#insect farms

[wachinyeya]

Insect Farm Hatches Plan for Greener Animal Feed for Chickens and Pigs https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/insect-farm-hatches-plan-for-greener-animal-feed-for-chickens-and-pigs/

[biblenewsprophecy]

[389]

by Sergiy Barchuk

[ireton]

Insects in your food and it's not labelled.

[textless]

[todaysbird]

anybody here who farms insects for human consumption and would be willing to participate in a interview for a (positive) article around insect farming? please dm me with your email and i’ll reach out!

[incorrect-hs-quotes]

JOHN: why do they always show cranberries in those big pits and it's implied it's wet and possibly swimmable. do cranberries really grow like that. what.

ROSE: You've never heard of The Bog?

JOHN: th. the what?

ROSE: Hm. I forget some people don't understand New England.

JOHN: each additional comment you add makes my blood run cold.

ROSE: Well, then, yes, cranberries grow in large clumps called bogs. Once they're ripe, the bog is flooded and the cranberries are harvested, basically by using big floating nets to round them all up and scooping them out of the water.

JOHN: ok thank you. i hate it a little less. the horrible little man in my head is still screaming "BOG BODY BOG BODY BOG BODY", but i appreciate the education.

ROSE: Additionally, you don't just flood the bog and then go around it in a boat, or whatever. No, you use hip waders to get in there and put the big floating nets where they go and get all the berries and such.

ROSE: And many cranberry farms opt for organic or sustainable pest control methods, one of which is encouraging wolf spiders to live in the cranberry field and eat the bugs to keep insect damage down.

JOHN: wait.

ROSE: And, well, when you're in the bog in hip waders, that makes you the tallest thing. Wolf spiders can swim a bit, but they don't like it, so they are, quite understandably, looking to climb out of the water onto a tall thing. So you will probably have, like, a hundred wolf spiders trying to climb your eyebrows. You have to be chill, though, because the spiders are also employees.

ROSE: If you ever want to go wading in a cranberry bog, just make sure you're cool with spiders.

JOHN: ...i want you to know, really truly know, that "make sure you're cool with spiders" is not a specific enough statement for that situation.

[nostalblue]

おおしおからとんぼ

中型で独特の青白い色をしたトンボを子供の頃から「シオカラトンボ」と一括りに呼んできたが、当地に初夏の頃から現れる写真のトンボは「オオシオカラトンボ」であるらしい。「シオヤトンボ」を含め、これら３種類はとてもよく似ている。

このトンボ、自分の留まりたい場所があるようで、農作業のため近づいた私に警戒して一旦は飛び立つも、しばらくすると戻ってきてまた同じ場所に留まっている。そのうちこちらへの警戒も緩み、近接の撮影も可能になった。別に彼のためにやったわけではないが、私が引いたトラロープを気に入ってくれたようでちょっと嬉しい。いずれにしてもトンボの類は蚊や蛾などの害虫を食らってくれるので当地では大歓迎だ。

黄色いのは別の種類だと思い込んでいたけど、これオオシオカラトンボの雌だった。雄も羽化した時は黄色だが、成長につれて青白くなるらしい。

屋外の洗い場排水が流れ込む水溜まりで、雌がホバリングしながら水面に尾の先を何度も叩きつけ産卵をしていた。ただ残念ながらそこは半日もすれば干上がり、一生懸命産んでくれたのに全て無駄になっちゃうな。何か凄く申し訳ない気持ち。

[avoiltaire]

KID FOR MOVIE 27!!!!

[admiralgiggles]

I’ll follow the sun

[probablyasocialecologist]

Insects are eaten in 128 countries, according to a study published this year in the journal Scientific Reports, which found 2,205 species are eaten worldwide. Most of these species are in Asian countries, followed by Mexico, and African countries. In Thailand, India, the Democratic Republic of Congo and China hundreds of species of insect are consumed, with Brazil, Japan and Cameroon each eating 100 or more species. Singaporean chefs will be able to import many creative insect recipes from around the world, where they are served deep fried, on sticks, in noodles, in margaritas, in arancini, tinned, or confit. Insect products are sold round the world in restaurants, markets, supermarkets and from vending machines. The EU is in the process of approving more insects as what it calls a “novel food source”, but to date it has approved only four. Australiahas only approved three species – a cricket and two kinds of mealworm – so far as “non-novel, non-traditional” food sources.

[...]

Why does the UN want us to eat insects? Because it is crunch time climate-wise, and insects are a much more sustainable source of protein than livestock. They have a high “conversion rate”, which means they are efficient at turning plant energy into protein, or in other words, turning what they eat into their own bodies. “Crickets need six times less feed than cattle, four times less than sheep, and twice less than pigs and broiler chickens to produce the same amount of protein,” according to the FAO. They can also be farmed indoors, use less space and water, and produce lower emissions. Because they can be farmed in rural and urban areas in relatively small rooms, they can also be a source of income for people who have less access to land or the training needed to farm livestock.

10 July 2024

[blinkees]

hii!! I have a small question :3

could you make any themed blinkies ? My friend has a rlly big hyperfixation on ants and I thought it would b cool to have some made for them!

any pictures or small little pixels of ants work!! And I was thinking words like “silly zee” or “zilly zeke” could go on it orrr “ants!!!” “Ants :3” etc! It’s alright if you don’t

Tysm!

[puppyguppy]

You cough and wave dust away from your face, eyes watering as you fish for the folded up letter you’d previously shoved into your back pocket. The man that’d picked you up from the bus stop was kind, but you couldn’t tell which was older; him, or the spluttering truck he drove. It made for difficult, hardly held conversation. Not because you’re shy or weren’t curious, but because the truck had been loud, and the man a bit hard of hearing. He’d had a warm smile as he waved goodbye to you though, tinged with a little red. However, before you could ask, or even so much as thank the guy, his truck was off down the road, kicking up dirt.

His barely held together tailgate read, in bold but faded white letters, “Plus Ultra!” When you can see and breathe clearly again, you unfold the paper in your hands and double check the address you’d been given. You’d been to the property before, of course, but a long, long time ago. Honestly, it felt like a lifetime ago – your childhood. Even then, you can’t really remember the place beyond a couple of random, core memories. Like falling asleep on both the way there and the way back, safe and comfortable, lulled unconscious by the quiet conversation of your parents and the rhythmic rocking of the car. You could’ve made more memories there – here. You’d been invited well into your teen years, for holidays and summer breaks and special occasions. And it’s not that you didn’t love your aunt, the one who used to live here; her and her ‘best friend’ though everyone in the family knew better. You still love her, love them. Hard not to with just how crazy they could be – like the two of them buying a farm out in the middle of nowhere, and thinking they could keep up with it. They’d done surprisingly well, up until randomly deciding to travel the world before permanently settling down. You’re pretty sure they eloped. You’re like, ninety-nine percent positive that they’re currently on their honeymoon. Just best friend things. You probably could’ve been closer to them, if you’d just given them the chance. But, you were young. You had classes and friends and hobbies at the time that you’d just considered too cool to pass up. Now all gone, for one reason or another, which is why you’re even here. Why you’d reached out to your aunt in the first place. It was the perfect opportunity. They’d more or less left the property abandoned, and you were in desperate need of an escape. A reset. That all depends on that more or less, though. Apparently, your aunt had hired a farmhand at some point. And, said farmhand still lived there. Here. Not in the house or anything, but in his own little trailer, supposedly. Parked somewhere rather permanently on the property. In the letter, your aunt had described him as ‘a bit standoffish’ but with ‘a heart of gold’. Then followed that up by saying that if you didn’t like him, well. ‘Tough shit. Leave.’ Whether you liked him or not didn’t really matter. You didn’t come here to make friends. You didn’t come here to get to know anyone else other than yourself. So, you figure, as long as he stays out of your way, you’ll do your best to stay out of his. Which… Ends up being almost eerily easy.

[cognitivejustice]

That is because farmers would spray insecticides multiple times a season to kill heliothis, or cotton bollworm, which is the crop's major yield-reducing pest.

Now the thousands of white bolls at his farm at Cecil Plains, 80 kilometres west of Toowoomba, are swarming with spiders of many sizes and colours and keeping other damaging insects in check.

'Frogs all over the place'

"We knew how the very dark days of cotton growing looked like, with up to 20 insecticide sprays per season," Mr Roellgen said.

Last year, for the first time, he did not apply any insecticides on his cotton.

"We have green tree frogs all over the place now, around the sheds and houses, which we never, ever used to have in the past, and I firmly believe that that is a secondary impact of having more insects around and having less pesticides in the environment," Mr Roellgen said.

The industry's progress in this area and other others, including water use have been revealed in the latest independent review of the sector's environmental performance.

"As the years have gone on I think we can really be proud of the advancements we've made, [but there are] still some areas that we need to tighten up."

[jahtheexplorer]

Spotted lanternfly

Hated by farmers, these little bugs are invasive planthoppers that came in a shipment from China in the 2012. Now they are everywhere. This one right here, was very photogenic.

Picture taken in the John Heinz wildlife refuge

[todaysbird]

a few people showed interest when i mentioned this piece, so here it is now that it’s published - thank you to the Barn Raiser for commissioning me to write this piece on insect farming & its environmental impact!