CATDOLL : CATDOLL: How to breed fly maggots artificially?

Fly maggots are rich in nutrition and good in palatability. They are one of the excellent animal feeds for turtles to be combined with or directly fed. According to relevant reports, fly maggots contain an active ingredient of antibacterial enzymes, which have a good effect on disease prevention.

(1) Living and breeding habits of houseflies Houseflies are suitable for living and breeding in an environment with a room temperature of 22-32℃ and a relative humidity of 60%-80%. Under the above conditions, the pupa develops for 3 days, from soft to hard, from beige, light brown, dark brown to black, and finally the adult fly breaks out of the pupa. The newly hatched adult fly can only crawl but not fly. It will take 1 hour before it spreads its wings and starts to eat and drink water. The adult fly is active during the day and stays still at night. After 3 days of sexual maturity, it begins to mate and lay eggs. The peak of egg laying is 6-8 days old, and then it gradually decreases. By the 15th day of age, the egg laying capacity is basically lost. The fly eggs hatch into maggots in 0.5-1 day, and the maggots are cultured in the feces of pigs, chickens, etc. for about 5 days before turning into pupae. A generation of flies is about 28 days. Under artificial breeding conditions, the most suitable temperature is controlled and nutrient-rich culture medium is prepared, and the maggots bred are large in size, high in yield, and good in quality. (2) The breeding facilities can be determined according to the scale of turtle breeding. The basic facilities for general fly breeding include breeding workshops, breeding cages and breeding tools.

The size of the breeding workshop can be determined by each turtle breeding farm according to its own needs. However, the workshop must be heat-insulated, ventilated, and clean. The floor should preferably be cement, which is easy to clean. In order to effectively prevent other outdoor insects from entering the breeding workshop, the ventilation windows should be equipped with fine screens.

The cage frame of the breeding cage can be made of steel or wood, and then covered with fine nylon mesh. The specifications of the cage are 150 cm long, 100 cm wide and 120 cm high. The bottom of the cage is required to be 30 cm above the ground when it is installed. (3) The breeding tools mainly include feed basins, water basins, eclosion tanks and egg-laying tanks. (4) Breeding of breeding flies Breeding flies are raised in cages. Generally, 15,000 breeding flies are raised in cages of the above specifications. A cloth sleeve should be added to one side of each cage to facilitate the hand to add feed, water and collect eggs. 15,000 adult flies are fed 25 grams of milk powder every day. The feed is placed in a feed basin with a gauze pad. The adult flies are allowed to stand on the gauze to suck the feed and water. The feed and water are changed once a day. Gauze is placed in the water basin, and wet wheat bran is placed in the egg-laying tank for the flies to lay eggs. The eggs are collected once a day and sent to the maggot room for maggot breeding. The number of eggs laid by breeding flies is the highest between 8:00 and 15:00 every day, so the time for egg collection should be appropriate. Each batch of breeding flies is eliminated after 15 to 20 days of breeding. They can be killed with hot water or steam, dried and ground into powder, and used as turtle feed, and then replaced with a new batch. During the breeding period of breeding flies, glass and screens should be installed on the doors and windows to facilitate temperature control, and fans should be installed on the walls to regulate the air. The room should be equipped with heating equipment to keep the temperature at 22 to 32°C in winter and the relative humidity at 60% to 80%. Be careful when operating to prevent the breeding flies from escaping. (5) Fly maggot breeding Fly maggot breeding can be carried out in a room with good insulation and ventilation conditions, using bricks with a side height of 20 cm and an area of ​​2 to 5 m2, or using wooden frames and plastic trays for breeding. A plastic tray with a diameter of 50 cm can produce 1.5 kg of maggots after one day of breeding with 3 kg of bran.

The specific method of raising maggots is as follows: pour fly eggs and bran into a plate, add maggot feed such as wine lees, bean dregs or bran, and mix well. Note that fly eggs should not be exposed on the surface of the maggot feed to avoid water loss and death of eggs. The thickness of the maggot feed is generally 5 to 10 cm, and the fermentation temperature in the maggot feed is not higher than 40℃ and not lower than 20℃ as a standard. In summer, when the temperature is high, the maggot feed should be appropriately thinner; conversely, in winter, when the temperature is low, the maggot feed can be appropriately thicker. If human and animal feces are used, bacteria and parasites must be killed before use. The ratio of feed to maggots, taking chicken manure as an example, is generally 3.5 to 4 kg to produce 0.5 kg of fresh maggots. Regardless of which raw material is used to raise maggots, the dryness and humidity of the maggot feed should be kept at 60% to 65%. (6) Maggot collection: Maggots are afraid of light and can be collected. Use feces to scrape the surface of the feed in the maggot breeding pond and push it continuously. The maggots will drill down and take away the surface feed. Repeat this method many times. Finally, a small amount of feed and a large amount of maggots are left. At this time, the maggots can be taken away and mixed with other feed to feed the turtles. (7) Breeding of fly species While producing fly maggots, some of the maggots are allowed to pupate as a source of new fly species. There are two methods for pupation: one is to let the maggots pupate naturally in the feed, wash out the maggot feed with water, and then get fly pupae; the other is to take out the maggots and put them in a basin filled with dry wheat bran to promote pupation after about 5 to 6 days of culture in the maggot feed. Then use a sieve to separate the wheat bran to get pupae. The size of the pupae is required to reach 50 pupae per gram.