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Serving the Dart Frog Community Since 2004...

Is it cheaper to buy FF or culture your own?
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Is it cheaper to buy FF or culture your own?
#1
is it cheaper in the long run to buy cultures every couple weeks or to culture your own fruit flies ?
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#2
Culturing your own fruit flies is far less expensive than ordering them and having them shipped to you.
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#3
alrighty. well i just bought some ff from the silkworm shop because i have two brand new froggies in their new tank and i figured might as well get live food so that they can eat asap then ill worry about trying to figure out how to do it myself. any suggestions on where to buy the cheapest culturing kit?
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#4
Black Jungle has kits for D. melanogaster and D. hydei.
both are $50 and contain enough supplies to make 10 cultures, they also have a culture of the flies with them to start you off.

Ed's Fly Meat has kits for for flies, rice flour beetles, and springtails: http://www.edsflymeat.com/kits.htm
the ones for flies come in 3 and 10 culture kits that also include a starter culture, and theres also a 50 culture kit that doesn't include starter cultures.
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#5
oh thanks. is that with shipping and handling? i spent 38 dollars on 3 cultures ready to eat (lol).
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#6
go to joshsfrogs.com i think or look up josh's frogs...cheaper ff culture kits come with ff....and enough to make ten cultures. plus his media has a mold inhibitor in it....wold suggest adding the excelsior for 3 dollars more than the coffee filter method. It's cheaper there and he sends fruit fly culture with it and by time it reacges your door, the culture is full of tons of flies to culture from and feed. i like his best...kits are great....come with cups and vented lids already. look him up...he sells good culture kits at a cheap price. takes many forms of payment also. kristySmile
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#7
I am a HUGE Joshfrogs fan. Great price for 20 cultures and you get it fast. They don't mess around with orders there. They get them out in a very timely fashion. I placed an order with them on Sunday evening and had my order on wednesday.

Candy
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#8
yes..if there is any fruit fly cultures or kits...its the BEST place to buy. Instructions included...priority mail will be at your door in 2-3 days unless you choose to pay more for overnight for an emergency....but his is best place, best media, i'd add the excselsior instead of coffee filters though and you'll get the culturing going. its easy. And his is the best. only place i buy from for cultures.....when it come to buying darts ....thats a whole other story. josh is into thumbnails mainly but does sell quality darts....as well as pat nabors....he has best plants i think, but this is off the subject. want quality ff culture kits at low price....the best ff culture kit....go to joshsfrogs.com
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#9
If you currently have a good ff culture, you can purchase a "refill" culture kit. Comes with everything but the flies. Like Kristy said, add the excelsior for $3.

Candy
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#10
good post candy....i find that the coffee filters will mold as they suck up too much moisture and need more experience to know exactly how soupy you make your media to put the coffee filters in....so go with the excelsior......on joshsfrogs.com when you buy the kit, comes with coffee filters, but there is a button underneath where you can choose the excelsior for 3.00 more. its better for the begiinner....also when putting the excelsior into the culture cups, put down far enough into media a little as not to touch lid......easier when removing fruitflies not to have the excelsior fall out or get in the way of putting lid back on quickly. i use a big(largest) funnel for automobiles to tap my ff into culture when ready. prevents escapes.....also do all this either on mite paper or spray mite control onto paper towels to reduce mites i cultures. I buy this from joshsfrogs as well...works good and i line rubbermaid dreawers ...stackable kind with sprayed mite paper towels to put my fresh cultures on. works great. Dart frogs are by no means inexpensive and require a lot of care. joshsfrogs has the best culture kits though and also sells other things like amphibian safe hand sanitizer...comes in handy....along with cochuts...i'd get the large polished ones and he sells tad cups and extra ff cups and petri dishes that fit under his large polished cochuts perfecrtly. they are great...his products phenomenal. I'll stop boring everone now with this post.Smile
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#11
Sounds like your ff culture set up and procedures are identical to mine. I haven't tried the whole breeding thing so I haven't needed the petri dishes. Anyway, maybe we got our opinion out there about who we prefer. :wink: :lol:
Candy
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#12
YEP, MAYBE AND ONE OF THE GREATEST JOYS OF OWNING DARTS IS BREEDING, HOPE YOU GET THE CHANCE SOMEDAY
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#13
If you have only three or four frogs, it's better to start with three cultures ready-to-go, then get like 25 empty cups and lids for making your own. Look up Fruit Fly Power Mix and find a culture you can make at home to get your own going. If you have only several frogs and you do ten cultures at once you are going to need to get rid of all of them in 28 days and have way too many flies on your hands.
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#14
I haven't done the calculations to find out how much each culture is, but it's much much lower than the purchased cultures.

I'm using a modified power mix formula to fit my local availability of products (I'm in Mexico City) and I make about 30 cultures at once. I then freeze the cultures and get 2 - 4 out each week.

Going way overboard, each culture can't be more than $0.70
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#15
I make my own media and cultures, Including buying the cups and lids it cost me about .40-.50 cents a culture
Much easier and cheaper to do it yourself.
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#16
I have a recipe for fruit fly culture that calls for potato flakes, brewer's yeast and powderd sugar. That sounds pretty easy. Has anyone else tried this ?

Fran
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#17
Fran,
that is pretty much the basic recipe that all instant fruit fly medias are made from. There are other items that can be added to that to benefit the media and the flys ( mold inhibitors, vitamins, etc.).
Good luck with it.
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#18
Thanks for the quick reply! Do you use granulated sugar or powdered sugar? I have also read that you can use half water/half vinegar and that will inhibit mold. Would that work as well as the mold inhibitor? (at least until I have a chance to get some)
Fran
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#19
Powdered sugar is usually what is used.

Some people do use vineger as a mold inhibitor, I don't know what the exact ratio is.
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#20
powdered sugar is what is used normally. cindy is right and i use a 20-25%ratio of vinegar and distilled water boiled. kristy Big Grin

p.s. cindy your cork bark is awesome and so was your special abg mix that came in. couldnt have asked for better :wink: kristySmile
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