Ah ok a somewhat natural selection. All the flightless fruit flies shipped in their container were dead so I added some as well as a piece of cotton soaked with water. I may just remove the flies I can and wait until I'm happy with the remaining number of slings and their strength.
You def need to get more FFF soon as you can, babies tend to eat alot when first born
I will leave them in there then.... I believe I should be covered on the FFF for a bit I prepared a head of time on that, but a great point I thank you. Only vague info on sling care other than they eat everyday and grow in good temps so I have a temp controller coming in for my heatmat that I plan on putting behind the enclosures. The ac when it's hot keeps the house around 72° F but on cooler night the girlfriend opens the windows and the room house can get down to 60-65.
I'm not sure if they'll eat the dead ones, also I worry about the dead FFF being diseased. IDK, someone else needs to chime in.
Sorry for not being clear I was just referring to the new live ones I put in, I have removed the dead ones best I could from shipping and will be prepping clean containers for the slings tomorrow.
Thank you very much ill look into some kits, I did notice the small vile I got from petsmart in emergency to get by has almost depleted the food in less than a week. I only paid for 5 slings and was sent around a dozen haha idk if it was to compensate for shipping time in case some were lost but all seem alive. I have a bunch of 2 oz cups already and will figure out how to seperate them tomorrow. Any need for like a pipe cleaner or something for them to climb at this point or just the containers with a water soaked piece of cotton?
Add some moss for coverage
Great I do have a a bag of moss that will last many enclosures. At what point should I move them to something like 16 oz cups with some more coverage items?
Juvies or 1/4 inch I would say. Maybe even bigger. You must judge
Slings will molt more often. From what I have read on the forums and online articles is that usually they will go into a premolt period and either make or use an old thicker web hammock and hang out in it for a bit. It may be harder to tell with slings ( mine are so tiny I can't see their faces) but if you notice it in the hammock on its back or side don't be alarmed, it's the position they molt in. Babies can be short to a few hours but sub adults could take days.
I culture fruit flies in 32 oz containers and they produce a lot. It may seem a bit much but I seperate the feeders in steps. I first place a white poster board down as a work surface as it helps me see any escaped flies or slings then I have 2 oz cups ready to catch. I start by tapping the 32 oz container to make all the flies fall to the bottom. Then I take off the lid continuously tapping the container with my finger and collect some into a smaller container like a 5 oz cup with lid (I do perform this outside sometimes as this is the best chance for the flies to get everywhere). When I have enough in the 5 oz I use a paper funnel to put 2 at a time into a test tube for final transfer to my slings enclosure. If any escape they will easily be seen on the white board and you can just throw a 2 oz cup over top of them and they will climb to the top and can be tapped from there into your test tube or final container. I might make a video soon for it.
Great description, thanks. I can see how the white board and the funnel would help. Feeding again tomorrow I think so I’ll try your routine. Oh and a video would be good. Let us know
