Black soldier flies, are common at farms, the maggots eat manure(they are being used ot cut down on waste farm produce by nearly half, and they use the maggots to feeed the pigs. I'm not sure what the flies eat... I dont know of any way to breed them, I know that the guy who is selling them uses a grain food to raise them instead of manure.
the only problem i have noticed a couple times with my phoenix worms. i have been using them for 3 months and am finding undigested phoenix worm in his poop. i emailed Dr Shepard from phoenixworm.com and this is what he said What you are witnessing is an occurrence, not a problem. We have seen the posts on forums and asked our breeders about this. (Our breeders worked with Phoenix Worms for more than four years before we ever sold a cup of worms. They are the animal experts. My background is in entomology so insects are my specialty.) What we learned is that undigested insects/parts of insects are sometimes seen in the stool of reptiles and amphibians and this is normal. Not to be indelicate, but we humans sometimes experience something similar when we eat corn on the cob. Maybe it happens when animals gobble up worms that they relish and eat them a bit too fast. We're not sure, but it is really doesn't seem to be a problem. so just in case anyone has the problem. its not something that they consider bad...
I do not reccomend phoenix worms for leos. My geckos ate them, but only if they were starving and that was the last food item in their tank. The problems I had were the size and ability of my leos to digest them. I got larges and they were too small to get my leos attention. Also as mentioned in the post above there was ALWAYS undigested worm pieces in the stool, much more than I could be comfortable with. Not good regardless of what the guy at phoenix worms says. I do reccomend the phoenix worms for beardies tho. My friend has been using them for about 50% of his beardies insect diet and they just destroy them, they litterally go crazy to get to them. He has been feeding them for about 4-5 months.
Phoenix worms are my beardie's favorite food of all time. Buddy positively runs to me when he sees the black cup in my hand. Then he sits there with this expectant look on his face just before he digs in, and the worms are history. He never did that with silkies and I don't even bother with crickets anymore--just salads and phoenix worms. Unless you have a baby, though, you need to get the large size because the biggest ones are only about an inch long. BTW, my friend's leo loves phoenix worms, too, so I guess all animals have their preferences.
