Making Food From Flies (It's Not That Icky)
In the quirky little college town of Yellow Springs, Ohio, home to many unconventional ideas over the years, there's now a small insect factory.
It's an unassuming operation, a generic boxy building in a small industrial park. It took me a while even to find a sign with the company's name: EnviroFlight. But its goal is grand: The people at EnviroFlight are hoping that their insects will help our planet grow more food while conserving land and water.
They don't expect you to eat insects. (Sure, Asians and Africans do it, but Americans are finicky.) The idea is, farmed insects will become food for fish or pigs.
It all starts in a small greenhouse. "This is where we propagate our species," says Glen Courtright, EnviroFlight's founder. "Sometimes we call this the Love Shack."
I see rows of tall, cylinder-shaped cages. Flying around inside them, or sitting on the mesh walls, are some black insects that look a little like wasps.
Actually, they're flies: black soldier flies.
These flies live all over the American South, but they rarely bother people, and they don't spread disease. The adults are shy creatures. They can't bite. They can't eat (they live off the stored energy that they built up as larvae). All they really do is mate and lay eggs. That's what they're doing in these cages.
The eggs turn into hatchlings that are so tiny they look like dust. But in EnviroFlight's nursery, they grow a mass of wriggling larvae. Kimberly Wildman keeps them in stacks of plastic trays or buckets.
"If I were to feed them, it would feel like the bucket was practically melting," she says. "They give off that much heat."
The larvae are insatiable eaters. They can consume twice their weight each day, turning it into protein and fat.
Glen Courtright, EnviroFlight's founder, is pictured with a machine that harvests the larvae, separating them from waste products.
They'll eat almost anything, which is the key to Courtright's business plan. These larvae are some of the world's great waste recyclers. "We make stuff go away!" he says.
Right now, most of the larvae here are feeding on waste from an ethanol plant. They're also happy to eat brewer's grain, which is left over from the beer-making process.
Scraps from a chicken nugget plant work even better, Courtright says. Such factories put out millions of pounds of chicken bits, breadcrumbs and oily sludge every year.
But it's possible to look at these larvae and dream even bigger. Think of slaughterhouses, for instance. Americans only eat 50 percent of a cow or a hog. The rest of the animal goes to industrial rendering plants, which turn that waste into a variety of products, including "processed animal protein" that's fed, in turn, to animals.
But black soldier fly larvae could consume that waste, too, without using nearly as much energy as rendering plants, Courtright says. He shows me a new experiment: He's turning the larvae loose on some leftover bits of chicken. "The bugs consume this material. Probably 90 percent of the material is consumed, and all that's left is a little bit of bone and sinew and fur."
No matter what they eat, the insect larvae in this building grow fat â and then they go into a commercial oven.
Courtright opens the door of the oven and pulls out a tray. "So what we have here is cooked, dehydrated, insect larvae," he says. "It kind of tastes like a savory cracker without salt. You want to taste them?"
I pass. Courtright pops a handful into his mouth. "Not bad!" he says with a grin.
Honestly, though, Courtright has no ambitions to sell snack food. He wants to turn cooked larvae into animal feed. The protein is just what young pigs need. Ground-up larvae also could replace some of the fish meal that's currently used to feed farmed salmon or trout. Right now, that meal is manufactured from sardines, anchovies and menhaden that are scooped from the ocean in massive quantities. But that source of fish meal is limited.
The way Courtright sees it, black soldier fly larvae could solve two enormous global problems at once: the waste problem and the food supply problem.
Actually, he's not the first to think of this. Craig Sheppard, an insect specialist at the University of Georgia, now retired, has been doing experiments with black soldier flies for a couple of decades now.
He's turned the little larvae loose on animal manure â they clean it up quite nicely. And over the years, he and his colleagues have talked to some companies about how to turn this into a profitable business.
Cooked, dehydrated larvae of the black soldier fly can be processed into feed for fish or pigs.
There were times, he says, when the idea seemed ready to take off. "The guys [from potential investors] would come down here and get real excited. They'd look at our production, and we'd say how we could ramp it up, and they would be walking away just grinning and high-fiving, like 'We gotta do this!' " And then they'd go home and talk to the higher-ups. And I could just imagine the conversation: 'Maggots? Really?' And they'd back off!"
Sheppard suspects that the idea seemed just a little too weird. You could be laughed at for trying it.
But there now are quite a few projects around the world that have picked up on this idea. People are trying it in South Africa, Canada and Indonesia.
What's changed is the demand for animal feed. Fish meal prices have gone through the roof. Feed for pigs is more expensive, too. Across the world, there's competition for land, crops and food.
Courtright expects that competition to grow. "We have a protein deficit. We have 7 billion people on the planet, heading for 9. We don't know how we'll feed them," he says.
So maybe, someday, black soldier fly factories will dot the landscape.
Courtright is talking to some big companies, working on deals to build the very first one. Maybe this time, the higher-ups won't say: "Maggots? Really?"
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Transcript
AUDIE CORNISH, HOST:
From NPR News, this is ALL THINGS CONSIDERED. I'm Audie Cornish.
ROBERT SIEGEL, HOST:
And I'm Robert Siegel. One of the great challenges facing our world is how to grow more food without using up the planet's land and water. And one of the most innovative solutions involves insects. Not our eating insects. The idea is farming insects that would become feed for fish or for pigs. NPR's Dan Charles explains how it works.
DAN CHARLES, BYLINE: In the quirky little college town of Yellow Springs, Ohio, home to many unconventional ideas over the years, there's now a small insect factory. It's a generic boxy building in The Millworks, a miniature industrial park. You have to search to find the company's sign. It says, Enviroflight.
GLEN COURTRIGHT: At least it's not Bug Tech.
CHARLES: That's the man who set up this company, Glen Courtright. Our tour starts with a small greenhouse.
COURTRIGHT: Well, this is where we propagate our species. Sometimes we call this the Love Shack.
CHARLES: I see rows of tall cages. And flying around inside them, or sitting on the walls, are some black insects that look a little like wasps. Actually, they're flies - black soldier flies. These flies live all over the American South, but they rarely bother people. Adult soldier flies are shy creatures. They can't bite. They can't eat. All they really do is reproduce and that's what they're supposed to be doing here.
COURTRIGHT: And, in fact, you could look here in this one.
CHARLES: Right here?
COURTRIGHT: They're kind of tail to tail. They're mating. So for us, that's money in the bank.
CHARLES: Females then lay eggs and eggs turn into tiny hatchlings. They look like dust at first. In the nursery, they grow a mass of wriggling larvae. Enviroflight's Kimberly Wildman keeps them in stacks of shallow buckets.
KIMBERLY WILDMAN: If I was to feed them, this would feel like the bucket was practically melting.
CHARLES: Really?
WILDMAN: Yes.
CHARLES: They give off that much heat?
WILDMAN: They give off that much heat.
CHARLES: And they eat like crazy, twice their weight every day, turning it into high quality protein. These larvae will eat almost anything and this is the key to Glen Courtright's business. These black soldier fly larvae are the world's greatest waste recyclers.
COURTRIGHT: We make stuff go away.
CHARLES: Right now, his building is full of larvae feeding on waste from an ethanol plant. He's always fed them brewer's grain, what's left over from making beer. Even better, he says, will be the scraps from a chicken nugget plant. These factories put out millions of pounds of chicken bits, bread crumbs and oily sludge every year.
Or dream even bigger. Think of slaughterhouses. Americans only eat 50 percent of a cow or a hog. The rest goes to industrial rendering plants. But black soldier fly larvae could happily eat that, too. Courtright shows me a new experiment. He's turning the larvae loose on some leftover bits of chicken.
COURTRIGHT: The bugs consume the material. Probably 90 percent of the material is consumed, and all that's left is a little bit of bone and sinew and fur.
CHARLES: Whatever they eat, all the insect larvae in this building grow fat and then they go into a commercial oven.
COURTRIGHT: So what we have here is cooked, dehydrated, insect larvae. And it kind of tastes like a savory cracker without salt. They're not bad.
CHARLES: You've tasted them?
COURTRIGHT: Oh, yeah, I've tasted them. You want to taste them?
CHARLES: No, not really.
COURTRIGHT: Okay, here, I will.
CHARLES: He pops a handful of them into his mouth.
COURTRIGHT: Not bad.
CHARLES: Honestly, though, Courtright has no ambitions to sell snack food. The goal here is to turn these larvae into animal feed. This protein is just what young piglets need, for instance. The ground-up larvae also could replace some of the fish meal that's used to feed salmon or trout. Right now, that fishmeal is manufactured from sardines and anchovies and menhaden.
COURTRIGHT: We have ships that are just sucking these fish out of the ocean.
CHARLES: Basically, the way Courtright sees it, these larvae solve two enormous problems at once: the waste problem and the food supply problem. Now this is not a totally new idea. Craig Sheppard, an insect specialist now retired from the University of Georgia, has been doing experiments with black soldier flies for a couple of decades now.
He's turned the little larvae loose on animal manure. They clean it up quite nicely. And over the years, he and his colleagues have talked to some companies about how to turn this into a real business.
CRAIG SHEPPARD: The guys would come down here and get real excited. They'd look at our production, and we'd say how we could ramp it up, and they would be walking away just grinning and high-fiving, like yeah, we gotta do this. And then they'd go home and talk to the higher-ups. And I just can imagine the conversation being like, well, you know, maggots? Really? And they'd back off.
CHARLES: Maybe it seemed just a little too weird. Something you'd be laughed at for trying. But a number of people, not just Glen Courtright, are picking up this idea again. What's changed is the demand for animal feed. Fish meal prices have gone through the roof. Feed for pigs is more expensive, too. Across the world, there's competition for land, for crops, for food.
Courtright thinks that competition will only grow.
COURTRIGHT: We have a protein deficit. And we have 7 billion people on the planet, we're heading for nine. We don't know how we'll feed them.
CHARLES: So maybe, someday, black soldier fly factories will dot the landscape. Courtright is talking to some big companies, working on deals to build the very first one. Maybe this time, the higher-ups won't say: Maggots? Really? Dan Charles, NPR News. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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