[dr.tran]

Sorry I'm not sure if this is the right forum but they are invertebrates.

So close to a month ago I found some blood worms in a rain pale I kept outside. I wasn't sure if they were because they kinda looked like a leech. So I brought it inside and kept it in an enclosed tank. They molted and turned to adults and confirmed that they were midge fly. I know that they are non biting and don't even need to feed. So I let them fly around in this tank and they died in a few days. But I was left with this slimy mass that look like snail eggs.

In the past I failed terribly with bloodworms and I have been trying to find live bloodworms in NYC for a long time with no success. But on a whims, I throw it in a 5 gallon bucket with some dead mulberry tree leaves and a 2 algae wafters for good luck. I usually use the bucket to culture daphnia so I know it was already cycled. I put an air line tube in it and left it in the closet. I didn't really think it would work. I also put a net over it just in case.

Then this past month I was crazy busy and I only been netting out daphnia to feed my fish. I didn't really get a chance to look at the bucket because it was out of my way. My storage closet is very packed and its a pain to navigate through it.

Fast forward to today where I had a day off and I decide to clean up and start up my adult brine shrimp culture. So I wanted to clean out this bucket and start throwing in my BBS.

To my shock and surprise, hundreds of bloodworms!!! So what I learned is that they don't do well in light but need a dark room in order for them to feed and develop. I started going through the leaves and they all started to swim up to the top. Just hundreds of bloodworms! I was getting worried because my white worm culture started to lag but this will carry me through a few weeks.

Great googly moogly!!! This is my holy grail for live food cultures and it wasn't as hard as I thought it was. Finally I got F2 or is it F1? But holy! I have never been so excited over a culture before. lol

Pictures will come in a moment. I gotta clean up and harvest.

 

[Robotponys]

Wow cool! Sounds like its really easy. Hope you have enough fish to feed them to.

 

[dr.tran]

Ok maybe I over counted. lol I have more like 50. Theres still more in the bucket and I am trying to catch them all. Next time I gotta figure out a way to do this without leaves. It makes it harder to catch them all.

Thanks Robotponys. They are. I guess I use to baby them too much. But just some dead leaves and time. I can't wait for these to turn into adults and for me to see how much of a harvest can I get next time.

Yes finally a safe source for live blood worms. I have frozen but man this is so much cooler to do.

 

[mordalphus]

During the early summer and early fall I culture them outdoors in rubbermaid ponds, millions, they really like maple leaf to eat.

Also, somehow a midge must have made it into my vivarium, because there are now midge larvae in there too

I don't think they mind light though, my outdoor ponds are in full sun all day

 

[james1542]

So would shrimp eat live blood worms? Just to tie this all together, seems like a really easy and cool idea.

 

[mordalphus]

So would shrimp eat live blood worms? Just to tie this all together, seems like a really easy and cool idea.

I tried that, they didnt eat live ones. All of my fish love them though.

But, my fish like mosquito larvae more because they wiggle more, blood worms only wiggle in my aquarium until they find something to latch onto

 

[dr.tran]

During the early summer and early fall I culture them outdoors in rubbermaid ponds, millions, they really like maple leaf to eat.

Also, somehow a midge must have made it into my vivarium, because there are now midge larvae in there too

I don't think they mind light though, my outdoor ponds are in full sun all day

Teach me master. lol.

In the last few years, I have been able to harvest bloodworms seasonally but its very few. I don't have to many midge flies here. That and I wanted a year round harvest. So I been experimenting on how to culture them indoors and trying to keep the generations going. I think I got it down now. We shall see in F3 generation. Still testing on weither temperature can cause them to mature early.

In either case, I hope to be able to harvest in the upcoming winter months

 

[dr.tran]

Oh and how do you harvest them without the muddy coat?

 

[chibikaie]

Oooh, how exciting!

 

[mordalphus]

I dont do anything special, i have noticed that when mosquitoes start appearing in my ponds, the blood worms disappear, so maybe mosquitos outcompete them.
I
will say, they do better in green water, when Iset up a new pond it takes a ehole year to start seeing bloodworms.

Also rainwater, they don't do so well with harder water.

 

[SpecGrrl]

Yay miracle of the bloodworms!

 

[mordalphus]

And to catch them i use a large fish net and scrape the side of my ponds starting at the bttom and moving straight up. For some reason they spend most of their time with their butts attached to the side.

 

[AVN]

Grats Tran. Share your secrets!

 

[dr.tran]

And to catch them i use a large fish net and scrape the side of my ponds starting at the bttom and moving straight up. For some reason they spend most of their time with their butts attached to the side.

Interesting. I usually find them in mud cocoons. I will watch my culture more carefully this time.

Grats Tran. Share your secrets!

I will when I have some. lol

 

[Robotponys]

My Amanos will eat live blackworms which swim and struggle like crazy. 0.o They are huge though.

 

[dr.tran]

Just found some bloodworm eggs. Looks like I'm going to have F3 generation. I know a local fish breeder who has a lot of tanks so it looks like I'm going to have some space for experimenting. lol

I'll update when I get this successful.

 

[dr.tran]

Is anyone good at identifying species of Chironomid? It turns out its some kind of green midge fly. But there are some that are brown. I thought they were mosquitoes but I think they are males. This morning I found my bucket swarming with blood worms again. I don't think they are F3 generation though. The eggs may have hatched but they shouldn't have grown to this size already. Perhaps some delayed bloodworms from F2?

 

[GMYukonon24s]

Congrats on the eggs

 

[dr.tran]

Thanks

I'm trying to get a proper id on these guys. Had a few escapes. They can be pretty annoying.

 

[sunindia]

hello, I am from India, I am trying to culture bloodwormsfor my turtles since past one month , searched a lot at internet but got failed , because first I went near pond and digged mud there and found some small worms stuck in moist mud (not wet mud), so I thought those are bloodworms and then I came home and kept them in bucket filled with water and some dead leaves ,small round rocks and stuff but later I realized that those were earthworms not bloodworms, then I tried to culture earthworms , went to another location and caught earthworms put them in coco moss but after few days all earthworms were dead because the moss was not good and no one sells here peat moss, only thing available here is coco coir moss , so I went again and caught some more earthworms put those in square shape tub and well aerated but they all died again because of same moss then i realized that it is problem of MOss, then today again I went third time to catch the worms and put those in a circle shaped tub with cardboard bedding now lets see what will happen, temperature here now a days is around 20-26Celcius because of rainy season and No one sells here earthworms or bloodworms because there are very few aquarium keepers and I asked few people outside my city (some 300miles away) they get their bloodworms supply by the drainage cleaner person, who go into sewage/drainage and catch bloodworms from there and sell them to friend who is 300 miles away.

my question are as follows-

Q1. DO I have midge fly here ? I have common household flies ,fruit flies, mosquitoes etc.

Q2. if I put a small tub with dead leaves at my open roof with NET cover then how midge fly will get in ? and if i dont put net then you said that mosquitoes wont let midge fly develop so I am confused what type of net to put , if I put bigger net then mosquitoes will also go in , so will it be ok to put fine net like 1/2mm net at tub for bloodworms.

Q3. Where to keep the tub filled with dead leaves and rainy water I collected ? in dark room or at my roof ?

Please add anything if you feel I should know for culturing bloodworms
Thanks a lot