ACCELERATING DECOMPOSITION RATE OF FRESH FAECAL MATERIALS FROM A FARROW-TO-FINISH SWINE FARM WITH BLACK SOLDIER FLY LARVAE (Hermetia illucens)

Abstract

There is need to generate  information required for the development of facilities for reducing  environmental pollution caused by careless dumping of raw faecal materials from swine production facilities into streams, channels, ponds and other water bodies in developing countries. The objectives of this work were to:(1) use a simple bio-decomposer to study the decomposition rate and waste reduction index (or efficiency of decomposition) of fresh solid  faecal materials obtained from a farrow- to- finish swine production unit when treated with Black Soldier Fly Larvae (BSFL) (2)  fit a regression curve with acceptable R-squared value to the  decomposition rate data generated in the study. With the use of the bio-decomposer, four batches of the Black Soldier Fly Larvae (BSFL) that developed from the hatched eggs were carefully collected and decanted from the faecal materials, after which they were weighed and mixed with four weighed samples of fresh solid swine faecal materials with three replications at an average inclusion rate of 94.3, 81.4, 61.4, and 59.04 gm of BSFL/kg of fresh solid swine faecal materials respectively in a Complete Randomized Design; the fifth sample of fresh solid faecal materials was used as the control. The average decomposition rates for the four samples treated at three treatment levels and control were 0.046, 0.041, 0.040, 0.040 and 0.0 kg/day, respectively translating to an average of 0.042 kg/day. These results depict a mean waste reduction index of 8.74 %/day indicating that high waste reduction efficiency has been obtained as attested to by the computed R-Squared value of   0.919. The fitted regression curve showed that the decomposition rate increased with increase in BSFL inclusion rate up to maximum limit of 42.85 g/day and inclusion rate of 63.27 g/kg for a 0.8 kg initial mass of fresh swine faecal materials. It was, therefore, concluded in the study that incorporation of BSFL is very effective for accelerated decomposition of fresh solid swine faecal materials from a farrow-to-finish production facility.