[Ed]

This is one of the reasons I have been hesitant to breed fruit flies. I've been using flour beetles which my frogs love. Usually they eat the larvae though. I've watched them eat the beetles a couple times and spit them out. Maybe they taste bad or something? If you really hate the smell of the cultures there's an alternative. They're very easy to keep and no smell!

Flour beetles like many of the beetles in that family have a foul odor that is released when stressed. This is why most frogs refuse them.

Ed

 

[Ed]

Keep in mind that antifungals can also prevent growth or slow growth of yeast which allows other microbes to over grow the cullture.

Typically real foul odors early on in the cultures it is typically an overgrowth of some other bacteria, probably facultative anaerobes or anerobic bacteria (or groups of bacteria). Microwaving the cultures until hot and then seeding with live baker's yeast once the culture cools off will help prevent the colonization by those bacteria. If you are still having issues with smell then you can do one of several things, you can try cinnamon, honey or even mixing the above recipe 50/50 with real carolina mix or other medias.

The issues with black mold (Aspergillus niger) is a little more problematic as you can't use flies from those cultures to seed new cultures as that just transfers the spores (I would suggest discarding cultures, and not even opening them in the house), you also have to make sure that none of your collecting equipment or culturing equipment are contaminated. If you resterilize all of those and can use flies from a clean culture, you can eliminate most of the risk by microwaving the cultures and letting them cool covered.

Ed

 

[Ed]

what does the powdered sugar and paprika do?

paprika supplies beta carotene (which can be supplied less expensively through other sources), powdered sugar is a source of food for the yeast.

 

[Ed]

Man you must go through cinnamon like crazy if you use one cup of it

Not only that, he is creating toxic conditions in his cultures for both the yeast and the flies.. safrole a main flavoring agent in cinnamon is known to cause issues in flies (see for example ScienceDirect - Mutation Research/Genetic Toxicology and Environmental Mutagenesis : Genotoxic effects of eugenol, isoeugenol and safrole in the wing spot test of Drosophila melanogaster) as well as yeast.

If I remember correctly he already has had fliers show up in his culture....

There is little protien in that media and protien has been shown to be a limiting agent on fly production... so with out a decent source of protien along with high doses of a chemcial that is aproblem for the live yeast (which are the main protien source in that culture mi) makes me skeptical on the production that is being claimed much less that the flies being produced are the best they can be.

Ed

 

[Ed]

so are you saying he is using way too much Cinnamon? or is Cinnamon OK in smaller amounts?

Cinnamon appears to be okay in lesser amounts. I'm not sure I buy that the amount added in most cases is enough to function as an antifungal but it can help with odor particularly if you heat it to release the essential oils.

Ed

 

[Ed]

how would you go about heating the Cinnamon to release these oils?

Heat the media after it is added to the media either through using very hot water or microwave the cultures.. it is the same process that causes cinnamon to spell great whether it is in a chai mix or pumpkin bread.

Ed

 

[Ed]

not to keep going off subject, but i have seen/read where when adding room temp water to cultures and then adding boiling water to the cultures. so by going what you said about releasing the oils in the Cinnamon are you robbing/degrading the overall quality-production of the FF culture if you don't microwave or boil the water?

If you are using a supplement that has non-thermally stable antimite or antifungal additives it is possible that those products degrade but in general most of the medias are based on freeze dried potatos so I'm not sure why you would worry that the quality would degrade.

Ed

 

[Ed]

So heating the cinnamon will help with smell more than if left at room temperature? It sounds like I shouldn't be using so much cinnamon....
Also like I said, I'm 99% sure I had fliers in my culture because of the gap left open, but the culture I set up a while ago doesn't have any fliers and is doing great.

I also will be using bakers yeast from now on, and have used it n my last 2 cultures because I found out that my supermarket has some.

As noted with great frequency on the forum.. Baker's yeast doesn't substitute for brewer's/nutritional yeast and vice versa.

Ed

 

[Ed]

well ED I will admit I thought they were the same thing in the beginning when I 1st started doing research on FF cultures. maybe that's a common problem due to lack of research.

I would agree that it is a common problem due to a lack of research. Protein is a limiting factor in how many flies can be produced from a culture (and whether or not that it produces an optimized fly). Reports of massive fly production in mediia that lacks protien are highly suspect...

Ed

 

[Ed]

so is that the sole reason why brewers yiest is used for nutrition and protein?

correct brewer's or nutritional yeast is added to increase the protien content of the media which maximizes production, while live yeast/baker's yeast is added to reduce microbial colonization and speed up egg deposition by the flies.

Now there are factors that can affect this, for example if your flies are generally cultured from the flies that emerge first ("first boom"), then you are selecting flies that grow rapidly, do not use the media efficiently, and die, from the waste products after the first major emergence. This is what typically occurs when people are talking about a new culture crashing when the flies emerge. It used to be incorrectly attributed to too many flies emerging but we know better now (or should know better now).

Ed

 

[Ed]

i remember reading a thread on here and the jist of it said to use flies from a culture that is the newest. example if you have 2 cultures that you are going to make new cultures with . the 2 that you have to choose from are dated 8/26/11 and 9/4/11. which one do you choose so you don't get the flies that grow rapidly, do not use the media efficiently, and die, from the waste products after the first major emergence.

i think i might have used the later of the 2dates in previous months and had fresh cultures crash,,, is this true you think ED?

What you want to do is use flies from both cultures. As that keeps the genetic diversity of the fly populations. If you continually pull from the later cultures you are selecting for flies that take longer to develop. Ideally you want a more consistent production.

Ed

 

[Ed]

Don't want to hijack this thread but there is a lot of good info coming from it. Just wanted to know if adding your dusting materials to your ff culture would help gut load the flies with calcium, vitamins ect. or would it crash the culture. Is there any benefit I know I would get tired eating dusted food all the time.
Barry

First off, you do not want to mix supplements into your media.. unless you are looking for nutritional problems in your frogs and potentially issues with the cultures.

Fruit flies cannot be gut loaded with calcium as they are extremely efficient in excreting excess calcium as it is taken up in the diet see for example, Dube, K.A.; McDonald, D.G.; O’Donnell, M.J.; 2000; Calcium homeostasis in larval and adult Drosophila melanogaster; Archives of Insect Biochemistry and Physiology; 44(1) :27-39

In addition they do not uptake and absorb D3 or significant levels of vitamin A, but they do absorb significant levels of vitamin E (which is present in many supplements listed as tocopherols) enough that they can disrupt the absorbtion of D3 and/or A. See the discussion here http://www.dendroboard.com/forum/food-feeding/67766-repashy-superfly-26.html#post608267

They also have a very fast turn over of gut contents.. See tha above linked discussion above.

On top of that, if you are using a supplement that contains amino acids you can push the protien content of the media to the point the cultures do not do well.

Based on the data available, I can't think of a good reason to add old supplements to the fruit fly cultures.

Ed

 

[Ed]

I also find that using vitamin fortified Orange juice instead of water lets you cut out a number of other ingredients. All I use is OJ, potato flakes, yeast, and cinnamon. I'm not that careful about proportions (enough cinnamon to discolor the tube of potato flakes and I add a pinch of yeast to the warm OJ) and just aim for a thick pudding consistency. A good culture smells bready. I get the occasional nasty smelling one which I usually attribute to a container that has reached the end of its useful life. (I'll let an old culture dry out and reuse the container indefinitely.)

Luke

I am greatly dubious that the vitamin fortification has anything to do with how the cultures perform.... see the above linked discussions on supplements as it doesn't follow the repeated and consistent reports in the diet studies on the flies..

Ed

 

[Ed]

In the main, you would simply be bumping up the sugar content. This is going to shift the balance of protien and sugar and will change the microbial fauna (keep in mind that the cultures is effectively an uncontrolled bioreactor) and potentially decrease the nutrients available to the fly.

There has been a lot of testing over the last 100 plus years on determining what provides the best culture media for the flies.. we are highly unlikely to find something of value by simply throwing stuff at the wall. There are in reality very few tweaks that can be made to improve the nutrition of the flies in a way that it carries over to the frogs. In the main, the inclusion of more carotenoids is probably the only one..

Ed

 

[Ed]

To repeat this once again..
Production does not equate to a good fly. Production does not automatically mean that the flies are using the media well. See for example the discussion here http://www.dendroboard.com/forum/food-feeding/33951-complete-fruit-fly-media-mix.html#post305957

If you are looking for maximal production you may getting away from the best fly as adding more sugar changes the protien level of the media which affects the nutrition of the fly.

Ed

 

[Ed]

Typically this is best accomplished by not using only the first groups of flies to emerge to start new cultures and including at least some carotenoids to allow for the conversion to rhodopsin in the eyes of the flies. Smaller or stunted flies that appear later are smaller due to inadequate nutrition in the cultures but they are often a bridge to large flies. In those cases, ideally make sure to use top quality supplements.

Ed

 

[Ed]

Yes, there are many different methods to add the required carotenoids to the flies so they can convert it to rhodopsin and sweet potatos are one method. I have been adding spirulina to the dry media for quite a while now for the same reason.

Ed

 

[Ed]

i have been wanting to use spirulina for some time now for human consumption, who/where do you get it from--im sure there are different versions out there?

\

I actually get it from bulkfoods.com as I only used 1 tablespoon per cup of dry media (before water is added) but you have to know the protien content of your media. If your already using a media with a high protien level then you may have issues when you add the spirulina. I'm moving to the Repashy Superfly from my old modified Carolina mix.

Ed

 

[Ed]

so are you going to use spirulina in the repashy superfly then?

No. It was the source of the additional carotenoids in the modified carolina mix I was using. If you use the Repashy media, there isn't a need to add any additional carotenoids.

Ed