"High density" vinegar eel culture

[Schuyler]

On the Live Food Cultures Facebook group there has been a lot of people talking about making vinegar eel culture in a way that's more similar to microworms (with an oatmeal medium).

These are the instructions I used as a basis:

https://thekillifish.net/vinegar_eel_culture/

http://fishguysplace.com/livefood.html#hdve

The sandpaper was from something I read in a book that roughing up the edges makes it easier for worms to climb. I'm using ACO dense poly pads ripped on half for the air hole.

Now that I'm posting this is clear to see that the container is not clear which may be annoying for trying to see them climb up.

Something else to try may be to get two identical containers and do vinegar in one and oats in the other.

[Guppysnail]

@Odd Duck I believe said vinegar eels do well on instant potatoes also. 

[jwcarlson]

I might have to give this a shot, I just started a liquid culture (purchased from fishguyplace, he was great) and it's growing wildly.  I suppose I should just purchase the started oatmeal version from him as well instead of making my own soup.  

I wonder how long they go before needing to be refreshed.  It's nice that the vinegar version just is... liquid, I guess.  But I've only had one for a few weeks so maybe it isn't as easy as it seems long-term.  I cultured wingless fruit flies years ago and those never seemed to do as well as the first one I bought from Josh's Frogs.

[Schuyler]

On 1/16/2023 at 8:08 AM, jwcarlson said:

I suppose I should just purchase the started oatmeal version from him as well instead of making my own soup.  

Or you could try both and see how much time the "soup" version saves

[jwcarlson]

On 1/16/2023 at 10:22 AM, Schuyler said:

Or you could try both and see how much time the "soup" version saves

Yes, that would be the plan.  I meant making my own culture into the solid stuff from my liquid one.  On the linked site it says it can fail sometimes. 

[Schuyler]

On 1/16/2023 at 8:23 AM, jwcarlson said:

 On the linked site it says it can fail sometimes. 

I was hesitant to share that one because it kinda felt like a sales pitch. It's probably true that it can fail but I'm always skeptical of things that sound like they're trying to sell me something

[Patrick_G]

On 1/16/2023 at 7:50 AM, Guppysnail said:

@Odd Duck I believe said vinegar eels do well on instant potatoes also. 

Yeah, @Odd Duck has a good recipe, I have one of her cultures, it’s really low maintenance. 
 

[jwcarlson]

On 1/16/2023 at 12:56 PM, Schuyler said:

I was hesitant to share that one because it kinda felt like a sales pitch. It's probably true that it can fail but I'm always skeptical of things that sound like they're trying to sell me something

Gotcha, I like Paul so I wouldn't have a problem paying him for his vinegar eel soup starter.  🙂

I like that his website is so detailed that you can basically do it yourself.  It feels like an earlier internet site and I have some heavy nostalgia for those kind of things!

All that said, I feel like if I had my liquid culture in a square container I could easily wipe the eels off the side because even in the glass just there's a "layer" of them that kind of builds up (and I swirl them back in, though I don't know if that's the right thing to do or not now that I think about it).  

Edited January 16 by jwcarlson

[Odd Duck]

I had not seen the “sandpaper to slightly rough up the inside” bit before.  I’ll have to try that.  The high density cultures last around 4 weeks or so before they start to diminish and need dividing or replenishing. I do need to top off the HDVE cultures with vinegar since my cultures tend to dry out (HD vinegar eels and microworms will both get dry).  The liquid VE cultures last for months but don’t have the worm density compared to the oatmeal/potatoes/‘whatever starch you like” in the high density cultures.  I keep liquid vinegar eel cultures on hand in case I get lazy and don’t get them restarted soon enough.  I’ve not had them fully crash and go bad, per se, but they have dried out on me and died.

I do know that when I’ve tried to use up leftover Josh’s Frogs fruit fly mixture only, the cultures didn’t do as well.  I’m still trying to use the stuff up since my pea puffers were completely unimpressed by the wingless fruit flies.  I mix no more than about 1/4-1/3 fruit fly mix with mostly instant potatoes or cooked oatmeal.  1/2 and 1/2 didn’t do quite as well as using more of plain starch source as media.  Same with microworms on the media. Plain old oats or instant potatoes are more reliable.  I won’t buy fruit fly media again.

Overall, I really like having the HDVE cultures on hand, especially for top dwelling fry.  The microworms may be a bit better for bottom dwelling fry since they go down.

[Schuyler]

There is a slight skin on top of the vinegar but I no longer see anything wiggling in the liquid. Hopefully it just needs more time...

On 1/16/2023 at 6:44 PM, Odd Duck said:

I had not seen the “sandpaper to slightly rough up the inside” bit before

It was from an old book/binder my dad gave me called "Exotic Tropical Fishes". It was in a section on microworms. Now that I think of it, that was written in the 70's or 80's and there's a chance it was saying that for glass containers

[Schuyler]

Well what do you know... It's working!

The vinegar is wriggling like a microworm culture and there are even some starting to climb the sides