Week 8 of collecting new larvae, and I have finally collected a few hundred from the food bin of the terrarium. I did have to sweep up some teenies off of the floor, but the vast majority were in the bin of coffee grounds and cardboard. The flies like moisture. The humidity level of the terrarium is 99%, but I think they want more moisture for the eggs. I added a wet paper towel to the food bin. I think that offered a nice incentive for them. I'm terrible at guesstimating: I'll guess that I added 200 new larvae to the feeding bucket the other night. That means that there are probably close to 500 new larvae.
I've gotten a little data-happy as I've tracked the second generation. Every night I open each of the 22 bins and note the fly count, conditions (moisture content, larvae happiness), and crawl off addition (if it's warranted). Additional information: larvae bucket food material, terrarium cleaning frequency, and guesstimate of teenies.
One of my long-term data findings will indicate the cycle of crawl off addition in relation to the fly hatch. It's too early to get anything useful from that data. My substrate data has been helpful to see charted out, as seen below. In a spreadsheet, I saw that dirt was a better substrate for the crawl off. I didn't realize how much more successful it would be:
I had issues figuring out the best substrate for the crawl off. I went about it in an experimental manner. Sawdust was recommended on a blog. Luckily I wasn't able to find much sawdust for a substrate, as you can see from the chart that it performs the worst. Maybe it wasn't the right wood. Maybe it wasn't wet enough. There are too many factors to figure out. Fresh mulch did ok. Dirt seems to be a no-brainer. I don't think it packs tightly enough for the prepupae to hatch. At some point, I would like to dissect some of these bins to see what prepupae didn't complete the cycle.
Some additional factors that I wish I had info on but may not be pertinent in the grand scheme of things: moisture/humidity of the hatching bins, oxygen levels, substrate temperature. For optimal performance, I'm sure all these factors would be great to know. I'm not equipped for that data right now though.
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| One of the teenies I found on the floor of the terrarium on a recent cleaning |
I've gotten a little data-happy as I've tracked the second generation. Every night I open each of the 22 bins and note the fly count, conditions (moisture content, larvae happiness), and crawl off addition (if it's warranted). Additional information: larvae bucket food material, terrarium cleaning frequency, and guesstimate of teenies.
One of my long-term data findings will indicate the cycle of crawl off addition in relation to the fly hatch. It's too early to get anything useful from that data. My substrate data has been helpful to see charted out, as seen below. In a spreadsheet, I saw that dirt was a better substrate for the crawl off. I didn't realize how much more successful it would be:
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| This shows the fly count for the substrates used. Brown (dirt) performs the best. |
I had issues figuring out the best substrate for the crawl off. I went about it in an experimental manner. Sawdust was recommended on a blog. Luckily I wasn't able to find much sawdust for a substrate, as you can see from the chart that it performs the worst. Maybe it wasn't the right wood. Maybe it wasn't wet enough. There are too many factors to figure out. Fresh mulch did ok. Dirt seems to be a no-brainer. I don't think it packs tightly enough for the prepupae to hatch. At some point, I would like to dissect some of these bins to see what prepupae didn't complete the cycle.
Some additional factors that I wish I had info on but may not be pertinent in the grand scheme of things: moisture/humidity of the hatching bins, oxygen levels, substrate temperature. For optimal performance, I'm sure all these factors would be great to know. I'm not equipped for that data right now though.
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