Can latrines be designed to allow black soldier fly (BSF) to thrive ?

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  • Carol McCreary
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Re: Can latrines be designed to allow black soldier fly (BSF) to thrive ?

Jeff Holiman maintains a toilet system in which black soldier flies collaborate with ordinary works to process a mix of feces and sawdust.

If you're a Forum member, you can reach Jeff by sending a message to him through the Forum web platform. Go to top of this page, pull down the menu at "Search" and click on "Find User" and enter the name JeffHoliman. You can send a direct message from the resulting page.

Hope this is helpful.

Carol
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Toilet availability is a human right and well-designed sanitation systems restore health to our cities, our waters and our soils.

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  • Emilio
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Re: Can latrines be designed to allow black soldier fly (BSF) to thrive ?

it may be possible, according to my experience with a malfunctioning septic tank, where solids remained in the distribution box and were consumed by BSF.

To do so in a pit latrine, you would need to separate the solids with bed of vegetable material (for examples grass clippings) cover with a second layer and induce the BSF population, the pupae would be difficult to recover but it may do the trick.

For this solution, I consider the maximum number of users of the latrine should be 5.
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  • bberry
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Re: Can latrines be designed to allow black soldier fly (BSF) to thrive ?

Graham,

I believe that Dr. Steven Mecca of the Global Sustainable Aid Project (GSAP) has used black soldier fly larva in his toilets, although my understanding is that he generally prefers to use worms in solids digesters. You can connect with him via SuSanA, his forum user name is "smecca"

Cheers,
Ben
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  • GrahamK
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Re: Can latrines be designed to allow black soldier fly (BSF) to thrive ?

Dear Elisabeth,

I have now discovered that human manure is consumed by BSF so all that is required is that new latrines are designed to allow sufficient drainage and air for them to be effective.

Is no one working on this?
It is of such enormous importance in many parts of the rural world!

Yours

Graham

P.S. I sometimes get the impression that the only development that matters is that which produces a profit!
Graham Knight

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  • Elisabeth
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Re: Urine diversion toilet waste removal and re-use through black soldier fly (BSF) technology (Khanyisa Projects and eThekwini Municipality, South Africa)

Dear Graham,

I think the BSF (black soldier fly) would not be grown inside of the pit but at an external place as it needs rather controlled conditions, and probably more oxygen than what would be available inside of the pit.
Or perhaps I misunderstood your question?

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Elisabeth
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  • GrahamK
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Can latrines be designed to allow black soldier fly (BSF) to thrive ?

Since coming across BSF I've been looking for advice on the use of this technique in ordinary latrines - and found nothing.
The potential benefit looks enormous and I would like to provide information to my many rural contacts so please advise me where to go for it!

Graham K
BioDesign
Graham Knight

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