Hi, I found your forum looking to see what the thousands of maggots in my compost heap are. Great site. :-D I read the whole thing and am glad to see they are good guys, with one exception... I need the compost for garden use and they reduce the compost yield WAY too much. My pile is ground live oak and misc leaf litter and ground grass clippings from Other People's Lawns but I added a bucket of mixed goner fruit, mac and cheese my wife snuck into the bucket and rejected dry cat food. It is a fast heating pile turned at least weekly and the BFSL keep to a cylinder 2-8" in from the edge. As an experiment the pile is "insulated" with bags of leaves and the whole thing is on top of/inside and covered by a couple of old bedliners. (This controls moisture and keeps the oak trees and catbriar roots out) When I lift a covering bag a the larvae are on the surface (and on the bag) but dive for cover. What I've done is throw the last bit of old bread, lettuce, and strawberry hulls in a big black planter bucket , add a shovelful of larvae rich compost and put the whole thing on the heap with the bottom embedded so the drain holes are in the pile if any others want to migrate in (I may reset the bucket so it is partially burird on it's side.) a small bag of leaves is loosely over the top with a couple 4" dia. tunnels to the chow not covered, then the whole thing has the big bedliner over the top for shade and it is in a shaded location under trees and east of a privacy fence.
I'd like to migrate as many of the buggers out of the pile and into the bucket, then give them their own home and exclude the flies from the heap with mesh. (preferably this weekend)
What I'm looking for are any suggestions to speed up the process.
The tea and leavings will go to the compost heap or a worm bin, with the BSFL acting mainly as a good food waste disposal with a nominal garden benefit. Supplementary feedings with grocer/restaurant waste may be used to increase production)
