A Detailed Guide to Raising Chickens with Fly Maggots, Methods and Key Points for Feeding Chickens with Fly Maggots
Why has fly maggot farming become relatively popular recently, and what can fly maggot farming be used for? In fact, the utilization value of fly maggots is especially great, because fly maggots have particularly high nutritional value, especially being rich in protein, and using them to raise chickens, ducks, geese and other animals is an especially good method.
Techniques for Raising Chickens with Fly Maggots
Fly maggot powder has a protein content as high as 60%, and its amino acids are balanced, making it the best feed protein source, equivalent to fishmeal. The maggots bred from one cage of flies, in the suitable temperatures of summer, can produce enough maggot protein to raise 5,000 pheasants; mixing 11.3% fly maggot powder into chicken feed can save 40% of feed and cut costs by more than half. The new techniques for using fly maggots to raise chickens have the following key points:
1. When using fly maggots to feed chicks, for 0-6 weeks of age add fresh maggots at 4 grams per chicken per day, for 7-12 weeks of age feed 8 grams, and after 13 weeks of age feed 10 grams. The crude protein content of the basal diet for chickens at 0-6 weeks of age is 19%, the crude protein content of the basal diet for chickens at 7-12 weeks of age is 15%, and the crude protein content of the basal diet for chickens after 13 weeks of age is 16%.
2. When using fresh maggots to feed chickens during the growth stage, every 1 kilogram of fresh maggots fed can increase the chicken's weight gain by 0.75 kilograms, advance the age at which the chickens start laying, and increase the chickens' total egg production over the whole period and the average egg weight.
3. Use 10% fly maggots and 10% fishmeal to feed laying hens separately, with the same basal diet. For chickens fed fly maggots, the laying rate is 20.3% higher than that of chickens fed fishmeal, the feed conversion efficiency rises by 15.8%, and the feed cost drops by 31.2%. Fresh maggots are directly scattered into the feeding trough or onto the ground, and fed twice a day.
What Are the Benefits of Raising Chickens with Fly Maggots
1. Supplementing protein
Animal feed is mainly composed of protein feed (such as fishmeal, soybean cake, silkworm pupae, etc.) and energy feed (such as corn, wheat, sorghum, etc.). Because traditional farmhouse raising of native chickens lacks protein feed, corn, wheat and other energy feeds are generally used for feeding, resulting in a serious lack of protein feed, an extremely low feed conversion rate for the chickens raised, and excessively high feed costs. Artificially farmed fly maggots and other insects are ideal cheap protein feed, and their protein content is very close to that of fishmeal. Using fly maggots as cheap animal protein feed for raising native chickens can completely greatly reduce feed costs, while also producing high-quality pollution-free products.
2. Improving production capacity
According to a report by Xing Dianquan of the vocational education group of Xiangshui Middle School in Wanzhou, Chongqing: using fresh fly maggots to feed chicks significantly speeds up growth and development, and can make laying hens start laying 1 month earlier; for every 1 kilogram of fresh maggots added, egg production increases by 0.75 kilograms, the laying rate can be raised by 10%-20%, and compared with the control group fed fishmeal, each chicken lays 1-1.5 kilograms more eggs per year. Using fresh maggots to feed broiler chickens, the weight gain rate is 70%-139% higher than that of the control group (fed an equal amount of fishmeal), and feed conversion efficiency increases. Adding 8%-10% fly maggot powder to the diet of laying hens raises the laying rate by 16%-18% compared with the control group fed the same amount of fishmeal.
3. Enhancing the chickens' disease resistance
According to relevant scientific testing, fly maggots contain abundant antimicrobial peptides. When used to raise animals, they can significantly improve the animals' immunity and achieve the effect of making them less prone to illness or even not getting ill at all. Using fly maggots and other maggots in chicken raising can increase the risk resistance of the farm and save a large amount of unnecessary medical expenses.
Raising and Breeding of Breeding Flies
Breeding flies should be kept in a fly room. The size of the breeding fly room is built according to need, and an old room can also be converted for use. Glass and screen windows are installed on the doors and windows to help regulate temperature, and fans are installed on the walls to regulate the air. Heating equipment should be provided in the room to keep the winter temperature at 20-23°C, and the relative humidity in the room should be kept at 60%-70%. Black cloth curtains are installed in the passageways to prevent the breeding flies from escaping. Racks are set up in the room, divided into 3 tiers: upper, middle and lower. The racks are made of iron or wood. On each tier, fly cages made of nylon mesh are placed. The cages are 100 cm long and 80 cm high. The breeding flies are kept and raised in the cages, with 12,000 breeding flies per cage. Each cage is fitted with a cloth sleeve for adding feed, adding water and collecting eggs. 12,000 adult flies are fed 20 grams of milk powder per day, and the feed is placed in a feed basin with a gauze pad surface, allowing the adult flies to stand on the gauze and feed.
The feed and water are changed once a day. Gauze is placed in the water basin, and wet wheat bran is placed in the egg-laying cage for the breeding flies to lay eggs. Eggs are collected once a day from the breeding fly cage and sent to the maggot room for maggot rearing. Breeding flies lay the most eggs from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. each day, so the egg collection time should be appropriate. Each batch of breeding flies is raised for 15-20 days and then culled. They are killed with hot water or steam, dried and ground into powder as livestock and poultry feed, and then a new batch is swapped in. While producing fly maggots, the fly maggots pupate, and there are 2 methods for obtaining new breeding flies. One is to let them pupate naturally and wash out the fly pupae with water; the other is, when the maggots have been raised for about 5-6 days and turn yellow, to take out the fly maggots to promote pupation.
Precautions for Raising Chickens with Fly Maggots
1. The total amount should preferably account for 20% of the feed, and not exceed 30%. If too much is eaten, the chickens eat maggots and excrete maggots, then eat them back again. The most frightening thing is that it may cause excess protein in the chickens, abdominal bloating and water accumulation, and sudden death.
2. Immature small fly maggots are not suitable for feeding to young chickens. It is not as people often say, “small maggots for young chickens, large maggots for large chickens.” This is because small maggots carry undigested bacteria in their bellies and also have bacteria on their bodies. Mature fly maggots no longer eat, and there is no black thread in their bellies. The mature fly maggots that have crawled out have also had the dirt on their bodies wiped clean.
3. Chickens with empty stomachs should first eat some other feed, and then be fed maggots, for a high utilization rate.
The editor has said so much about some of the benefits of raising chickens with fly maggots, so everyone must now know the role of fly maggots. In fact, the native chickens and native eggs that have always sold especially well are mainly fed fly maggots. Chickens that have eaten fly maggots are especially rich in nutrition and also taste more delicious.