# Standardizing Isopod culture sizes



## Reef_Haven (Jan 19, 2011)

Does anyone actually count out individual adult isopods for their cultures for sale?
I've seen a lot of cultures for sale with little to no information on how many someone could expect within the culture or the size of the container.

I know it's not feasable to count out each culture, but maybe it would be worth while to dump one typical culture into a shoe box and actually seperate out how many adults are in a typical culture of each isopod people sell.

I'd like to see some opinions of how many of each type would be appropriate, something along the lines of 25 orange, 50 grey, 100 dwarf whites, 8 ounce containers 50/50 mix leaf litter/coco coir?

Also what's the diffence between giant orange, porcellio orange, spanish orange?


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## Pumilo (Sep 4, 2010)

Hey Kevin, I actually hand count my isopod cultures out, and I list how many I put into a culture. My starter cultures generally have a minimum of 25 subadult to adult. I don't count any babies that make it in. If any younger ones go in, I will usually throw 2 in but only count it as one. Now this is what they are started as. You will often receive more than that as breeding still occurs while on my shelf. Sometimes you may pay for a culture of 25, but if I made it a month ago, you could receive 100. So my counts are all MINIMUM counts.
I sometimes offer larger sizes and list that in the description.

Giant Orange, Spanish Orange, and Porcellio scaber Orange, are all exactly the same thing.
Giant Orange cultures I typically do a starter culture of 15 subadult to adult, all breeding age, in a starter culture. Again, amounts and approximate ages/sizes are listed in my descriptions. 

My isopods are all sent out on a mixture of 75% leaf litter and 25% coco fiber. This keeps the substrate very light, so bugs are not crushed, nutritious, as they eat leaf litter, and the coco fiber holds moisture. I send out almost all my isopods in very small, 2 ounce containers, which allows me to fit quite a few into a small size box, to keep shipping prices down. This way, I am able to fit up to 5 or 6 springtail cultures, AND up to about 8 or so isopod cultures in one small box. Or, I can probably fit 20 or more isopod cultures in the same, 8" square box. Yes, 2 ounces is a very small culture size, but you are paying for the number of bugs, not the dirt. I am clear that I am supplying STARTER cultures, and have threads detailing the best ways I have found, to grow them out.

I agree that there is a lot of variability in what you may receive from vendor to vendor, so I do my best to describe exactly what I pack into my cultures. I've talked to many people that have purchased from shows, only to find 3 bugs in the culture. You'd be surprised how many times I hear the number 3! I should also state here that DendroBoard has other excellent places to get great bug cultures. I am NOT dissing every other bug seller. We have seen 2 or 3 not so great ones in the past, but the mods do their best to field complaints when there are a lot of them, and remove that seller from the boards.

Ask you seller what, if any, guarantee they may have. I charge a little more for shipping, so I can ship it how I feel is best. That includes insulation, Phase 22 panel, and sometimes a heat pack in addition to the Phase 22. I cover every loss I've ever had. 

Sorry, it reads like an ad, but you asked... Mods, of course, are free to edit or yank this out of here, if it's out of place.


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## therizman2 (Jul 20, 2008)

All of my descriptions are pretty clear on my site, 8oz containers, and all are started with at least 2 dozen, but usually more as anything that isnt adult size rarely will be counted.

As for my substrate, it is similar to ABG, or sometimes is ABG and then I will put leaves on top of that so that it is in the container pretty tight and isnt getting tossed around in shipping. All of my containers are taped shut before shipping, and then shipped however is necessary to make sure they get there alive.

I also usually put in a piece of vegetable just so they have a source for water and food if they want it. 

Only issues I have had is with shipments getting delayed or boxes getting crushed, both of which I will either refund or replace whichever the buyer prefers.


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## Reef_Haven (Jan 19, 2011)

I'm surprised isos are physically counted. I just assumed people grabbed a handful of substrate from their master cultures, and estimated how many isos were in there.
How do you separate the isos out of your master cultures?


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## frogparty (Dec 27, 2007)

carefully......very carefully


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## therizman2 (Jul 20, 2008)

Mine when I feed them, they all gather on/around/under what I have fed, so I just grab that out and scoop some soil out around them. Some of my master cultures I would guess have bugs numbering near a thousand now. Last time I started whites, I did 24 cultures out of one of my master cultures and there were still a TON left in it.


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## Reef_Haven (Jan 19, 2011)

Sure, I get how to feed them out or seed a tank. Just seems rather tedious trying to pick out 25 or so per culture, if your making up a dozen or more cultures. I guess it wouldn't be too difficult if you have full sweater box size cultures and cover most of the surface with damp cardboard.


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## Pumilo (Sep 4, 2010)

I do like Mike mentioned. Feed your culture in a couple of spots. Wait 12 or 24 hours and grab a handful of substrate. I dump it on a plate and grab a modelers paintbrush and/or a butterknife for fairly quick separation. Many is the time I am up at 2 AM counting bugs.
You can also use corrugated cardboard. Just leave it in the culture. They like to congregate between the layers, in the corrugated part. You can peel the layers apart and brush them out.
The problem you can get with just grabbing a handful of substrate, without baiting and counting, is sending out a culture with only 3 isopods in it.


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## Shinosuke (Aug 10, 2011)

Mike and or Doug, do you have any pictures of your "master" colonies? I've got the basics of culturing down but my cultures seem to reach a certain size then just kind of stagnate. If I could see one of your big cultures in a normal, day to day kind of state it might help me figure out what I'm doing wrong.


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## Nightlife (Jan 15, 2012)

How large are your master containers? I am using shoe box size containers.


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## therizman2 (Jul 20, 2008)

I can take a pic tonight when I have to take pics of other stuff for people. I just use shoebox size sterilite containers (get them from the Dollar Store), put around 2" of substrate (ABG mix of similar depending what I have on hand that day), then some leaf litter (though most all of mine need more at this time) and then cardboard (and again, a lot of them need more). I keep them all pretty moist too, I couldnt tell you exactly how moist, I just know by weight when I pick it up if it needs more water added to it.


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## motydesign (Feb 27, 2011)

Shinosuke said:


> Mike and or Doug, do you have any pictures of your "master" colonies? I've got the basics of culturing down but my cultures seem to reach a certain size then just kind of stagnate. If I could see one of your big cultures in a normal, day to day kind of state it might help me figure out what I'm doing wrong.


a master is really hard to understand numbers... UNLESS you kill them all! i did this on accident once. thankfully i have good friends out there and im back up and running stronger than i was when this happen.

the layer of death was the same below the cork and about an inch deep into the soil. this was caused by a lack of oxygen to the culture (put a piece of glass over the lid/vent while i was working in the frog room)


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## goof901 (Jan 9, 2012)

cork? interesting...


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## motydesign (Feb 27, 2011)

Helps keep moisture in and is a feeding cover


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## sarasmiles (Sep 5, 2012)

I am not as technical counting out each and every one of my isos for my cultures. I scoop up some ABG from the master culture right around where I had fed a few days before, and I count until I hit at least 20. There is usually far more, probably closer to 30 isos in each of my cultures, and my cultures usually end up being kept by me for several months before selling. I was mostly making them for my own personal use and friends' use, but a friend at a local pet store started giving people my name who were looking for isos and springtails for their other pets terrariums, and so that's why I started making more and have never been strict about the exact iso count to start the culture because I actually do it because I enjoy making them and I normally just sell locally when someone contacts me and they can physically look at the culture before they buy it. 

I would think most reputable people start their cultures with 20-30 isos, but the only way to know is to ask on an individual basis. I will say, however, when I purchased my very first culture of Spanish Orange, I did receive 3 isos!!! haha It was from a well-known vivarium supply vendor, and I learned my lesson quick to ask questions before I made another purchase from someone else.

I guess the only way to really know how many isos the cultures are started with is to ask each individual person what their particular method is.

Sara


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## Pumilo (Sep 4, 2010)

sarasmiles said:


> I will say, however, when I purchased my very first culture of Spanish Orange, I did receive 3 isos!!! haha
> Sara


Ha! What is it with the number 3, when dealing with bad cultures?!


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## Pumilo (Sep 4, 2010)

As Motydesign pointed out, pics of a culture, showing numbers of bugs, is difficult to get. The moment I bump it, or open the lid, they dash for cover. They are gone before my camera focuses.
Let's see, my purples can produce huge numbers in a small container. I'm talking thousands in a 16 oz Hillshire farms deli meat container. So all my Dwarf Purples are in those. Gray/Striped are in 16 oz deli meats and also in Ziplock shoeboxes. Giant Oranges I set up 40 adults in Ziplock shoeboxes. Dwarf White isopods I do in larger, 2.5 gallon Rubbermaids. Rubbermaid 2.5 Gallom Easy Find Lid Food Rectangular Storage Container: Kitchen & Dining : Walmart.com Springtails are all in Rubbermaid 1.5 gallons containers. Rubbermaid 1777163 1.5-Gallon EZ-Find Food Storage Container: Kitchen & Dining : Walmart.com


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## therizman2 (Jul 20, 2008)

One of my cultures... sorry for the cell phone pics and like Doug has said, the second you do anything most all of the scurry away to hide.


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## goof901 (Jan 9, 2012)

therizman2 said:


> One of my cultures... sorry for the cell phone pics and like Doug has said, the second you do anything most all of the scurry away to hide.


Looks like I need to moisten mine up... 



Pumilo said:


> Ha! What is it with the number 3, when dealing with bad cultures?!


Haha that was me too. Got a bad culture with 3 isos in it. (please note, this culture was NOT from Doug)


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## Pumilo (Sep 4, 2010)

I run all my isopod cultures moist, but not moist enough that any water could be "wrung out" of it, if you squeezed it. Obviously, you cannot really squeeze a handful, or you would kill all the bugs, so you have to just kind of go by feel. If an isopod culture gets too dry, they will stop breeding and eventually die. If an isopod culture gets too wet, breeding will drastically slow.


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## therizman2 (Jul 20, 2008)

I think those pics make it look a lot wetter than it is. The cardboard I try to make sure is always damp, usually misting it whenever I open up the containers, otherwise the isopods seem to have little interest in it when it is dry. I agree with Doug, too dry and they stop doing much of anything and die, too wet and they dont like it either. 

Another key for me seems to be their diet, seems they greatly prefer some vegetables over others and never really go for dog food. They also really like fish food. Usually I put a dry piece of cardboard in there and put the fish food on that though, otherwise it molds over very quickly. They also only rarely get fish food because I worry a bit about it having mites.


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## Shinosuke (Aug 10, 2011)

Thank you very much for posting those pics. That looks like it could be one of my dwarf purple cultures, though mine are probably a tad more wet than that. Maybe I am overcrowding the little boogers and need to split out the cultures more often...

Sorry for derailing the thread. I doubt I'll ever have enough bugs that I'll feel the need to sell them, but this is an interesting thread nonetheless!


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## radiata (Jul 24, 2010)

Pumilo said:


> I do like Mike mentioned. Feed your culture in a couple of spots. Wait 12 or 24 hours and grab a handful of substrate. I dump it on a plate and grab a modelers paintbrush and/or a butterknife for fairly quick separation. Many is the time I am up at 2 AM counting bugs.
> You can also use corrugated cardboard. Just leave it in the culture. They like to congregate between the layers, in the corrugated part. You can peel the layers apart and brush them out.
> The problem you can get with just grabbing a handful of substrate, without baiting and counting, is sending out a culture with only 3 isopods in it.


Doug - 2AM? Wow, do I have a widget for you! 

I've been toying, on and off for a few months now, with a device to help me harvest Isospods. (I'm *not* a bug seller, I just want to be able to feed Isos to my darts one day a week, complete with the _duste du jour_.) I think I'm currently on my fifth build for this widget. So far, it is working for Spanish Orange, Calico, _P. Scaber_, Giant Canyon and a local (NJ) 'Dwarf' Grey which is actually twice the size of the Dwarf Greys usually available in the hobby. My Terribs are getting the Spanish Orange (not sure yet if they can handle the other larger isos), any my Tincs are getting the NJ Dwarf Greys.

Developing a harvester for the real dwarf iso is going to be more of a challenge.

I'll be posting photos and additional info when I complete testing my latest build...

~


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## Pumilo (Sep 4, 2010)

radiata said:


> Doug - 2AM? Wow, do I have a widget for you!
> 
> I've been toying, on and off for a few months now, with a device to help me harvest Isospods. (I'm *not* a bug seller, I just want to be able to feed Isos to my darts one day a week, complete with the _duste du jour_.) I think I'm currently on my fifth build for this widget. So far, it is working for Spanish Orange, Calico, _P. Scaber_, Giant Canyon and a local (NJ) 'Dwarf' Grey which is actually twice the size of the Dwarf Greys usually available in the hobby. My Terribs are getting the Spanish Orange (not sure yet if they can handle the other larger isos), any my Tincs are getting the NJ Dwarf Greys.
> 
> ...


What the heck would I do at 2 AM, then?? Haha
Would love to see what you come up with for that! Can I just put in a standing order for one? 
Actually, I've already made 2 different automatic sorters and counters. The problem is that they are very high maintenance, and never seem to work quite right when I really need them to. They take up way too much space in my house, and, worst of all, they both go to bed well before 2 AM!  (My daughter is NOT amused...at least I crack myself up!)


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## frogparty (Dec 27, 2007)

you need to rig the funnel we used in invertebrate zoology. they just drop out the bottom into a holding container


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