Three things people get wrong about my BFF
The black soldier fly doesn't smell, doesn't bite, and doesn't sting. Mo breaks down the three myths people lead with — and what's actually going on.
Anytime somebody finds out what I do for a living they have one of three faces and I know all three of them by now. So before you go and pull one of those faces let me clear the air on my BFF.
Number one: “ew, it smells.” No it doesn’t. The black soldier fly is odorless. They don’t even bring on any kind of apex on their body, so they don’t transmit germs either. Whatever bug you’re remembering from a dumpster behind a gas station, that’s not my BFF. My BFF is clean.
Number two: “I got bit by a black soldier fly.” This is a lie, and as a man of science I have to sit there and call you a liar in reverse. They don’t have mouths. They have small tongues, and that’s usually only to suck a little bit of moisture, because they’ve already eaten all the food they’re going to eat in their time as larva and pupa. By the time they’re flying around as adults, the eating is done. So whatever bit you wasn’t the soldier fly. Now they do have a very good grip on the edge of their appendages — that’s how they hold onto trees and leaves — and that grip feels different than other bugs. Different doesn’t mean bite.
Number three: “I got stung by one.” No stingers. None. So no.
I correct these myths because they’re not just wrong — they’re keeping people from looking at the animal long enough to see what it actually does. And what it does is incredible. Between the neonate stage and pupa, they will devour anything you put in front of them. Flesh, cartilage, gone. Down to the bone. They are quiet, odorless, mouthless little machines doing work that the planet needs done.
So next time, before the face — ask. You’re not talking about my BFF, thank you.
— Mo