Well, today I saw my first adult black soldier flies, white kneestockings and all. Actually I almost swatted them, their flight habit is similar to a local wasp but they alighted and I was able to get a good look. Nice looking insect, I'll have to catch a few for my daughter to zoom the webcam on.
In regards to the larvae... well, I spent all day doing yard work while my wife and daughter went shopping beginning around 0930 and around 1640 I decided to take a break. I found the refrigerator door open about six inches and everything on the top shelves "cool but not cold". The critters ate well today. Everything not in an unopened package became maggot chow. As there was a half gallon of liquid, I added all the stale/personally disliked cereal and cookies I could find and a big scoop of maggoty compost. An hour later I could hear them working through the mess. I had moved the bucket to the top of the pile yesterday, outside the layer of insulating leaf bags, and the bucket was *hotter*. I'm wondering how much of the heat in the compost pile is from them and how much is from the decomposition of the core of the pile.
Anyway, with all the liquid I was adding I decided to move the livestock to an undrained container and settled on a scavenged stainless bowl that also provided more surface area. This was formerly the top of a gas-station vacuum that someone had decided to vandalize by driving a truck over it. I'd been using it as a firebowl, but I dont plan on burning anything in the immediate future. You have to understand that stainless is virtually a sacred metal to me, so you can tell how interested I am with these bugs :P
