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Fruit Fly Media/ Makes 10 cups

Supplies: Fruit fly mix to make a culture for fruit flies

Use our fruit fly media to create your own fruit fly cultures. Add 3/4 cup of our media with 1/3 cup of distilled white vinegar add up to 1/4 cup of hot water to a 32oz deli cup mix to a apple sauce consistency.

Cover and allow to cool Add 60-80 fruit flies and excelsior or 2-3 folded coffee cup filters.

Melanogaster take 12-14 days to breed and produce

Hydei take 16-18 days to produce.

Discard cultures after 30 days to prevent mite contamination.

When making new cultures, dust flies in calcium and or vitamins (more on that later) and use the top 20% to make new cultures. Helps prevent mites spreading as they may be more prevalent towards the bottom of the culture. Mites will be likely to fall off flies coated with calcium powder.

Every week produce a fresh batch of cultures. If you only need 2 cultures, produce a set of 2 cultures every week. In a given month you will have 2 weeks of cultures that are yet to produce files and 2 weeks worth of cultures that are producing flies.

A culture only lasts for a month (30 days) from when its made. Most experiences dart keepers produce two or more cultures a week to have a backup and extra flies. If your culture begins to mold, add a little more vinegar even with flies present. If your cultures appear to too runny (watery), add less water next time or use vented lids (cloth versus plastic lids with holes). If cultures are drying out use lids with holes versus the vented cloth lids. Never use solid lids or your flies will suffocate. Room/ home humidity levels will affect culture moisture so adjust the amount of your water that you add to your cultures accordingly. Note, we do not recommend using Apple Cider Vinegar. Comparatively versus distilled white vinegar although it has a high nutrient load it has less volume of actual vinegar capable of fighting mold. Since it has a high nutrient load it will actually provide more nutrients for mold to grow. In controlled tests up to 1/8 cup of apple cider vinegar we found fungal spores thrive and spread in cultures. Comparatively at 1/8 cup of distilled white vinegar we had not spores survive within the first 7 days of culturing and direct introduction of spores.

Toss out every 30 days! After 30 days toss out the culture. After a months time you are likely to will start generating more mites than flies! You can freeze your culture for several days to eliminate anything remaining in the culture and dump out the contents in the trash. This is recommended as you do not want living fruit flies to be introduced into your community by means of your garbage can. (Its also illegal as well to release any non-native insect or animal into the community.) Note, you can also wash your deli cup after freezing. You can easily discarding the frozen media contents and reuse the cup and lid. Vented fabric lids will need to be replaced every so often. Just rinse cups then soak cups and lids in hot water. Ideally use vinegar or 5% bleach to water solution. Using vinegar or bleach is best to kill any residual bacteria or fungi. Soap is an option, but do not use together with vinegar or bleach. Allow to air dry.



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Price: $10.00

Product Code: FRUITFLYMEDIA






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