Maggots in worm bin

by Mark Ortego
(Baton Rouge, La)

Maggots in my worm bin

Greetings,
I am trying to start a worm bin. I didn't research but just took off. Put compost manure, dirt, and some leaves in my worm bin.

Dumped a bunch of watermelon rinds in hoping to break down some before I started adding worms.

Man! The BSF maggots took over! So, I made a screen covering for the bed and started seeing the fly's hatch. I would let them out every day and didn't add any more organic material.

Finally, I didn't see any for a week and started adding worms to the bin. It's a 50+ gallon tote by the way.

Everything is going well and the worms seem to be doing ok and I've started to introduce a few potato peelings and cucumber peelings along with some shredded brown paper.

Today I noticed about 3 BSFs come flying out when I took off the lid and found about 3 maggots that I took out.

Any tips on how to prevent further infestation?

Will diatomaceous earth get rid of them or kill them? Will that hurt the earthworms?

Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks,
Mark

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May 02, 2023
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Worm Book
by: Anonymous

Thank you Stephan again!!
I will check out the articles and am looking forward to the book.


I made a screen top for my bin to keep the flies out.

Again, thanks for your generosity.

May the Lord continue to Bless you also!

Gratefully,
Mark
May 02, 2023
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starstarstarstarstar 		Re: Maggots in my worm farm
by: Stephan

Hi Mark,

thank you for ordering my book. I hope it will help you with your worm composting project and will assist you to reach your goals.

To answer your questions, I suggest you have a look at the following article you can find on worm-composting-help.com

1. How we raise big bait worms for fishing.

https://www.worm-composting-help.com/Fishing-worms.html

As a general guide. Compost worms grow bigger when there are not too many of them sharing a single worm bin. So, it might be a good idea to start a bin specifically with a small number of worms and a special setup and feeding regime. You will find some more information about the subject in my book as well.

2. Soldier fly maggots that you found in your worm bin might very well have been hatching from the maggots that have been found in your worm bin previously. I try to prevent them from entering the worm bin in the first place wherever possible.

3. Worm tea is actually not produced by the worms themselves as they don't urinate. It's rather an accumulation of excess liquids that absorb nutrients from the worm castings that are present in a worm bin.

For more information have a look at the following articles.

https://www.worm-composting-help.com/brewing-worm-tea-am-i-doing-it-right.html

https://www.worm-composting-help.com/worm-tea.html

There is as well information about worm tea in my book.

I hope this will help you to make progress.

Kind regards and God's blessings.

Stephan Kloppert

Author of "How to start a profitable worm business on a shoestring budget"

Editor of "How to start a profitable worm business on a shoestring budget"
May 01, 2023
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starstarstarstarstar 		Book
by: Anonymous

By the way I just ordered your book!
Thanks again,
Mark
May 01, 2023
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starstarstarstarstar 		Worm Questions
by: Anonymous

Sorry! Stephan!
Typo

Regard, Mark Ortego
Apr 30, 2023
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starstarstarstarstar 		Worm Bin Worms
by: Anonymous

Greetings Stephen,

I took the time and was able to get the BSF out of my bin for the most part and started seeing some worms. (As I posted earlier)

I do have a couple of questions.

When it warmed up a little about a month ago, I found a couple of soldier flies in my bin. So far, I found about 6-8 over a three-week period. I haven't located any maggots though. Are these possibly left over from my original infestation?

Second, I have been adding some greens and vegetable scraps in my bin along with leaves and the worms seem to be thriving. I seem to have a bunch of them. The thing is, I don't see any of them getting large. Is this common?
There aren't any giant ones like I find in my yard or garden.
The longest ones I've seen are about 2-3" at most but less than 1/8" in girth
The ones 1/8 -3/16" are short- no longer than 2".
Is this common?

Also, they don't seem to produce a lot of juice. I have my bin tilted with holes on one end to catch the liquid but they don't seem to produce much.

Any more insight or tips would be helpful

My main goal was to get the worm juice for fertilizer and maybe a little compost.

Thanks again,
Mark Ortego
Sep 26, 2022
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Re: Maggots in my worm farm
by: Stephan

Hello Mark,

Black soldier fly maggots (BSF maggots) can cause serious trouble in a worm bin if not monitored well.

Although like worms they recycle organic materials as well, compost worms just don't like to be in the same bin as BSF maggots and so it's best to prevent them from entering a worm bin and/or remove them as soon as possible once they have entered a worm bin.

I published several articles about the subject of a maggot infestation in worm bins and below I leave two urls to some of the articles that can help you to get on top of the BSF problems in your worm bin.


https://www.worm-composting-help.com/how-to-stop-these-maggots-from-killing-all-the-worms-in-your-worm-farm.html

https://www.worm-composting-help.com/Maggots-in-a-worm-farm.html

I trust this will help you and wish you lots of success with your worm farming project.

If you have further questions, please feel free to respond to this message.

Kind regards and God's richest blessings

From

Stephan Kloppert

Author of "How to start a profitable worm business on a shoestring budget"

Editor of www.worm-composting-help.com

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