# Fruit fly cultures in a small apartment



## mellowvision (Feb 6, 2009)

I hope I'm not asking a question that I've asked before, but here goes. 

I've been culturing fruit flies for months now, and usually have 5 jars going at various ages. I rarely let a culture go more than 3 weeks without restarting it. 

I have 2 problems.

1 is that I usually notice small white bugs, much smaller than fruit flies, on the screen. Something makes me think they are not fruitflies, but something else... but they are tiny tiny things. Are they a problem?

2 is the smell. I live in a small 1 bedroom apartment in nyc. By the second week, a culture smells aweful, somewhere between an ashtray and a dung pile. Is there some good way to control the smell? Can I add activated carbon to the medium? I'm using a powdered medium that contains potato flake and anti-fungals... but am not sure which commercial product it is, since I get it second hand from a friend who uses way more than I do.


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## ChrisK (Oct 28, 2008)

Those are mites and could be trouble if you keep the cultures too long, people deal with them in all kinds of ways from mite paper to just not worrying about them.
Smell is something that people also deal with in many different ways - do a search for both subjects on here and you'll find tons of suggestions and solutions


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## dendro-dude (Jan 25, 2010)

For the smell, you can try a different media.

My media smells allright:

Banana and Apple Sauce Mix 
by Anthony Hundt 
1 cup banana (about 2 bananas) 
1 cup apple sauce 
1/8 cup vinegar (or 2 tablespoons or 15 ml) 
2 cups oatmeal 
a few granules of baker's yeast (this can be Fleishmann’s yeast)
Put banana and apple sauce in blender or bowl and mix until the banana is liquified. Heat in the microwave for approximately 2 min. or until hot enough to kill off any wild fruit fly eggs that were in the bananas, and to reduce mold. Add the vinegar and mix in oatmeal until it becomes firm, but still moist. Put the mixture in wide mouth quart canning jars and allow to cool. Once cooled, add the yeast and flies. Any unused media can be frozen until needed.


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## mellowvision (Feb 6, 2009)

thanks for the info.

so I guess what I'm hearing is, is that mites are not contained by the screen? That is, they are attracted to the culture and can get in through the screen? or are they just being transferred from one infected culture to another? I use a very fine stainless mesh, it came with storebought cultures from petco.

smellwise, I've always assumed it was fly waste, not the media that was smelling... because the new media has no smell and it doesn't really seem to go bad very quickly... I suppose I could try a new media, but it seems like a lot of work to grow flies. 

thanks again.


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## dendro-dude (Jan 25, 2010)

Perhaps.. Maybe fly waste, mold, or bad media.

Which Fly are you culturing?


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## davecalk (Dec 17, 2008)

If you are using a potato flake medium, I would recommend adding cinnamon to the batch. That will help a great deal with the smell.


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## jon (Mar 12, 2008)

I read somewhere on DB about putting the cultures in a large tupperware like container, putting a small aquarium air pump in the container, and running the 1/4" airline out the window. It creates just enough negative static pressure to keep the smell from escaping into the room. Except when you open the lid, of course. 

Cinnamon not only helps the smell, but it's a natural antibacterial and antifungal. It should help reduce the possibility of mold in cultures.


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## R1ch13 (Apr 16, 2008)

I have to keep all my cultures in my room.

And I am not claiming my room smells lovely or anything.

But since keeping all my cultures in a large food grade toy box with a lid I have noticed the smell has greatly diminished.

It has also helped the production of my cultures tenfold.

Richie


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## nathan (Jul 24, 2009)

You can add a drop or two of honey to the surface of the food once mixed. It ussually helps.


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## xshortstufx (Jul 15, 2010)

Sorry to threadjack  but do you add the cinnamon before or after you add the water???


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## deansie26 (Nov 18, 2009)

In the media orange juice is used often but I find this is what smells the worst and water seems to activate the yeast better. Mites are not as terrible as I thought at first, Having good ventilation in the pots and not having the media sopping wet helps plus dusting the flys when making each new one. I cover each new culture with tights (pantyhose I think use call it ) and an elastic band, keeps them well ventilated and not as humid etc.


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## JakkBauer (Jul 11, 2011)

pacifikbad said:


> At performance of a hairstyle by way the lock on a lock is cut off the first control lock in the bottom part of a nape. All the others separate hair partings, are imposed on a control lock and cut off at its level. The top locks will turn out more shortly if at them to increase a tension corner. If hair are cut without change of a corner of a tension, all at one level, at drying the top locks will be shorter than the bottom.
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Wtf r u explaining how to dread your hair? Sooo random... Oddly enough I just put a couple dreads in mine two nights ago after drinking too much patron....

To stay on topic... I had my cultures in our spare bedroom and it started to stink! My girl has so many clothes that I have to keep mine in the closet of the same room so the smell was no bueno. I got a sterilite 3 drawer rolling shelf to put those stinkers in, its not completely airtight but contains the mustyness so I don't always smell like a giant fly culture.

Sent from my DROIDX using Tapatalk


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## Absolutbill (Aug 23, 2011)

*Re: water soluble hair spray*



pacifikbad said:


> At performance of a hairstyle by way the lock on a lock is cut off the first control lock in the bottom part of a nape. All the others separate hair partings, are imposed on a control lock and cut off at its level. The top locks will turn out more shortly if at them to increase a tension corner. If hair are cut without change of a corner of a tension, all at one level, at drying the top locks will be shorter than the bottom.
> homemade hair conditioner for damaged hair
> Replacing lacking чешуйки, and also подпитывает hair follicles with the necessary substances promoting growth.
> frizz ease hair spray
> ...


I think the links are just spam, I would not click on any!


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## mordoria (Jan 28, 2011)

Just buy repashy SuperFly. I live in a one bed rom and never smell the flies.


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## Freeradical53 (Jan 25, 2008)

Fruit fly cultures are really not that smelly. Potato flakes, mold inhibitors, powdered sugar, cinnamon, and brewers yeast are all you need. No orange juice, banana, or other ingredients are needed. If you have only a couple of cultures are going at once it's not a problem....no smell


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## WendySHall (Aug 31, 2010)

I make a very simple mixture like FreeRadical was talking about. (No escargot for my flies!) I don't notice any smells coming from the cultures whatsoever when I keep them on the top shelf of my baker's rack out in the open. However, when I was keeping them on a tall (but not wide) bookshelf, I could smell them if I was close. I think perhaps the fact that they were more "enclosed" had something to do with it.


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## Kaity (Sep 18, 2010)

I'm moving to a one bedroom and have this same concern. Would it affect yield to store the cultures in those airtight sterylite containers?


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## Markw (Jun 27, 2011)

Because you use yeast in the cultures, which produces CO2, and all the hundreds of flies producing CO2, if it is airtight, I would be scared of them being asphyxiated like springtails. 

As for the original subject, I keep anywhere between 13 and 17 cultures at any given time between one and four weeks old in a 6x8' room. I find that if you keep them very high up, or very low, you don't really have any kind of smell in the room. If they are around eye/nose level, mine only really smell like bread. What I did was I went to the local flea market and they had these decorative rocks that you sprinkle fragrant oil over. I chose apple cinnamon, poured the oil concentrate over, and the rocks last for the whole room for at least 2 weeks. Other than that, I keep mine in the bottom of a curio cabinet, with one of the doors slightly cracked. That way, there is no smells in my room at all. And I also have my 50g 5.5.0 P. Vittatus vivarium in the same room.

Mark


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