Fruit Fly's from PetSmart

[skronkykong]

I picked up a few tubes of hydei from the local Pet Smart for about $5 each. I didn't have my hopes up but I must say I'm pleasantly suprised at how well they are doing. With the foam lids and shape of the containor tapping in ff's is effortless with no escapes. The food media is blue and barely smells of vinegar with no mold yet (few weeks old). And its on the second generation with plenty of food left. I'm thinking I can get at least three generations out of each tube. I've read that culturing hydei can be tricky but it hasn't for me (yet).

My only complaint is that the tubes are rather small so there is a lot of crowding and waste build up. I've been tapping some into a jar with homemade media to keep sex ratios and start my own cultures.

[Curt61]

Hey, yes I enjoyed those tubes also, but I bought them from a online company, I tried putting my own media into it and it has molded twice, so I gave up on those. Medias seem to just stop producing instead of running out for me, make sure you have at least 2 of your own cultures set up from the flies you got out of your tubes. Just so you don't loose them all to mold or mites. Just so you won't have to go back to petco to get another tube or 2.


Curt.

[DartMan]

I've never had any luck with those cultures. I've bought them on two seperate ocassions where my cultures crashed or I just mis-judged my rotations for creating new cultures.

You might try starting a whole new culture, like a 32 oz. deli container, using 2 vials of those type.