# Quickest way to make numerous cultures?



## a Vertigo Guy (Aug 17, 2006)

Whats your method? I was considering doing all the mixing in a big crock pot.


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## SMenigoz (Feb 17, 2004)

tinctoritus said:


> Whats your method? I was considering doing all the mixing in a big crock pot.



I make about 40 cultures a week and doubt that there's a shortcut. I premix my media in a tupperware container:
big box of potato flakes
powdered sugar
dry yeast powder
and mix...don't ask me about ratios, I don't measure anything anymore :roll: 
The liquid comes from a gallon jug:
3/4 aged water
1/4 vinegar
From the tupperware container, I scoop out approx. 1/3rd cup media, add water/vinegar to slurry to "proper" consistency, sprinkle a few grains of active yeast on top and add excelsior. 
Not really rocket science...more like working on an assembly line.
Scott


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## UmbraSprite (Mar 2, 2007)

Scott,

How many tanks/frogs are you feeding that 40/week covers it? I will soon be bringing quite a few more animals in and am trying to plan.

Chris


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## kyle1745 (Feb 15, 2004)

Number of cultures will be different for everyone so careful with going off someone else's numbers.

I personally make around 40-50 a week and here is what I do.

- Mix up as much dry medium as possible this is normally about 2 months worth. 4 2.5gal bags of my own mixture.
- Put 1/3 or 1/2 cup of medium in all of the labeled cups
- add equal amount of water
- add active yeast
- add either elixir or coffee filters, I use each for specific flies.
- add flies and store

I rotate all of my ffs weekly and never keep any of them longer than 4 weeks. (This keeps mites down)

You can see my melanogaster cabinet here, though this is rather empty:
http://www.kylesphotos.com/frogs/album4 ... y.jpg.html


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## Ryan (Feb 18, 2004)

I do it similar to kyle, seems to be the most effective to me.


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## a Vertigo Guy (Aug 17, 2006)

The way Im doing it now is pretty similar to how you're doing it Kyle. Looks like theres no shortcut around this.

Someone who does a couple hundred cultures like Bill oughta chime in on this!


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## SMenigoz (Feb 17, 2004)

UmbraSprite said:


> Scott,
> How many tanks/frogs are you feeding that 40/week covers it? I will soon be bringing quite a few more animals in and am trying to plan.
> Chris


60 tanks...# of frogs??...a few hundred. :wink: 
A long time ago I learned that its FAR better to have too many cultures than not enough. How many of us had ff's overnighted to make up for crashes or slow growing cultures?
I also have a few locals that get theirs from me instead of the hassle of making cultures themselves.
Just counted...389 cultures going :shock: ...believe it or not, I don't consider it work, but then again, I'm a dork.
Scott


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## Jungle_John (Feb 19, 2007)

any body want to tell use what there fruit fly recipe is? im looking for a good cheap one. im still buying mix from the online stores and its killing me. about to start using jars as cups. also were can i buy elixir in bulk???


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## UmbraSprite (Mar 2, 2007)

> 60 tanks...# of frogs??...a few hundred. :wink:
> Just counted...389 cultures going :shock: ...believe it or not, I don't consider it work, but then again, I'm a dork.
> Scott


Scott,

Trying to do the math but it doesn't add up. At 160/month thats over 2 months to hit 389. How long are you keeping them going? 

I will be feeding about 160 frogs in ~40 tanks....so trying to plan ahead. Need to get the cultures going soon.

Chris


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## SMenigoz (Feb 17, 2004)

UmbraSprite said:


> Scott,
> Trying to do the math but it doesn't add up. At 160/month thats over 2 months to hit 389. How long are you keeping them going?
> I will be feeding about 160 frogs in ~40 tanks....so trying to plan ahead. Need to get the cultures going soon.
> Chris


OK, so maybe I underestimated how many cultures I make/week. :roll: 
I keep cultures as long as they continue to produce--comes down to a "feel" for when a culture has peaked and not worth my effort continuing it.


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## UmbraSprite (Mar 2, 2007)

So that being said....

40 cultures a week with 40 tanks is 1 culture/tank per week....
Seems a little slim to me ... what do you think? I just don't want to get caught off guard here....

OMG....just trying to visualize the rack of cultures I am going to have ... and I don't think I have seen one like that since I interned at the National Aquarium 15 years ago!


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## sports_doc (Nov 15, 2004)

IME I wouldnt keep all the cx in one rack...the mites will take over.

Spread them around and keep the new away from the old.

I make 16 on thursday, 18-20 more on Sunday. 

I use a cooked recipe from flax seed....most of the time, primarily b/c it doesnt smell like baby poop when it rots and has less tendency to become soupy in summertime.

but I also use the good old Carolina potato flake mix like Scott often enough....its faster.

Assembly line fashion, speeedy, no finesse just get 'er done. 

personally I hate doing it, but I error on the side of 'extra' ff's if I can. 

AND btw thats 36 vivs, and 36 cx's week....plus lots of froglets. Trick is to use fresh ffs from early hatches each time [they produce more], keep the mix consistent with a high brewers yeast concentration, never skip making them and avoid mites....

whenever possible, hire someone to make them for you  [damn fruit flies]

Best,

S


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## KeroKero (Jun 13, 2004)

Having been the person making something like 20 FF cultures a week and then 10-20 cultures a week for my own frogs, I pretty much figured out what the above guys have said. 

The key is to break it down into steps. Step one - media. Step 2 - yeast. Step 3 - excelsior/coffee filters (kyle I'd love to know which you use for which). Step 4 - add flies.

Now, step 1 can go a few different ways. If you make your own media, there are two ways you can do it... the other way that I know some other people do it is to mix the media in a trash can (no joke) and then scoop out the media into the containers... this is usually the case with recipes that involve moist ingrediants that are not liquid (for example apple sauce, bananas, molasses, etc). Pretty much mix the big batch of that in a huge container then scoop it out into the cultures when done. Now with dry mixes, including prepared mixes - which are usually a dry powder type deal that you add an easily flowing liquid like water and vinegar - you can do it the way I do it. I put the scoops of dry media in all the cups (and make sure to mark the cups so I know what media is where - tho if I use eds my melano mix is the green enhanced and the white mix is hydei so it's easy to tell and the blue carolina works for both), and then set them up next to the sink. I add water, swirl, move it to the other counter. I do that til it's done. Then I go back and tap in yeast into each. Then the excelsior. Then I play with some flies...

Fly wise, like Shawn says, I use the fresh batch of flies. I then mark the culture top with red marker so I know those are for feeding (they also go into a different FF drawer). The only time this is not the case is with hydei... which I try and make twice a week and I mix old and new booms to mix the ages so I get better male/female ratio. I make it twice a week to stagger my booms so I can do this better.

It also helps to have an assigned day to do flies. It used to be sunday for me, but then I was always gone on sundays, so that didn't work. I changed it to mondays, do it while i make dinner (the culture part, not the fly part, that's after dinner when I have the TV on). Unfortunately, I've been travelling a lot lately, and wasn't at home the past two mondays. Scott, I think I need to raid your 389 cultures


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## elmoisfive (Dec 31, 2004)

Unfortunately there is no shortcut, particularly if you are working with a large number of cultures. Setting a schedule helps but it's still work. Don't even ask me how many I have running at any one time but it's north of Scott's number :roll: 

Bill


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## geedubya (Mar 16, 2006)

*Mass culturing and re-use*

Okay, all you big-time fly guys. With so many cultures, do you re-use cups? lids?


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## KeroKero (Jun 13, 2004)

I will admit that since my collection has expanded again, I haven't been using as many reusable cups... this is also partially because I have a case of toss away cups I don't know what to do with. If I did them all in reusable cups, I could fill my dishwasher with them, lol. The toss away cups tend to take a lot of room in the trash  It definately takes less time to just toss them, but I hate making that much trash. Currently the weather is condusive to me hosing off my cultures (literally) outside to rinse them before I wash them. Smack as much as I can out into a trashcan, hose them out, pile them up to clean, enjoy the sunshine, get a beer from a neighbor lol.

Lid wise... I prefer my reusable lids with foam plugs - especially now that I've had a good number of my cultures infested with a small local fly (not a drosophila, so the genetic integrety of the culture isn't disturbed but still!) I'm going to switch most of my cultures back to the foam plugs. I'll probably still keep the cultures I do specifically for larvae in the toss away cups tho. I also use the toss away cups for baby TFs, lol.

It may be work, but I use it to unwind from work, and I make them/clean them while watching TV/movie.


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## geedubya (Mar 16, 2006)

Corey,

Do you find that the maggots like to get in the foam plugs to pupate? Do you have a way of preventing this? How do you clean the plugs?

Thanks!


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## SMenigoz (Feb 17, 2004)

I re-use the cups but toss the lids-- don a rubber glove, scoop out the old media and excelsior into a trash can then into a 5 gallon pail filled with warm water and bleach. Soak overnight then into the deep sink; sponge out the softened crap, rinse and place upside down to drip dry. 
_Lather, rinse and repeat..._ :wink: 
Saving the lids is not a good idea(IMO) as they're a way to track mites into your new cultures, unless you can find a way to clean 'em effectively.
Scott


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## Tripod (Jun 5, 2006)

I save and reuse my lids. They get a similar cleaning to the cups: a light scrubbing with soap/water, soak in 10% bleach solution overnight, thorough rinse the next day, set aside to air dry, and a light spritz of mite spray before being stacked and put away.


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## KeroKero (Jun 13, 2004)

The lids with the paper on them I tend to toss... most often because I tend to poke holes in them and put them in tanks for a few days when they are getting old :roll: The reusable lids from Ed's get cleaned, and I use the foam plugs a couple times then replace them.


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## bruce (Feb 23, 2007)

*Culture making........*

If this helps, I make up about 75-plus cultures a week. The first set I quadruple the "fresh banana/grapefruit juice" etc. mix in a big soup pot 
(it holds five times the recipe) for most of the cultures. Mold is a problem here and the acidity of the mix eliminates it. The first day I add the mix to the cultures, wait a day, add yeast and filters, wait a day and add flies. I have found greater production with this mix for me vs. the standard powder mix.
Having had mites in the past, I too add the flies in a different room and culture for a week or two before bringing them to the warmer frog room area. 
For the final cultures, I use the standard "dry mix" as some of the flies respond better to lower acidity it seems for me.
Being a relative newbie, additionally,I would suggest ordering flies from a number of sources and see which ones work best for you. I found it amazing the different reproduction rates per fly, per media/temperature differences.
In addition as a way to transport them and ease of cleaning, I use laundry baskets (white ones with handles). Three of these filled, stack well on each other and hold all together about 80 cultures. 
Did I mention the value of an understanding spouse?
B.


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