Fruit Fly Culturing, Care and Feeding - Everything you need to know about Drosophila

[MichaelS]

The biggest reason D. hydei cultures crash faster than D. melanogaster is because Hydei take longer to reach sexual maturity and take a little longer to hatch. When you set up a melanogaster culture the flies are always ready to lay eggs within a couple days. If you are not careful when you set up a hydei culture it may be over a week till the flies are ready to lay eggs. I set up most of my D. hydei cultures mixed with D. melanogaster. The melanogaster larvae usually start off working the medium before the Hydei. I get an early hatch of melanogaster followed by a hatch of hydei and melanogaster. The fact that the media has larvae feeding on it earlier than a Hydei only culture keeps the cultures free of mold and fungus. I just dump flies in when I set up. If you are going for more hydei put less melanogaster in. I have some cultures of dark hydei, light hydei, and apterous melanogaster and they are doing great.

[John]

Everyone's mileage may vary on this. I don't have any fungus/mold issues.

[rumrunner]

Has anyone bought/used the Drosophila you can buy from petsmart ?

[Alpha Pro Breeders]

Alpha Pro Breeders is another great place to get all your fruit fly supplies. (Also a sponsor on this forum)

Feeder insects & supplies - Alpha Pro Breeders

[Paul Rust]

Alpha Pro Breeders is another great place to get all your fruit fly supplies. (Also a sponsor on this forum)

Feeder insects & supplies - Alpha Pro Breeders

Added it to the article, thanks.

[Alpha Pro Breeders]

Thanks Paul.

[charlamanda]

*Can honey be used as a bacteriostatic in place of the methyl paraben and/or instead of the molases? and ** Where can you find the methyl paraben?
Great article!! I am going to give this a try.
I have 3 very small Gray Tree froglets who's main diet is fruit flies. The cultures I have been ordering aren't lasting very long, have very low number from the get go and/or take some time arriving.
There have been too many between times they go without, either because I am waiting so long to get them or the culture I have just dies abruptly. I think culturing my own maybe my best option.
Thanks again for the info, it seems simple and inexpensive.

[John]

*Can honey be used as a bacteriostatic in place of the methyl paraben and/or instead of the molases? and ** Where can you find the methyl paraben?

I don't think honey will have much anti-bacterial benefit, and it might just be a source of sugar.

I know you can get Methyl Paraben from Josh's frogs but there are other non-frog specific sources to buy it online as well.

[Alpha Pro Breeders]

*Can honey be used as a bacteriostatic in place of the methyl paraben and/or instead of the molases? and ** Where can you find the methyl paraben?
Great article!! I am going to give this a try.
I have 3 very small Gray Tree froglets who's main diet is fruit flies. The cultures I have been ordering aren't lasting very long, have very low number from the get go and/or take some time arriving.
There have been too many between times they go without, either because I am waiting so long to get them or the culture I have just dies abruptly. I think culturing my own maybe my best option.
Thanks again for the info, it seems simple and inexpensive.

Cinnamon can be used, along with mixing it with 50/50 vinegar and water instead of using methyl paraben. I don't like to use anything thats not natural. Usually the cinnamon alone will deter any mold growing

Alpha Pro Breeders

[Paul Rust]

Has anyone bought/used the Drosophila you can buy from petsmart ?

Yes, if you can find any still alive, they are fine to start your culturing with. I started a culture from some of these 1.5 years ago and it's progeny are still going strong.

[wesleybrouwer]

There are tons of recipes that will all work fine,
but i like to contribute as well what recipe has proven itself for me personally.


I don't use exact science on how much of everything,
i try to see if the brew is thick enough so my flies won't drown in it

My ingredients are:

Water
Oatmeal
little bit of fruit, altough i know the vitamins are all boiled out of them
yeast
some white sugar
vinegar
and some coffee from the collection tray under my senseo

(a lot of people in Holland use a quit similar recipe with some variations on it,
some other ingredients used a lot are: wine, baby food, wheat, breadmixture and so on)

I just mix in everything together while boiling and put it in my cultures,
then i let it rest overnight for the yeast to do it's work.
On top of the mixture i use a variaty of stuff like the coffee filter, fold up kitchenpaper(not sure of the word) or the inside cartboard of a toilet roll.
When using woodshavings, first treat it by putting in the microwave or steamclean it to destroy the mites on them.
Only downside to this is you also destroy the acetobacter, that "lives" in wood by nature, with it.

After that, i sift some larvaes out of an old culture and put them together with a good amount of flies in the jar.

Before i do so i sift the flies while putting gistocal(or another cheap calcium powder)
over them.
The reason for this is that it will attach to the mites,
microscopic research has proven they become immobile while doing so.
Most of the mites will fall of the flies and you will have less chance of bringing in the mites into you're fresh culturing media.

The reason behind my recipe is as followed.

Since the larvae live of the yeasting process,
that is the most importat part of the culture.
The vinegar is a waste product created by the acetobacter,
a good bacteria that is involved in the yeasting process.

The yeasting sugar is converted to ethanol,
ethanol will be transformed by the acetobacter to acetate.

By putting in the vinegar, the fruitflies are tricked to believe that the culturing media is well on it's way of producing enough food for their larvaes to feed on.
Therefore they will reproduce in a much faster rate.

By putting in larvaes, you make sure that there won't be an overgrow of fungus,
since the wrong or to much of it also ruins you;re culture.
They start eating it immediately and so keep it in limits.

The coffee was more of a tryout,
since i always got a problem with fruitflies investing my collection tray of the senseo machine with warm weather outside.
I tought they might like it.
After trying, they do indeed.
An additional advantage i probably found using it,
is that the cultures i put coffee in,
are less sensitive for mite invasions.
It may be coincedence since i don;t understand why that should be,
but i compaired it more then once and each time the culture with coffee had lesser problems dealing with mites.
Any one who might have a theory is welcome to explain it to me

[Paul Rust]

Thank you for this Wesley!

[wesleybrouwer]

You're welcome Paul.

2 more things i tought of i did not mention.

When using to much of the culturing media,
it will take longer for the larvae to pupate since they got plenty to eat and don't mind on being able to fly of to another place

On the other hand, as you are sifting the larvaes out of old medium you can also feed them to you're dart frogs or other small frogs.
The easiest way is to use a fine mesh colander or something like that and just put it under the tap to rinse of all the unwanted stuff.

Bon a petit