Maggots

[Mex_Ghost]

I read the topic "Raising houseflies in 32 oz pot, but I hope somebody could give an advice.

I wanted to make a "trap" (I´m not sure if it´s ok that word) that I found in the web, It seems like....

I wanted to catch flies on a bottle, so when I arrived late at home after work, I could take out the flies from the bottle, so I put inside some meat, and after some days I could catch some flies, but after 10 days (yestarday] I saw several maggots, some were "climbing" to the top of the bottle and the most were at the bottom with the meat, there were so many maggots that the meat seem like if It was alive.

Now my question is.... what should I do with those maggots?? do I leave them inside? or do I have to change them to other recipient?? If I change them to other recipient..... Do they need food?

saludos

 

[PhilinYuma]

Wow! You need to do something pretty soon! Here's what you do.

Pour the smelly mess of meat and maggots into a hard plastic food container like those made by Rubbermaid. There should be a few inches of container wall above the level of the mess. If you have some at hand, add some wood shavings, but don't waste time trying to find them. Add enough water to come halfway up the mess. Cover the container with some cloth, like a facecloth and hold it in place with string or a rubber band.. Put the whole thing in a larger container (a glass pie dish would do), with a little water in it, not enough to make the media container float. The maggots will flee the water, climb the sides of the container and pupate on the cloth. This apparatus must be dedicated (as though you couldn't guess!) and must not be covered, to prevent the growth of fatal anaerobic nasties.

In future, I suggest that you liquify some beef liver in a blender, since the smell of rotting meat does not upset you and also toss in a large pinch baker's yeast though, as you have seen, it is not essential., and when it contains a mass of maggots, put them in a strainer, wash them clean and put them in a dog food culture like that described in "breeding HFs in a 32oz pot" You should get an interesting mix of houseflies and blow flies. Yum

Do let us know how this goes!

 

[Mex_Ghost]

"Put the whole thing in a larger container (a glass pie dish would do), with a little water in it, not enough to make the media container float"

why do I need the larger container? what is the roll of it?? I took some maggots an put them in other container with nothing else than the cloth above, but later I´´l do your advices, thanks for the help and I´ll let you know what happenend, about the smell is not really a problem cause I put the container outside close to my dogs excrements so there are some flies and the smell is not a problem, also here in Mexico is kind a problem trying to buy pupae, and I Haven´t find somebody trying to make a flies colony or a flies breeder, I hope I can succeed.

Arturo

 

[PhilinYuma]

Sorry. Thought I answered this yesterday. When I used a method like this last year, I covered the maggot container with cheesecloth and had some holes in it to let air in. The second, "pie dish" container was a water trap to stop overly ambitious maggots from travelling too far before pupating. Just about any cover with some small air holes will do.

 

[kookamonga]

This sounds pretty cool, I'll probably try it out later as well :>.

 

[Mex_Ghost]

I did what you wrote (at least, what I understood, haha) and after I put the water, I thouth that the maggots were going to die drowned in the water, some days later, the remaining meat and the water became in a mix, and yestarday, there was no mix, only maggots, that climbed to the top of the bottle, Do I need to add more food?, or just wait?, tomorrow I´ll upload a Photo tomorrow.

saludos

Arturo

 

[PhilinYuma]

Good for you! It's much easier to read than do, isn't it? As you discovered, the trick is to only add enough water so that the maggots can climb to safety. When they are clear of the water, the high humidity drives them to crawl further away. Once clear of their food, they will simply pupate, regardless of how developed they are, so you may find that flies of different sizes emerge. Let us know how it goes!

P.S. Really stinks, doesn't it?

 

[Mex_Ghost]

funny how this works!!!, I mean Everything, I begun with 4 L2 nymphs, giving them FF, now I have 11 nymphs and I have tried with Flies, Crickets, bees, and Butterflies!!!, now thank you all I´m learning on raising flies.... about the smell, I´m geting used to, Imagine that I´m hunting flies with a home made net, and sometimes I´m looking between dogs poo for flies, also when I look inside the bottle with the maggosts from time to time... I have to get used to .

Now I´m looking here in Mexico for "schools" of butterflies breeding, one institution wrote me that next course begins on June, and other institution that are at the north of Mexico told me that they are going to see the way they can help me, If I can do it right with the butterflies I let you know!!!

saludos

 

[Mex_Ghost]

At first I put some maggots inside a bottle with some sand, today I found some pupae

now do I have to let them become flies??, do I have to put some water?

now let me show you the bottle with all the maggots (the photo is a little moved)

they are all outside my home... are they ok? or should I do something else??

saludos

 

[PhilinYuma]

You are doing absolutely splendidly! Without a doubt, within a few days, houseflies will eclose/emerge. Two days ago, I had a Rubbermaid container half full of my HF medium and several thousand maggots. I followed the advice that I had given you and covered the container with a permeable material (sorry, i don't know what it is. I think that it is sold as "none- slip" cloth) and put it in a pie dish with 1/2" (1.25cm) of water. Alas! This container had a lip on it. the maggots climbed over it and fell into the water below. Their legs are not very strong, and I had close to 100 drowned maggots before I discovered my mistake! I put the container in a 5gal (19L) bucket with some sawdust, and all is now well! Felicitacions!

 

[Mex_Ghost]

Yesterday at night I relized that I had some Flies, all were green!!! (about 12 or 15), I think they take less time than blue bottle flies to hatch, I had one bottle with sand and pupaes, and other bottle with a mixture of powdered sugar, powdered milk and some pupaes (no flies at the moment), all the flies emerge from the bottle with sand.