curly winged fly cultre media

[Alan]

do any body culture these flys im looking for a media to culture the larva on

cat food and and any meet stink ive used it b4 :S......but i was just looking to hervest larva from wild flies so kept it out side
but ill need to keep these inside to speed up there life cycle and be able to harvests more flies but any of the media ive seen advertised seem very expensive either it self or the company charges over the odds on delivery

so could any body let me into the trade secret of the vegi fly media PLEASE or point me in the direction of some cheep stuff


thanks
Alan

[Alan]

no body fancy sharening there secrets

[Insectchat]

Alan, I must have missed this post!

I reared them once, and the medium really did stink. What I did was put a tray of kitchen towel which I'd soaked in milk, in with the flies. Left it in there for 4 days or so, in warm conditions, so it started to rot, and absolutely stink!

I think took it out, and waited another few days until the eggs had hatched, and you could see small maggots eating their way through the kitchen towel. I then added cat food on the top, and kept it warm.

The maggots grew extremely fast, and then eventually make their way up the jar to turn into pupae.

But yea, it does smell bad, and there isn't really a way to stop it. I don't think you can buy it, or at least, I've never seen it for sale anyway.

[Alan]

there is a veg based culture that u can buy BUT its kinda expensive in the amount that you will need to use and ill be using these flys for my Ts and mantis so use quite alot so would need quite allot of the medium

ive had a think about it and am going to do some trials with veg based culture
im going to try and match the nutritional stats of cat food as best i can

if any ones interested heres where i have seen the culture for sale

(scroll down a bit on first link )
EN TER-fly culture
http://www.dartfrog.co.uk/equipment/fertiliser.html

jangela own recipe
http://www.jangala.co.uk/livefoods_home.htm


thanks
Alan

[Insectchat]

Ahh yes, I remember jangala! I came across that when searcing myself ages ago, but figured it was totally out-dated. (2 years now.)

I see what you mean, they are certainly not cheap, and just for rearing the flies it would just get impractical.

If you find a good, medium, please let me know :)