Feeding BSF larvae in Batches or Continuously?

When we gave food to the BSF larvae, we noticed something interesting. When we gave them fresh waste every 3 days, they grew faster into bigger prepupae. This is called “continuous feeding.”

On the other hand, when we gave them all their food at once. This is called “batch feeding.”

The reason the BSF larvae didn’t grow as quickly with batch feeding is because they seem to like fresh food more than old, rotten food. When we give them all their food at once, they have too #much to eat all at the same time. Some of the food starts to go bad because tiny living things (microorganisms) break it down. This is like a competition between the larvae and the microorganisms. The food that goes bad isn’t as good for the larvae, so they have to eat more of it to get enough nutrients.

Two very important things for the larvae to grow are proteins and carbohydrates. But if the food gets old, it loses these important things over time. So, when we give old food all at once, there aren’t as many good things for them to eat. That’s why the larvae don’t get as big and heavy with batch feeding compared to when we give them fresh food regularly, like in continuous feeding.