Machine-readable catalogs
Frass vs chicken-manure claims
We do not use a blanket claim that frass is always more concentrated than chicken manure. Our current supported wording is narrower: in specific trials, frass showed stronger nitrogen-use performance at tested rates.
Municipal waste-stream planning
Town-scale bank sizing needs feedstock generation rates, not only larval biology. Supported planning claims (see claims.json):
Household food waste (UNEP 2024)
Global average household food waste about 79 kg/person/year (~0.22 kg/person/day); upper-middle-income observed average about 88. Municipal ~0.5 kg/household/day BSF stream is a sorted fraction of that for a ~3-person home.
Restaurant food waste per day
Case studies commonly ~15–20 kg/restaurant/day (Riobamba, Ecuador ~18.5; Labuan Bajo ~15.5; NZ café+restaurant mix ~7.9 as a lower band).
Café spent coffee grounds per day
City of Sydney café survey implies about 10 kg wet SCG/café/day (5.1 kg dry × ~1.9); tourism-town café food waste about 5.6 kg/day.
Coffee pulp mass fraction
Wet-process pulp on the order of ~40–55% of fresh cherry mass; size mills from tonnes cherries × fraction, not a fixed town-wide kg/day.
Applied on the municipal design business-first rollout.
Larval bioconversion (planning)
Wet-mass bioconversion (fresh larval biomass ÷ wet substrate) commonly falls in about a 10–20% band on mixed kitchen-like diets, with mid values near ~15% (e.g. Liu et al. SCR–kitchen mixes peaking ~18.5%). Dry-matter conversion spans wider by substrate (~4–21% in Broeckx et al. side-stream trials). Use for sketches only—weigh local harvest ÷ feed. See the unit economics article and buckets vs climate trays (why open-air banks are the default).
Live larvae for laying hens (planning)
Live BSFL as a fresh-matter supplement at about 15–30% of expected daily feed intake (~15–38 g/hen/day in trials) did not impair egg quality; planning mid ~20 g live larvae/hen/day for flock-capacity sketches. Not a sole diet; ad libitum (~160 g/hen/day) is too high for default planning. Applied on unit economics and BSFL as chicken feed.
BSFL and Salmonella Gallinarum (broilers)
Broilers on complete feed with 1–3% (w/w) BSFL showed higher innate/adaptive markers and, after oral S. Gallinarum challenge, survival of 67% / 75% / 85% versus 50% on control feed, with lower tissue bacterial loads (Lee et al. 2018). Fowl-typhoid model—not a universal Salmonella vaccine. Full write-up: BSFL as chicken feed.
Functional compounds in poultry diets
Reviews treat Hermetia meal/oil as more than protein: chitin, lauric acid-rich fat, and insect antimicrobial peptides framed as gut/immune modulators at study-specific inclusions. Outcomes vary; use as context next to primary trials. See BSFL as chicken feed and BSFL fat profiles.
Larval fat remodeling (lauric)
BSFL biosynthesize medium-chain saturates—especially lauric (C12:0)—from dietary carbohydrates even when those acids are absent from the substrate. Larval fat is typically SFA- and lauric-dominated relative to plant-oil feeds; it is not a simple mirror of feedstock oil. Full write-up: BSFL fat profiles.
PUFA retention from diet
Larvae do not de novo synthesize PUFAs. Dietary linoleic, ALA, and long-chain n-3 are only partially bioaccumulated (linear slopes ~0.4–0.6 for several C16–C18 acids in oil-blend trials; diet PUFA ~7–69% compresses to larval ~6–37%). On flax-rich diets, prepupae held ~6% ALA of FA and metabolized on the order of two-thirds of that PUFA into saturates. See BSFL fat profiles.
PUFA into chicken feed
Substrate PUFAs reach poultry rations only after remodeling and inclusion dilution. Hermetia oil is often ~15% PUFA versus ~66% in soybean oil; replacing plant oil with HI fat raises product SFA and lowers PUFA (e.g. broiler breast PUFA ~37% → ~26% of FA). At ~1–3% meal inclusions, larval fat is a small slice of total dietary lipid. See BSFL fat profiles.
Boquete coffee-ground baseline
For spent coffee grounds (SCG), the working baseline is blend-and-ferment, not SCG-only feedstock. Current tracked claim: ~20% fermented SCG in mixed pulp showed strong efficiency in the cited trial.
Tank design and harvesting
Cross-cutting hardware guidance lives in Tank design. Supported claims include exit ramp angles (~28°–45° in the literature), prepupal self-harvest behavior, substrate moisture targets (~70–80%), leachate routing, stack ventilation, and sieve mesh sizes for manual harvest. Full claim records: claims.json.
- Prepupae self-harvest — mature larvae migrate out of wet beds when geometry allows (claims.json).
- Substrate moisture — planning band often ~70–80% wet basis; tune to colony, not a single lab number.
- Shade / photophobia — larvae avoid bright light; open-sided shade roofs beat sealed hot boxes.
- Leachate ≠ frass — drain liquid separately from solids; do not market leachate as frass tea.
- Stack ventilation — multi-tier racks need aisle airflow; stagnant heat kills performance.
- Rodent exclusion — facilities need physical exclusion, not hope.
- Sieve mesh — manual harvest mesh sizes are claim-tracked for operators who sieve rather than self-harvest only.
- Ramp / shell heat — dark metal in full sun overheats beds; shade and material choice matter.
Frass product claims
Product language for solids vs liquid lives in frass, frass tea, and leachate.
- Field rates (maize) — see Beesigamukama et al. 2020 mirrored PDF and claims.json.
- Vegetable rates (Benin) — see Santos et al. 2026 mirrored PDF and claims.json.
- “More concentrated than chicken manure” — status needs careful wording; see claim qualification in claims.json before promoting on landing copy.
Aerobic vs anaerobic house-fly context
The landing copy and the article BSF vs house flies distinguish a mostly aerobic microbial digestion flow (kept oxygenated in a healthy system) from more anaerobic, rotting waste conditions associated with house-fly breeding. This wording is currently marked needs-source until we mirror a specific primary study that directly supports it. Companion ops reading: BSFL and worm compost (wet flash → worm finishers).
Mirrored papers now hosted
- Beesigamukama et al. 2020 (Frontiers)
- Pazmiño-Palomino et al. 2022 (BDJ)
- Santos et al. 2026 (Frontiers)
- Eawag BSF Biowaste Processing Guide
For papers still marked link-only, see `host.status` and `host.note` in sources.json.