EVO Conversion Systems - The Black Soldier Fly Company
  • Home
  • Blog
  • Consulting Services
  • Products
  • Consortium
  • About
    • Nature's Recycler
A Science Blog About

Black Soldier Fly

Looking for Artificial Lights for Adult Black Soldier Fly

3/28/2018

24 Comments

 
This should be an interesting post for most people. Looking out for artificial lighting for the BSF breeding has long been an effort in this industry, as an efficient light source can eliminate the variability caused by sunlight quality due to weather or seasonal changes, and thus secure a stable black soldier fly egg production. There are couple key studies in this field that I have to acknowledge for developing our final product of a high efficiency LED breeding lamp.

Tomberlin, J. K. and D. C. Sheppard (2002). "Factors influencing mating and oviposition of black soldier flies (Diptera: Stratiomyidae) in a colony." Journal of Entomological Science 37(4): 345-352.

--In this study the researchers mentioned they have tested 40-watt Sylvania Gro Lux light and 430-watt Pro Ultralight Light System, but neither of these lights had triggered mating nor unfertilized eggs were deposited, and by accessing direct sunlight successful mating was observed and fertilized eggs were collected. This suggested that sunlight are different than those two artificial lights and black soldier fly adults need direct sunlight for successful mating as well as for formation of fertilized eggs.

Zhang, J., et al. (2010). "An artificial light source influences mating and oviposition of black soldier flies, Hermetia illucens." Journal of Insect Science 10(202).

--The researchers in this studies tested a few dozen light sources and found quartz iodine lamp is working for the black soldier fly, at 60% efficiency compared to sunlight. The study suggested a wavelength range from 450-700nm is responsible for successful mating of black soldier fly adults. However hatching rate was not investigated in this study.

Oonincx, D., et al. (2016). "Photoreceptor spectral sensitivity of the compound eyes of black soldier fly (Hermetia illucens) informing the design of LED-based illumination to enhance indoor reproduction." Journal of insect physiology 95: 133-139.

--Unlike the previous studies, this one took another approach to find the effective light. The researchers identified three types of photoreceptor cells in the compound eye of BSF, which can be excited by UV, blue color, and green color lights, respectively. A LED made with this color mixture were proven to be able to trigger black soldier fly mating and producing fertilized eggs, though the study did not give out a fertilization rate, but it did indicate the fertilization rate is higher than using fluorescent lamps, which is barely emitting any light at the UV range.

Nakamura, S., et al. (2016). "Small-scale rearing of the black soldier fly, Hermetia illucens (Diptera: Stratiomyidae), in the laboratory: low-cost and year-round rearing." Applied Entomology and Zoology 51(1): 161-166.

--In this study a system composite with two 40-watt fluorescent lamps supplemented with a 20-watt LED with spectrum from 400-800nm triggered mating in small cages (20x23x35cm) and fertilized eggs were obtained. When compared with flies bred under sunlight, the eggs produced under the LED system has lower fertilization rate.
​
The study from Zhang et al. (2010) had profound influence in the Chinese BSF breeding industry, as most breeding centers I visited had installed some quartz iodine lamps as light supplement. Though I did not see any breeding center had this lamp used as sole lighting source, as the main lighting source is still sunlight. The lights are only turned on when it's cloudy outside, or during the winter as this light emits huge amount of heat and can also be used as heating source. However this lamp has a big disadvantage and that is the energy consumption--as at least 500-watt is needed and usually people will use the 2000-watt version.
Picture
Qaurtz iodine lamps are installed in most breeding facilities and will be turned on when it's cloudy outside. Though I have heard people complain it's not working other than providing heat, so during winter it's turned on for most of the day.
Picture
Farmers are using the quartz iodine lamp in many ways--some illuminate from the side, and some from the to; off course the results will be different. Generally if casting from overhead can provide better results.
The EVO Consortium has long been looking for more efficient lighting sources, and there are indeed many lamps we found that works and we have observed couple key phenomenons:
  1. Many lights work. For example, we have found many fluorescent type lamps from the market work for black soldier fly, with different color temperature, from 5500k to 7000k. Fluorescent lamps with different color temperature doesn't seem matter much for the mating.
  2. Some CFL/LED can trigger mating pair formation, though the mated females oviposited unfertilized eggs.
  3. Light power is important. For the same model of lights, if the 100-watt doesn't trigger any mating, sometime if you triple the power--the 300-watt version of this light source can stimulate mating.
  4. When using sunlight as light source, a consecutive cloudy days not only decreased the amount of eggs produced, but the hatching rate of these eggs decreased too.
Picture
Generally, any light appears to be white, orange, or red has fair amount of useless wavelengths for black soldier fly breeding
With the current known information, about 70% of the light in natural sunlight is useless for black soldier fly breeding. Though because sunlight is free for us to use, we wouldn't mind or care. However it will be a different story when this applies to artificial light source which is powered by electricity with a cost--no one wants to pay for energy used to produce useless lights. The less "useless light" the lamp produces, the more efficient it is, as long as this lamp covers all the lights needed by the black soldier fly.

​So how to improve the lighting? Based on our researches there are basically two approaches to find better light sources.

First approach is testing hundreds of lights from the market and find the best one for our BSF. The advantage of this approach is that you can usually find a lamp that's very cheap and working, the quartz iodine lamps for example, usually cost under $10 USD per piece. On the other hand, the disadvantage of this approach is also very obvious, using the iodine lamps as example again, around 80% of the energy were used to generated useless lights which resulted in extremely high operating cost.

​The second approach is to find out what lights does black soldier fly need for both mating stimulation and egg fertilization, then assemble the lights accordingly. The challenge of this approach is that we still know very little about how the light impact the black soldier fly physiology process that's responsible for mating success. Right now we only know what the black soldier fly compound eye can see, but potentially there are many more organisms that might be sensitive to the lights too, for example, the ocelli; the pigment cells on the body that make this insect black might be sensitive to the lights too, as we already know about human that even though we cannot see UV with our eyes, the UV helps us to produce substances such as vitamin D that's critical for our health.
Picture
Based on all the information obtained, we hypothesize that:
  1. Theoretically, all the lights can stimulate black soldier fly breeding if power is not a factor to consider. This means, given enough power, 2000-watt for example, many lights can become effective to the adult black soldier fly and for stimulating mating, but not necessarily egg fertilization; though higher the power it requires, the higher percentage of the energy was used for useless wavelengths, and thus less efficient.
  2. The mating pair formation does not mean a successful mating, as the light quality during the pair formation is also important for the fertilization to happen.
  3. Lights for black soldier fly adult is not just for them to be able to see each other--it's also a required and ongoing condition to trigger more complex physiology processes that helps egg fertilization.
Above are the experience we wanted to share with you of what we know about the artificial light for breeding black soldier fly. With an overall consideration, we decided to use LED technology to assemble the best light possible as of today. 
Picture



Purchase or learn more about this LED HERE
Author:
Spring Yang
EVO Conversion Systems
JM Green
24 Comments
Joe Wang
1/30/2019 10:39:47 am

Nice article and very useful!

Reply
Larry D. Hays link
1/1/2020 05:04:49 am

Send me A lamp Bulb that you believe would cause my Black Soldier Flies to mate Please send a price and availability also include Freight Thank You Larry Hays

Reply
Rodney Eugene Crittenden link
8/22/2021 02:58:32 am

The key is the temperature/humidity depending where you live 25 -28C. Then lighting the led full spectrum will work cost $50 Ebay. Oh yeah you get a lot of flys you get a lot of eggs. Third is the smelly substrate attracted. Add the signature scent to the get lot of eggs. Did you to it figured that out the black soldier fly larva pod scent?

Reply
Larvox Adam Kowalczyk
6/8/2020 02:54:21 pm

Hi, the light (150W) is really good. After few minutes flyies goes wild. I am waiting now for fertilized eggs. Thanks!

Reply
Sharon
11/29/2020 07:06:37 am

Which kind of 150w globe did you use? Does it matter if the room is not very dark? (There is some light from the windows sometimes)?

Reply
Larvox Adam Kowalczyk
11/30/2020 02:53:50 am

Hi, I use 150W from Evo. The lengh od the wave is crucial. You can also experiment with bulba for reptils. I observe that day light in summer at 10-14 oclock (I live on Poland) is OK too (flies copulate and lay fertilised eggs) but no as good as Evo light.
BR

FALOLA KAZEEM ADEKUNLE
9/28/2020 12:49:11 am

Pls I need the one that work for my BSF with short period

Reply
Ahmed
2/4/2021 11:38:30 pm

أربي هذة الذبابة وأريد المساعدة لشخصك

Reply
Anup tv
11/16/2020 09:41:03 am

Hi , I require a light to illuminate a 10 feet by 5 feet room
Location India Taminadu

Reply
Eleutherius Komba
12/28/2020 05:54:05 am

Hi
I live in Tanzania. I need a lighting system that make bsf mate and lay fertilised eggs throughout the year. Give price and freight to Dar Es Salaam Tanzania on courier service

Regards

E J Komba

Reply
Spring
12/28/2020 06:05:52 am

You can place the order from the website and the shipping cost will be calculated at checkout

Reply
Prashaanth
12/29/2020 03:29:19 am

We require a a LED light of EVO, is that available? Would appreciate if can have the price as well.

Reply
Ekwejunor-Etchie
12/29/2020 05:26:21 pm

What will it cost me to have this lamp for my bsf farm?

Reply
Gabriel Lima
7/19/2021 03:12:58 pm

do you ship to Brazil? zip code 40420260

Reply
Cristiano Alves dos Santos
9/24/2021 08:33:32 am

Olá Gabriel, estou na luta tbm para criar as BSF, me chama no zap 12 997385383.

Reply
Johnny ProszÄ™
8/31/2021 09:18:59 am

Hi, how may larvaes can I produce with one 150w light? Let's sat that I have a lot od adults in 3x3x2m room. Thanx!

Reply
Abdul Aziz
2/27/2022 07:43:39 am

I need full information for bag raeing

Reply
Adam adam
2/28/2022 01:40:54 am

You need to check Evo site. The 150 W lamps are good.

Reply
MckimmeCue link
4/18/2022 07:43:44 am

What an exquisite article! Your post is very helpful right now. Thank you for sharing this informative one.
If you are looking for coupon codes and deals just visit coupon plus deals dot com

Reply
Peter William
4/26/2022 02:52:57 am

I have read your post, it’s very informative and helpful too for readers. Thanks for sharing your knowledgeable content with us. I experienced 12v light bulbs for my home and in result, got appearance, safety and security. I recommend you to experience these <a href=”https://kingsoutdoorlighting.com/collections/outdoor-light-bulbs ”>12v light bulbs</a>.

Reply
Jay Dee
7/1/2022 02:29:03 pm

Regarding what Peter William wrote, are you or anyone else using the 12v led bulbs for their black soldier flies? I looked at the link he posted at the bottom of his comment and saw the different colored MR16 12 V bulbs and was wondering if a lamp with a red, green, and blue bulb in a container for the BSFs would do the trick for helping them reproduce and fertilize the eggs. If so, this would seem to be the cheapest and most energy efficient way to go. Thanks for all who answer this question.

Reply
Spring
7/2/2022 09:00:22 am

Some 12V LED works for a short period, as they have some unintended UV emitting at the beginning, but soon after this spectrum goes away the light will lost function for BSFL. This is a very common issue to many BSF lighting on the market.

Reply
Selva Prathap (EETA 6)
11/23/2022 11:27:24 am

Hi Evo, I am from India. Your product seems promising. How much is the cost for 200watts lamp. What is the minimum quantity order.

Reply
Jalil Sedna link
1/19/2023 12:54:58 am

Awesome read. very informative. I have tested over 10 types of lamps and each time got different results; none exceeded our expectations. I researched a lot and finally decided to order Evo Lights. Cause my main intention is to use LED lights solely as the light source. I will share the result when I get the lights in use.

Reply



Leave a Reply.

    Author

    Individuals with over 25 years research experience with the black soldier fly. We are passionate about the science behind the black soldier fly and its ability to convert waste to protein.


    ​Get Notified Here

    RSS Feed

    Subscribe

    Archives

    September 2022
    August 2021
    June 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    June 2020
    April 2020
    February 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017

    Categories

    All
    Author Dr. Heather Jordan
    Author Dr. Jeff Tomberlin
    Author-dr-jonathan-cammack
    Author Spring Yang
    News
    Science Paper Review

    Install an RSS app to get notified from us when a new post is up!

Services

Consulting

Support

Contact

About

About Us
Black Soldier Fly
Picture
Picture
© COPYRIGHT 2016. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
  • Home
  • Blog
  • Consulting Services
  • Products
  • Consortium
  • About
    • Nature's Recycler