waste management, greenhouse gas emissions, and land use.

Environmental Impact:

-Efficient Resource Use: Insects require less land and water than conventional livestock or vegetal protein, making them a sustainable protein source.

– Circular Economy: By converting waste into valuable organic products, insect farming supports the principles of a circular economy, reducing reliance on finite resources.

Addressing Specific Challenges with Wet Organic Waste

Wet organic waste poses significant challenges for traditional waste management processes. It has a shorter shelf life and higher water content, making transportation and handling less economically efficient.

These waste streams are often directed to biogas production, which, while offering renewable energy benefits, misses the potential for higher-value upcycling.

Biogas also comes with significant challenges. The high initial costs for setting up biogas plants can be prohibitive, especially for small-scale operations. Maintaining the optimal conditions for anaerobic digestion, such as temperature and pH, is challenging and can affect efficiency. Moreover, if not managed properly, biogas production can cause environmental pollution from effluents and even methane leakage.

BSF Farming as a Solution:

BSF larvae thrive on wet organic waste, which typically comprises 60-70% moisture. This makes BSF farming an ideal solution for managing wet waste streams effectively. The collaboration between FreezeM and Shachar Group demonstrates how this model can be successfully implemented. FreezeM’s decoupled model, which supplies ready-to-use BSF neonates, allows waste management companies to convert wet waste into valuable insect protein without the need for on-site breeding facilities.

Strategic Synergies and Case Study Insights

The collaboration between FreezeM and Shachar Group exemplifies the benefits of integrating insect farming into waste management operations. Shachar, specializing in upcycling food waste, faced challenges with wet waste streams. By leveraging FreezeM’s BSF technology, they transformed wet waste into valuable resources.

Case Study Highlights:

– Scalability and Efficiency: FreezeM’s PauseM® BSF neonates enable scalable and efficient insect farming operations by outsourcing the breeding process and focusing on their production capabilities.

– Innovative Solutions: Shachar’s pilot rearing facility explores various waste streams, optimizing BSF feed recipes and achieving superior feed conversion rates.

– Environmental and Economic Impact: This collaboration not only reduces waste but also generates new revenue streams through the production of high-value protein and organic fertilizer.

Conclusion

Insect farming represents a transformative opportunity for waste management companies. By turning organic waste into high-value protein and oil, companies can enhance their profitability, contribute to environmental sustainability, and support the growing demand for sustainable animal feed. With regulatory support, technological advancements, and strategic synergies, waste management companies are well-positioned to lead the way in this innovative and sustainable industry.

As the world seeks sustainable solutions to pressing environmental and food security challenges, insect farming offers a promising path forward. Waste management companies that embrace this opportunity can play a crucial role in shaping a more sustainable and resilient future.