Aussie Finch Forum

I have got my fly box producing many more maggots that I seem to be able to use.I feed them maggots twice a day, I'm not sure if you can overfeed them
but they line up each time I put them in the food tray and they are all eaten each time.At the moment I keep the hatched maggots in a container on
top of the fly box to keep them warm and they start to pupae long before I finish them.
Are there any ways of slowing down their growth? I tried freezing some but they just seemed to shrivel up.

Cheers Greg.

Open container (i.e. no lid) in the fridge. They'll store for a week. You can't really overfeed them. I wish I had that problem.

Thanks Danny, I don't have a lot of birds to feed.


Cheers Greg.

All my aviaries get more maggots than they can eat. I only feed in the morning and I feed enough so that there are some remaining the following morning.
If you've still got leftovers then chooks love them as do wild birds - wrens, double bars and red brows .

Greg, cant over feed your birds, mine get magggots 24/7, then if they arent eaten they usually pupate in tray, birds love them then even more then maggots. Any dry mix mix is placed into a stroage tray for feeding to the chooks once a week. The pupa will hatch into flies which cant fly for a few hours after hatching the finches pick off the young fly. If they get to fly off then the Jacs and crimsons usually pick them off on the wing. If anything that lasts that long goes to the chooks end of the week. Good system really

My maggott breeding seems to have hit a snag,after being able to breed heaps of maggotts they seem to have gone on strike.
The last two batches had no maggotts and just a heap of smelly bran, I thought that I may have had it too wet so the next lot of
bran went in drier, still no results, our weather has been a bit cooler but the box has a thermost that keeps it around 26/28 deg.
The number of flies is about the same as I have always put maggotts back to keep the cycle going.
Any ideas please ? It's not a good time for this to happen as there are young that were being fed, I've increased their mealworms
which hopefully will be ok until I sort out this problem.

Cheers Greg.

G'day Greg,
Funny you say that, i went through a period a few weeks back and then again just recently. After checking everything the first time I finaly clicked when I found the light on inside the box on a hot day, turns out the thermostat had been truned up and not turned down again so the culture was running at around 35C - flies went on strike.
The last few batches have also been very small and bran is as you say going fermented before enough flies get into it even though the box is at the right temp and food/water is provided to the thousands of flies in each box. I think in thhis occasions I use calf milk replacer instead of full cream milk powder and it is just not right for the flies.
I guess you need to cross check verythng your doing and check it again and work out if something has changed, and it wil most likely have in some subtle way.

Trilobite wrote:...I think in thhis occasions I use calf milk replacer instead of full cream milk powder and it is just not right for the flies....

I've been using calf milk replacer (Profelac Gold) for ages without any problems. There's some variable or combination of variables we've not nailed as I too have had times when production drops for no apparent reason.

Over/under supply of maggots....


which brings me to the question. Why not freeze them in? Easy and long term storage and a convenient way to have a back up supply.
All of Europe gives pinkies(maggots) in frozen form and i don't know anybody over there who gives them as "live" food.

All comes from suppliers and I suspect they have never ever seen a flybox over there.
Maybe something to do with the large (bird keeper) population and the question of supply and demand.

Not that we want to swap with them, do we? 150 million people with a 500 km radius of Amsterdam?

cheers


case

We feed quite alot of Bushfly Maggots and in the big aviary inparticular there are always left overs next morning.
In the past they were disposed of or used as new breeders,today they are simply dumped into a wide container in the shade near
a feed station and allowed to pupate and hatch I doubt if any ever get to actually take to the air.
I am amazed at how many birds particularly Parrot Finches, Saints and Cordons just sit on the container rim waiting for a feed.
Infact it at times is more popular than the tray of new offerrings.