Flies (house/bluebottle) why so complicated?

[lectricblueyes]

I understand that fruit flies go through a phase that's basically like this

Egg

Maggot

Pupae

Adult

I also understand, that flies... house or bluebottle also go through that exact same phase.

So why then, do we not harvest housefly cultures the way we harvest fruit fly cultures.

That is to say... 32oz cup, medium on the bottom, material to crawl on (coffee filters) and a lid....

Dude, these insects breed and make babies in my trash can when I toss out food and organic matter. Why then, do we not simply put that material into a cup and breed them... then.. use the adults when we need them... why the constant need to re-order the pupae, put in fridge for 1 week as needed... blah blah blah...

What gives?

 

[PhilinYuma]

Very good question, Dave, and I have a very good answer, of sorts, but maybe someone else has a better one, so I'll wait and see until later.

 

[lectricblueyes]

Very good question, Dave, and I have a very good answer, of sorts, but maybe someone else has a better one, so I'll wait and see until later.

Phil, the suspense is KILLING me! lol

 

[massaman]

I am sure no one wants to put rotting meat or any thing like that into a cup to raise flies if they got weak constitutions or they dont like to be grossed out!The smell would also be a factor and turn people off to the idea as I know I would not want to even try to raise them. As I can get flies easily just open my garage door and let some flies fly in and and close the door then open my apartment door and let them fly in and all i do is catch them for my mantids and I think obama should of gotten a praying mantis to take care of that fly swatting problem he had. He got a big complaint from Peta as why in the heck do we have to give even a fly who can carry diseases any special privledge for being a animal as people are more important then the rights of animals in my opinion but to each their own!

 

[revmdn]

Yes the medium stinks real bad. Not sure about the other pitfalls. I say try it and let us know.

 

[Katnapper]

I would agree with the stink factor. Otherwise... I really don't know!

 

[PhilinYuma]

O.K. Dave.

Most insects go through the four stages that you mention. They are called holometabolous, but the maggots (larvae) live under many different conditions and eat many different things.

Fruit flies and house flies belong to the same order, diptera (in the old classification of, order, family, genus and species) but not the same family, so they would be allowed to marry in both the Catholic Church and the Church of England.

The two families that we call "fruit flies" tend, not surpisingly, to spend their first three stages in rotting fruit (some drosophildae are laid in drying animal carcasses, just to be different, but we won't bother with them), eating the liquid and microrganisms that grow on decomposing fruit. The house fly, though, lays its eggs in dead or living flesh, and the larvae can eat much larger chunks of food (mel and hydei maggots cannot swalliw anything as large as a pollen grain).

The basis of a fruit fly culture, then is rotting fruit, and that of a hose fly is decaying animal protein.

So far as I can tell, I am running my last test batch tonight, it is possible to raise house flies in exactly the way you say, by putting the moistened, powdered dog food and wood chips into a pot, sprinkling on a few yeast granules, adding about ten fles, and away you go.

I would suggest, though, that after about four days, when you can see the tiny maggots, you let the flies fulfill their destiny in a mantid pot. You can now leave the pot open, keep it moist and stir it now and the to aerate it. This will reduce the growth of anaerobic bacteria and the stinky mercaptans (I think!) that they produce as well as ammonia. When the maggots start to come to the surface and crawl on the sides like ff maggots, put a lid with a coarse mesh on the pot to keep 'em in. I mentioned flooding the mixture, elsewhere, to drive the maggots out in the "open tray" method, but I have found that here, this causes them to climb all over the mesh lid and gunk it up so that no fresh air can get in. Properly aerated, the mixture should give off very little odor.

I have been getting yields of 50-100 flies per pot, and there is the problem. If you feed 100 flies per day, you will need between 7 - 14 pots per week, every week, just to keep going. This is why large scale breeders like Chuck, and folks with a lot of herps, tend to use the method that is described in the "bucket" and SpiderPharm instructions.

So Dave, chose your method and go to it!

 

[mantidian]

can someone explain to me what is the bucket technique

 

[cloud jaguar]

The thing about flies is the gawdawful stench! I even rinsed my bluebottle maggots i found under water. Later the maggots still reeked. Once they pupated they still reeked. Eeeewwww!

 

[bassist]

The thing about flies is the gawdawful stench! I even rinsed my bluebottle maggots i found under water. Later the maggots still reeked. Once they pupated they still reeked. Eeeewwww!

All my bugs are in my room so I'm used to the smell of blue bottles and house flies

Arstood a member here told me in the live chat he breeds house flies using fruit fly medium and a 32 oz cup I haven't attempted it yet but probably will in the future.

 

[Rick]

Or you could skp all the hassle and do it the easy way.

 

[PhilinYuma]

Or you could skp all the hassle and do it the easy way.

You're right, you could, but the same thing could be said about the veggies you grow. You could save all that time used in hunting down Asian garden beetles and slugs and arrowheads and just pick some up from the store. A lot of us like to claim that it is cheaper and more relable to raise our own feeders, but one reason that we do it is because we grudgingly enjoy it.

 

[lectricblueyes]

Or you could skp all the hassle and do it the easy way.

Depends on each person's needs and/or what they consider to be an entertaining side-dish of this hobby.

I'm beginning to see it your way Rick, but that's me. At first I thought the kit would be easy/fun. Just getting the kit was a hassle.

I'd do the bucket method if I didn't live in an apartment. The only place I could keep that bucket is on my balcony but the smells would upset my (10 feet away) neighbors!

At this point, given my living conditions, I'll have to skip the "fly breeding hobby" and go with the "costs money, not much fun, but simple" method.

I was given a full refund on the kit and the shipping. So, no harm done to my wallet.

Like the old saying goes "to each his own".

The new plan, pupae in the fridge.... which brings me to the question...

When I take them out, and put them in a 32oz cup... what else should I keep in the cup to feed them? or should I just toss a dab of honey in there for them to eat?

Thanks!

 

[lectricblueyes]

You're right, you could, but the same thing could be said about the veggies you grow. You could save all that time used in hunting down Asian garden beetles and slugs and arrowheads and just pick some up from the store. A lot of us like to claim that it is cheaper and more relable to raise our own feeders, but one reason that we do it is because we grudgingly enjoy it.

You could also kill your mantids and place them inside of cups like G.I. Joe dolls. You know, one in the breeding position, one in the attack position, one in the threat display position. This would be the easy method. No feeding, just... easy. lol

(JOKING!! DON'T TAKE OFFENSE!!)

 

[Rick]

Depends on each person's needs and/or what they consider to be an entertaining side-dish of this hobby.I'm beginning to see it your way Rick, but that's me. At first I thought the kit would be easy/fun. Just getting the kit was a hassle.

I'd do the bucket method if I didn't live in an apartment. The only place I could keep that bucket is on my balcony but the smells would upset my (10 feet away) neighbors!

At this point, given my living conditions, I'll have to skip the "fly breeding hobby" and go with the "costs money, not much fun, but simple" method.

I was given a full refund on the kit and the shipping. So, no harm done to my wallet.

Like the old saying goes "to each his own".

The new plan, pupae in the fridge.... which brings me to the question...

When I take them out, and put them in a 32oz cup... what else should I keep in the cup to feed them? or should I just toss a dab of honey in there for them to eat?

Thanks!

I'm glad you got a refund as I couldn't believe the cost for basically nothing.

I keep the maggots in the fridge and only remove the amount I need. I put them in the same 32 oz that I use for mantids. It has the hole in the side with the foam plug. Put the maggots in there and they will pupate in a day or so. Once they do just leave them be. Depending on temperature they should be flies within a week. My room is 80+ and the last ones I did only took a few days. Once they are flies I feed them locally sold homemade honey from a syringe. I just stick the syringe over top of the foam plug and give them a nice big drop on top of the foam that is sticking into the cup.

They last for a good while in there like that. Sicne you have many mantids you will likely be able to use all hte maggots up before they go bad. They last at least a month in my fridge. I generally take out more maggots when I have used three quarters of the last batch of flies. I just try to time the next batch so I don't run out. Open the lid for a few seconds on the maggots for an air exchange, I find it makes them last longer if you don't use them to fast.

When I go to feed mantids I stick the whole 32 oz container in the freezer. I find it takes a good four minutes for fresh flies to slow down and drop to the bottom. Once they stop moving I take them out. I then use a long pair of tweezers to remove them and drop them into the mantid enclosures. They sell them at petstores and they are about 10" and are very handy. The older the flies get I find the shorter a time period they need in the freezer to stop moving. Just be sure to remove them as soon as they stop moving and drop to the bottom. They are very resiliant though.

Hopefully that makes sense. It is all very easy once you are doing it and is the easiest way I have come up with. The maggots are cheap and I get them most often from grubco. You can also buy maggots that have already pupated but I found those don't last long in the fridge at all.

 

[lectricblueyes]

I'm glad you got a refund as I couldn't believe the cost for basically nothing. I keep the maggots in the fridge and only remove the amount I need. I put them in the same 32 oz that I use for mantids. It has the hole in the side with the foam plug. Put the maggots in there and they will pupate in a day or so. Once they do just leave them be. Depending on temperature they should be flies within a week. My room is 80+ and the last ones I did only took a few days. Once they are flies I feed them locally sold homemade honey from a syringe. I just stick the syringe over top of the foam plug and give them a nice big drop on top of the foam that is sticking into the cup.

They last for a good while in there like that. Sicne you have many mantids you will likely be able to use all hte maggots up before they go bad. They last at least a month in my fridge. I generally take out more maggots when I have used three quarters of the last batch of flies. I just try to time the next batch so I don't run out. Open the lid for a few seconds on the maggots for an air exchange, I find it makes them last longer if you don't use them to fast.

When I go to feed mantids I stick the whole 32 oz container in the freezer. I find it takes a good four minutes for fresh flies to slow down and drop to the bottom. Once they stop moving I take them out. I then use a long pair of tweezers to remove them and drop them into the mantid enclosures. They sell them at petstores and they are about 10" and are very handy. The older the flies get I find the shorter a time period they need in the freezer to stop moving. Just be sure to remove them as soon as they stop moving and drop to the bottom. They are very resiliant though.

Hopefully that makes sense. It is all very easy once you are doing it and is the easiest way I have come up with. The maggots are cheap and I get them most often from grubco. You can also buy maggots that have already pupated but I found those don't last long in the fridge at all.

thanks for the detailed information. I appreciate that. The ones I got from Spiderpharm are brown, which means they have pupated. I've put them in the fridge, but have taken out around 100 and put them into 4 cups. I'll simply follow your instructions starting at where you talk about the pupae. I suppose these will not last as long as your maggots so I will need to hatch them in the next week. I've read pupae only last 1 week in the fridge. It's already been 3 days.

Thanks again.

 

[Katnapper]

thanks for the detailed information. I appreciate that. The ones I got from Spiderpharm are brown, which means they have pupated. I've put them in the fridge, but have taken out around 100 and put them into 4 cups. I'll simply follow your instructions starting at where you talk about the pupae. I suppose these will not last as long as your maggots so I will need to hatch them in the next week. I've read pupae only last 1 week in the fridge. It's already been 3 days. Thanks again.

The ones from SpiderPharm are houseflies, and the maggots Rick mentions from Grubco are Blue Bottles... just to clarify, in case someone didn't know.

The pupae will last for more than a week in your fridge, Dave... but take them out every few (they say 4) days for a couple of hours at room temp... then put them back in the fridge. You won't have as good a hatch rate on them the second week, but I do find they last longer than just 1 week.

What I do is throw the pupae into a 12x12 net cage, let them eclose, and smear honey on the top of the cage for the matured flies to eat. It can sustain most of them for several weeks.

 

[PhilinYuma]

Dave (since you started this thread!): I think that you have made a smart decision. Firstly, if you are working long hours, you want to come home, enjoy yr mantids and go to bed. You don't want to be learning the basics of what is a more complex endeavor than it appears. Secondly, if you aren't used to rearing arthropds of any kind, you are going to have a steep learning curve. It has taken me about two minths, in stops and starts, to work out a feasible method for raising houseflies in pots, and I know what I am doing. Mija lives in a part of the world where mail order house flies are not available. She has access to a species of the Tephritidae, "true fruit flies," like the Mexican fruit fly, that are intermediate in size between hydei and house flies, but their life cycle is a month long and I am trying the pot raising method in the hopes that she can use it without being killed by her father and with the ability to raise flies of different sizes.

I'll open a new thread with what will essentially be a short diary of the pot raising method, which in this part of the world should take about ten days.

 

[Rick]

The ones from SpiderPharm are houseflies, and the maggots Rick mentions from Grubco are Blue Bottles... just to clarify, in case someone didn't know. The pupae will last for more than a week in your fridge, Dave... but take them out every few (they say 4) days for a couple of hours at room temp... then put them back in the fridge. You won't have as good a hatch rate on them the second week, but I do find they last longer than just 1 week.

What I do is throw the pupae into a 12x12 net cage, let them eclose, and smear honey on the top of the cage for the matured flies to eat. It can sustain most of them for several weeks.

BB's or house everything is the same. I found ordering maggots was much better. They last way longer in the fridge.