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Culturing Fruit Flies
Tranquility Base wrote:
I have been working on a recipe for culturing fruit flies
from instant mashed potatoes for about a year now with limited success.
Hey TB,
I have been using a recipe for a while now, which uses instant potatoes. The
results are actually pretty good. I only need about 6 flies to start a thriving
culture. I found the recipe off of an excellent web site for every fish related
topic. It consists of:
1/2 cup instant mashed potatoes
1/2 table spoon of sugar
mix together
fill sterilized container with approximately 1" of above mixture
fill with water up to the top of the mixture (I usually add a little extra, not
too much standing water though).
Now add just a small pinch of dry yeast granules on the top of the media.
Add flies and cap the top of the container with some sort of sponge. (I use a
regular sponge that is used for washing the car only $.99, brand new of course
:) I also boil the sponge for about 10 minutes, just to be on the safe side.
If the mixture gets to dry I just add a little more water when needed.
If done in a large container the culture can get pretty large, too large at
times.
The best media I have found to date was by accident. I was cleaning my tanks and
replacing filter and pre-filter cartridges, when I threw away my Hagen
pre-filter pad. I then continued to clean out my fly cultures waste (dead
carcasses, empty shell, etc.) into the same waste basket. I tied the bag closed
and left it. Not realizing what could happen, I left it there for about a week.
To my suprise, when I came home one day I started noticing little black things
running all over the place. When I took a closer look I realized what they were.
Not realizing where they were coming from I continued my investigation. When I
found the source ( the waste basket ) I was shocked to see hundreds of flies
still trapped in the bag. To make a long story short, I collected over 200 flies
in the next two days alone. The culture was tapped out after about 5 days of
heavy feedings to all tanks.
If anybody has any other media types that will boost fruit fly cultures please
share.
Also, any tips on boosting an indoor daphnia cultures.
Thanks,
Tommy G.
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