Bad Fruit Fly Delivery

[MotherMantis]

So, I had to order fruit flies to feed the plethora of nymphs I have at the moment. I ordered from Josh's frogs, but the estimated arrival was far too long for them to wait so I found a petco and drove the hour to get some other fruit flies until the first batch was delivered. 

Skip to today, about a week after I ordered, and they arrived. The post man completely ignored all the tape on the box to keep it UPRIGHT and stuffed it in the mailbox sideways. All the liquid ran out and drowned all of the flies  :angry:  I contacted Josh's frogs to let them know, but it's at no fault of their own. My question is, can more flies still hatch from this or its it a total loss? Would you file a complaint against the post office?

I have pictures but it won't let me post.

 

[Sarah K]

REALLY, Josh's Frogs shouldn't have made thier culture so watery in the first place, and then this wouldn't have even been a problem! Fruit fly media is supposed to be a paste. A good paste will not be watery enough to drown the flies or even move from it's original location in the cup, even if the cup gets completely flipped upside down!

Honestly, I have ordered fruit fly cultures from Josh's Frogs before as well, and have had other problems in addition to the one you discuss. I am not the only one either, check out thier breeder feedback right here on the forums:



I  would just order fruit fly cultures from someone else from now on, or even better, buy a kit and culture them yourself. We sell both fruit fly cultures and culturing kits on our site and never have problems like this with our cultures. 

 

[Teamonger]

I'd keep any culture medium that's still in there as the flies may have laid eggs. Give it a week and see if any maggots show up before giving up on it.

 

[Serle]

You've been reading my mail , exactly the same story on one of my culture deliveries, stuffed in sideways.   These were         D. Hydei's therefore a little more finicky  I split the whole horrible mess in half  rinsed off some flies and nymphs , if it was some what mature there may be some eggs or larva - as teamonger writes.  Both cultures did come back and produce ... it' s true the feed culture should be thicker .... S

 

[MotherMantis]

REALLY, Josh's Frogs shouldn't have made thier culture so watery in the first place, and then this wouldn't have even been a problem! Fruit fly media is supposed to be a paste. A good paste will not be watery enough to drown the flies or even move from it's original location in the cup, even if the cup gets completely flipped upside down!

Honestly, I have ordered fruit fly cultures from Josh's Frogs before as well, and have had other problems in addition to the one you discuss. I am not the only one either, check out thier breeder feedback right here on the forums:



I  would just order fruit fly cultures from someone else from now on, or even better, buy a kit and culture them yourself. We sell both fruit fly cultures and culturing kits on our site and never have problems like this with our cultures. 

Now that the liquid has settled, I don't even think there were flies in there in the first place. I just assumed they drowned because I didn't see any. I don't see any maggots either, but there are a few pupae on the lid and sides. It's still very liquid in there, and after some research I see that's a bad thing. The ones from petco are very solid with a ton of flies already hatched and have a pleasant peanut butter smell while this smells a bit like old wet cat food   Again, this is my first time ordering these online so I may have misinterpreted the product, but I was under the impression flies would already be in there like the picture showed.

I wish I would have made an account here and read the reviews first  :mellow:  I think I'll do what you suggested and just make my own now that I'm not in a pinch for some. 

He did respond to my email quite quickly, though. Shame it didn't work out.