# DIY FF media



## wesly2007 (Jul 6, 2007)

I know some of you are making your own FF media and im wondering what the recipe are. Also I would like to know hiw well they produce for you.


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## Gocubs (Apr 23, 2012)

Jon (rustyshackleford) makes his own and from my experience watching his frogs, it produces very well. So hopefully he reads this and shares. I know alot of people have started making their own since josh changed his formula to a less managable recipe


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## Gamble (Aug 1, 2010)

Here's my FF Media Recipe

6c potato flakes
2c brewers yeast
1c powdered sugar
2 teaspoons cinnamon
2 teaspoons of methyl paraben

I do not know how many cultures this makes bc I just keep making batches until I fill up a storage container ... then I just use it as needed.

I have personally done an experiment using NEherps & joshs media and have found that my mix produces longer & larger cultures compared to those.

I will also say that adding too many flies can crash your culture. I add about 50 flies.i use excellsior. I also use distilled water & put my cultures in the microwave once made to sterilize them further.


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## Daleo (Jan 31, 2012)

I make a big batch of dry ingredients that consists of:

1 box potato flakes
1 cup nutritional/brewer's yeast
1 cup sugar

Then in each culture I do:

1/4 cup dry mix
3 tablespoons white vinegar
1/4 boiling water

This seems to do ok for me. I'd be interested in what others do, as I feel I could get more product out of the cultures.


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## frogparty (Dec 27, 2007)

With the exception of NW Power mix made by Darren Meyer, no DIY FF mix seems to come close to Repashy superfly, so I quit trying 

NW power mix is flax and applesauce based, and labor intensive to make, but works equally well for hydei and melanogaster. Let me see if I can pull the recipe off my old laptop


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## IEatBugs (May 15, 2012)

Check out this thread for all the recipes you can think of.
http://www.dendroboard.com/forum/food-feeding/33846-hydei-media-mix-ideas-needed.html


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## frog dude (Nov 11, 2011)

My main recipe (that I got from another board member) is

8 parts potato flakes/powder

1 part pure white cane sugar,

1 part brewer's yeast.

I sometimes throw in a cup or two of Josh's frogs media (that is what I did for my last bulk batch. I had some left over Josh's frogs media {the old recipe} and it seems to work well), but I am just out and I am going to start using methyl paraben.


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## Pumilo (Sep 4, 2010)

2 twenty-six ounce boxes potato flake (24 cups)
4 cups powdered sugar
1 pound brewer's yeast (7 cups)
10 tablespoons cinnamon
5 tablespoons methyl paraben

I run the powders (cinnamon, methyl paraben, and powdered sugar) through a baker's sifter to eliminate clumps and get a more uniform mix.
Then it's all thrown into an oversized ziplock bag, or a 5 gallon bucket, sealed, and mixed like crazy.
This is a complete dry mix. I pack about a gallon into Seal-A-Meal, vacuum pack, freezer bags, and pop them in the freezer. I keep one gallon out for making cultures in the near future.

I mix 1/3 cup dry mix, with 3/4 cup HOT water. I give each culture a quick swirl, but that is the only mixing they see. Then you put your excelsior, or whatever you use (I often use leftover, fiberglass screen mesh), into the cup, cap it, and pop it in the microwave for about a minute per culture (five cultures gets about 4 or 5 minutes). This finishes it setting up, because I use more water than some, due to Colorado's dry climate. More importantly, this will kill any mites and mite eggs in your media or on your culture materials.
FULLY cool, sprinkle with a tiny bit of active bakers yeast, and spike it with flies.

This works very well for me. If I did many Hydei cultures I would probably double the yeast, for more protein. It does work well with Hydei cultures, but would probably work even better for Hydei, with a little more protein (yeast).


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## Ed (Sep 19, 2004)

Gamble said:


> y mix produces longer & larger cultures


This does not mean that the flies produced are better in any respect. 



Gamble said:


> I will also say that adding too many flies can crash your culture. I add about 50 flies.i use excellsior..


Dogma.. the only reason a large start to a culture would crash it is because the flies are genetically intolerant of the conditions post emergence.. not because too many crash it..... 

Some comments 

Ed


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## Gamble (Aug 1, 2010)

Ed said:


> This does not mean that the flies produced are better in any respect.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


I should add that the crashes were most likely due to how I was keeping them, probably not directly related to how many were used to start.


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## frogcrazy (Nov 23, 2004)

I basically use the same recipe,but I do not use sugar in mine. What does the sugar do,and should I start to add it to mine?
Darran


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## Blue_Pumilio (Feb 22, 2009)

I don't really use measurements, but use the following:

Mostly Potato flakes
About 15-20% oatmeal
About 5-10 % nutritional yeast
Some ground flax seed
Some red pepper powder
Ground Cinnamon
Some sugar
Capful of Olive oil
Capful of Flax seed oil
Just a little garlic powder

I then use 1:1 ratio of water & vinegar until the mix is similar to applesauce. Never had mold issues with this.

Pinch of Live yeast (sprinkled in the contianer on top, afterwards)

Occasionally I add something else of interest, if I happen to have any good ground grains. 

It produces very well, especially for the hydei. It sounds more labor intensive then it is.


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## fishgas4 (Jan 23, 2012)

Can the methyl paraben be purchased at a grocery store? 

Is its purpose to inhibit mold or is it a preservative?


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## Rusty_Shackleford (Sep 2, 2010)

fishgas4 said:


> Can the methyl paraben be purchased at a grocery store?
> 
> Is its purpose to inhibit mold or is it a preservative?


Methyl paraben is a food quality mold inhibitor. I've never seen it for sale in a grocery store. 


Sent from my iPhone via Tapatalk


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## Frogman8 (Sep 28, 2010)

My ff media that I had been using for years... 
2-large bananas
2-cups breakfast oats
1-large jar apple sauce
1-tsp cinnamon
1/2 cup vinegar
Put in microwave for 1-2 min , had excellent results


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## Frogman8 (Sep 28, 2010)

Forgot to mention put ingredients in blender first before microwaving


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## Taari (Nov 6, 2012)

A couple questions:

A few people mentioned microwaving their culture media before adding flies. This seems counter-intuitive to me. Wouldn't that also kill your brewers yeast, negating any benefit it has?

Many of these culture recipes seem very low in nutritional value. Potato flakes and cane sugar are nothing but highly processed, empty calories. Wouldn't it be wiser to make a nutritious, healthy food for our flies, which will then be the primary source of food for our frogs? If the food at the bottom of our albeit small food chain is highly nutritious, then that nutrition is passed up along the chain to our frogs. Is there anything that can be done to make the culture more nutritious?


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## Gamble (Aug 1, 2010)

fishgas4 said:


> Can the methyl paraben be purchased at a grocery store?
> 
> Is its purpose to inhibit mold or is it a preservative?


Its a mold inhibitor. I get mine here: 
Methyl Paraben (1 LBS/453 grams) - Culturing Supplies | Josh's Frogs

Brewers Yeast (5 LBS/15 cups) - Culturing Supplies | Josh's Frogs

Fruit Fly Culturing Supplies, Fruit Fly Media | Josh's Frogs


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## Rusty_Shackleford (Sep 2, 2010)

Taari said:


> A couple questions:
> 
> A few people mentioned microwaving their culture media before adding flies. This seems counter-intuitive to me. Wouldn't that also kill your brewers yeast, negating any benefit it has?
> 
> Many of these culture recipes seem very low in nutritional value. Potato flakes and cane sugar are nothing but highly processed, empty calories. Wouldn't it be wiser to make a nutritious, healthy food for our flies, which will then be the primary source of food for our frogs? If the food at the bottom of our albeit small food chain is highly nutritious, then that nutrition is passed up along the chain to our frogs. Is there anything that can be done to make the culture more nutritious?


The process of microwaving the media is to kill any possible mites that may be in your media, coffee filters, etc. 
I have nuked and not nuked and I have never noticed any difference in the yield of flies. 

The maggots don't eat the potato flakes as their sole source of nutrition. I believe fruit fly maggots eat rotting fermenting fruit. I believe what happened is the brewers yeast reacts with the sugar, ferments it, and that is what the maggots eat.
For what it's worth I use powdered sugar and not granular sugar. 
It seems like there is a constant barrage of newer frog keepers trying to reinvent the wheel when it comes to fruit fly cultures. Fruit flies have been cultured for a long long long time by the scientific community for various genetic testing and other experiments. What I do works for me, is relatively cheap to make, and provides me plenty of flies. Flies which my frogs eagerly eat and provide enough substance to reproduce. Why try and fix what isn't broken?


Sent from my iPhone via Tapatalk


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## Colleen53 (Jan 19, 2009)

I have used regular sugar for many years now, but will try the powered sugar.


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## Pumilo (Sep 4, 2010)

Both brewer's yeast, and nutritional yeast, are dead, or inactive yeasts. Their primary use in our cultures is as a source of protein. If brewer's yeast were live, it would probably suffocate your culture in very short order. That would be a whole lot yeast to be activating at once. That much live yeast combined with that much sugar, could kill the flies overnight.
The tiny bit of yeast that is sprinkled over the top is the only live yeast in your culture. That tiny sprinkle should be Active Bakers Yeast.


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## Taari (Nov 6, 2012)

Powdered sugar is nothing but granulated sugar that is ground into a powder and mixed with corn starch. 

Anyway, I get what you mean about reinventing the wheel, but to be perfectly honest, the scientific community doesn't always take into account proper nutrition. Just because something won't kill you (or an animal) and provides adequate calories, doesn't mean it's the most nutritious option out there. 

Our frogs eat the flies, so what the flies eat should matter too. 

What about using sweet potato flakes instead of white potato flakes? Mixing in some banana and apple sauce as one recipe above mentioned, maybe even cooked, mashed carrots or spinach, parsley, etc. using apple cider vinegar instead of white vinegar for the recipes that call for it.

Maybe I'll have to play around and experiment with some ideas and see if any of them work.

Pumilo, would that be the same kind of yeast that one might use to make bread?


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## frogparty (Dec 27, 2007)

its all Saccharomyces cerevisiae....


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## Reef_Haven (Jan 19, 2011)

Taari said:


> Our frogs eat the flies, so what the flies eat should matter too.
> 
> 
> 
> Maybe I'll have to play around and experiment with some ideas and see if any of them work.


Many different recipes will work. The trick would be to quantify what is a more nutritious fly. 
Factors such as time to emergence, number of flies produced at each emergence, weight of the flies, activity of the maggots and duration of productive life are hard to correctly compare as there are strong genetic and environmental components that affects each and every one of these factors.

See this post by Ed.
http://www.dendroboard.com/forum/food-feeding/67766-repashy-superfly-26.html#post608267


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## Reef_Haven (Jan 19, 2011)

Here is an excellent study on the Nutritional Requirements of Drosophila melanogaster.


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## JPccusa (Mar 10, 2009)

I am sold on the Repashy SuperFly after too many "heavy weight endorsements."

I know this is not what you are asking, but you have to consider the cost/benefit of making your own fly media. Reef Haven posted good links that should be considered.


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## Ed (Sep 19, 2004)

Taari said:


> Our frogs eat the flies, so what the flies eat should matter too.


Not in the way most people expect.... 
I suggest reading the links provided above and if those don't answer your questions, then I can try to answer them.... 

Some comments 

Ed


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## wesly2007 (Jul 6, 2007)

Wow ive just been given alot to think about. Im currently using Josh's Frogs and get good production. I may still try some of these recipes out of curiosity, and the fact that I now have plenty of tim being as im going to be layed off for the next couple of months.


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## LarryLee (Jan 15, 2012)

ive been using joshs new recipe.. had trouble at first then i started just adding water, mix top portion with a fork and go from there, if there is a dry portion at bottom of cup it doesnt hurt a thing. works great for me.
i set it up and put the excelsior in cup, add flies.... if recipe looks dry after couple of days i put it in container and mist top of cup and inside of container.
Larry


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