[antoniolugo]

I saw this Fruit Fly Links Obesity and Heart Disease - Softpedia and thought that if you increase the calories in the fruit fly media with fat, you could make them a treat for frogs that are going to lay eggs or to stimulate reproduction on females.

Again this is just a thought, I just saw this and really dont know if it would be a good idea.

I did an experiment to see if I would get the same fruit fly production by adding a teaspoon of olive oil to the media when I was preparing it and looks ok. I think Im getting close to same or same production and I also noticed that the media decomposes or gets consumed a little slower. The fruit flies seem to look the same, not bigger, not smaller, but the fat content on them could have increased, but I dont have any equipment to measure that.

What do you think? Its a good idea or its just a waste of time and could harm my frogs?

 

[Pumilo]

This sounds like a post for...Look! There he is! Up in the sky! It's a bird! It's a plane! It's...Ed!
Interesting experiment. I look forward to Ed's comments.

 

[antoniolugo]

This sounds like a post for...Look! There he is! Up in the sky! It's a bird! It's a plane! It's...Ed!
Interesting experiment. I look forward to Ed's comments.

Lol! well lets wait for him and see what he thinks about this.

I saw the post about the dog food and the vitamin E issue that accumulates in fruit flies and this makes the vitamin dust to not be absorbed properly by the frogs. But I dont know if olive oil or coconut oil will have the same vitamin E content as the dog food.

 

[Pumilo]

That is regarding a specific type of Vitamin E called Tocopherols. It might not apply here. Don't know.

 

[Rain_Frog]

I think I once added vegetable oil to my fruit fly cultures and it drastically lowered production.

 

[antoniolugo]

I think I once added vegetable oil to my fruit fly cultures and it drastically lowered production.

How much did you add?
I did one culture with alot of olive oil in it, like 3 tablespoons just to see what happens. I got some production going, but its slower and it lower the production. Also the media is consumed very very slow.

I made another one with just a teaspoon and I dont see the production being affected too much if it is being affected. I think it helps aswell for mold and fungus and I think it holds more moisture.

 

[Ed]

I think this helps with the answer http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/jf990993o

Most of the cooking oils on the market have moderate to high levels of tocopherols.

In addition, you should keep in mind that the levels of fat in the feeder insects can contribute directly to issues such as corneal lipidosis so increasing the fat content is probably not the best idea......

Ed

 

[Ed]

That is regarding a specific type of Vitamin E called Tocopherols. It might not apply here. Don't know.

Tocopherols = vitamin E (the most active are alpha and gamma tocopherols).

 

[antoniolugo]

That is regarding a specific type of Vitamin E called Tocopherols. It might not apply here. Don't know.

Vitamin E is a tocopherol. In the case of the vitamin E that we take as a supplement its called alpha-d- tocopherol.

Here is something I found on the internet: Even though its name makes it sound like a single substance, vitamin E is actually a family of fat-soluble vitamins that are active throughout the body. Some members of the vitamin E family are called tocopherols. These members include alpha tocopherol, beta tocopherol, gamma tocopherol, and delta tocopherol.

Different types of oil have different contents of vitamin , which include different quantities of the different types of tocopherols.

If vitamin E is a concern with the oil, coconut oil I found is the one with less content.

Im no expert on this, just did a little research. We dont even know whats too much vitamin E for a frog, but I thought it should be something to consider if we try using vegetable oils to help with the fat content of fruit flies.

 

[antoniolugo]

I think this helps with the answer http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/jf990993o

Most of the cooking oils on the market have moderate to high levels of tocopherols.

In addition, you should keep in mind that the levels of fat in the feeder insects can contribute directly to issues such as corneal lipidosis so increasing the fat content is probably not the best idea......

Ed

So its not a good idea to use it like a treat or to stimulate breeding in the case of females?

 

[Ed]

Vitamin E is a tocopherol. In the case of the vitamin E that we take as a supplement its called alpha-d- tocopherol.

Here is something I found on the internet: Even though its name makes it sound like a single substance, vitamin E is actually a family of fat-soluble vitamins that are active throughout the body. Some members of the vitamin E family are called tocopherols. These members include alpha tocopherol, beta tocopherol, gamma tocopherol, and delta tocopherol.

Different types of oil have different contents of vitamin , which include different quantities of the different types of tocopherols.

If vitamin E is a concern with the oil, coconut oil I found is the one with less content.

Im no expert on this, just did a little research. We dont even know whats too much vitamin E for a frog, but I thought it should be something to consider if we try using vegetable oils to help with the fat content of fruit flies.

If you increase the tocopherol of the fly, you change the ratio of vitamin A to D3 to E needed to balance that food item as all three of those vitamins compete for uptake in the digestive tract of the frog. If the ratio ends up outside of 10 to 1 to 0.1 then you have conditional deficiencies of the frog. The supplements are made to balance the insect on the basis that they should be very low in tocopherols however, fruit flies if provided with tocopherols can store them (and they don't store D3 or A) to levels that can be hundreds of times above that found in the media.. sufficient to disrupt the needed uptake of vitamins by the frog.
This is before we even get to the point of increasing the risk of corneal lipidosis in the frogs.....

Ed

 

[Ed]

So its not a good idea to use it like a treat or to stimulate breeding in the case of females?

Increasing the fat content of the diet can increase the frequency at which the eggs are produced but this comes at a cost of the nutrients needed to make a healthy egg. The female will produce eggs that are not sufficiently provisioned with vitamins which can not only deplete the maternal reserves (which can cause problems with her) and prevent her from aquiring enough to meet metabolic demands but produce eggs that do not develop or froglets that are affected with spindly leg syndrome.

The vast majority of the frogs in the hobby are already obese so I'm not sure why you would want to provide them with a higher caloried diet. It's like giving the person that is 5 foot 6 inches tall and weighs 350 pounds french fries fried in lard, and covered with cheese whiz.

Ed

 

[Pumilo]

The vast majority of the frogs in the hobby are already obese so I'm not sure why you would want to provide them with a higher caloried diet. It's like giving the person that is 5 foot 6 inches tall and weighs 350 pounds french fries fried in lard, and covered with cheese whiz.

Ed

Shouldn't you wrap that in bacon?

 

[antoniolugo]

Increasing the fat content of the diet can increase the frequency at which the eggs are produced but this comes at a cost of the nutrients needed to make a healthy egg. The female will produce eggs that are not sufficiently provisioned with vitamins which can not only deplete the maternal reserves (which can cause problems with her) and prevent her from aquiring enough to meet metabolic demands but produce eggs that do not develop or froglets that are affected with spindly leg syndrome.

The vast majority of the frogs in the hobby are already obese so I'm not sure why you would want to provide them with a higher caloried diet. It's like giving the person that is 5 foot 6 inches tall and weighs 350 pounds french fries fried in lard, and covered with cheese whiz.

Ed

Thanks for this valuable info! I just thought it could help in a good way reproduction or maybe a frog that is not eating well.
Its good to know that its better without it.
Those french fries sound tasty tho!

 

[Ed]

Thanks for this valuable info! I just thought it could help in a good way reproduction or maybe a frog that is not eating well.
Its good to know that its better without it.
Those french fries sound tasty tho!

Fried in lard yes.. covered with cheese whiz.. no...

If the frogs were seasonally cycled with significant down times for the females to aquire the needed nutrients then that would be fine or as needed for a thinner animal (if there is no other underlying cause) but I'm just not seeing where the risks to the frogs is work the result.

I would be very leery of using coconut oil as it contains a lot of saturated fats which are much more likely to result in the fats that cause corneal lipodosis...

Ed

 

[Rain_Frog]

I prefer french fries covered in chili and cheese.

I'm not sure how you could even get "olive oil fattened" flies to your frogs if the media itself has low output. At least, in my experience vegetable oil decreased output. The only thing I can think of is that most of the larvae suffocate since eventually the oil separates from the media and floats ontop.

 

[antoniolugo]

Fried in lard yes.. covered with cheese whiz.. no...

I would be very leery of using coconut oil as it contains a lot of saturated fats which are much more likely to result in the fats that cause corneal lipodosis...

Ed

I thought the same thing, but just dont now much about the metalism of frogs and could have been different. But in the case of fat its similar to ours then.

 

[antoniolugo]

I prefer french fries covered in chili and cheese.

I'm not sure how you could even get "olive oil fattened" flies to your frogs if the media itself has low output. At least, in my experience vegetable oil decreased output. The only thing I can think of is that most of the larvae suffocate since eventually the oil separates from the media and floats ontop.

That happened to the culture that I put lots of oil to see what happens. The other one with just a teaspoon its almost like the original media. Not much difference.

 

[motydesign]

Ed i find it funny this is the second time Tocopherols have come up in the past month... im sure its just a coincidence but non the less the subject is here yet again.
my curiosity is starting to peak as it seems that each time it comes up it has to do with altering or trying to find a better mouse trap.

media is cheap, use what is proven and good. unless you are chemist and bio engineer.... then PLEASE keep us updated on new research .

 

[Ed]

I prefer french fries covered in chili and cheese.

I'm not sure how you could even get "olive oil fattened" flies to your frogs if the media itself has low output. At least, in my experience vegetable oil decreased output. The only thing I can think of is that most of the larvae suffocate since eventually the oil separates from the media and floats ontop.

It depends on how you work the media.. you can do the same thing that is done with some baked goods (add enough oil to "moisten" the dry media parts to get it throughly bound together, then add the wet ingredients and heat to get it to bind together. If the oil was seperating and floating to the top then you added more oil than the media could hold and it probably did drown the larva since this method can be used as a method to control mosquito larva in small volumes of water.....

However this brings us back to the issues disrupting the ratios of vitamins A, D3 and E as well as the risk of corneal lipidosis.

Ed