richard@gryphon.COM (Richard Sexton) (11/12/88)
I'm having a problem with fruit flies.
Apparantly they are a wonderfull food for tropical fish, so I set
about recently trying to establish some sort of practical method
of culturing them.
What I have so far is: a large tupperware container in which I left
about 3 dozen grapes. It's in an office at work where nobody will
notice, inside a book case with glass doors.
I put the grapes there about 3 - 4 weeks ago, and have been noticing
a small increase in the number of fruit flies.
I checked it today, and we seem to have quite a crop.
Now, the problem is, how do I get them into an aquarium. My first thought
was to try to train them. It didnt take long to figure out this wasn't
working. Unruley buggers, fruit flies.
My next attempt was to cover the tupperware bowl and place a jar
next to it with a grape in it. Hopefully they would not be able to
get back in the tupperware container and would all congregate in the
jar, which I could quickly close.
Once I have them in a jar, they're as good as dinner, as apparantly
all you do is add a bit of water, shake the jar up, and pour it in
an aquarium. Thus, you dont want a lot of grape goop in the jar.
At any rate, they ignored the jar completely and all snuck back into
the tupperware container.
So, my questions:
What is it they are attracted to ? There's an amyl acetate
kind of smell coming from the grape slush. Is this what does
it ?
DO any of you peple raise fruit flies as part of your jobs ?
Surely you have a better method than this.
I've heard a bit about the wingless drosphilia, but I understand
that there are two strains - a warm one and a cold one and
the warm one regains it's wings above 70 F. Not much use.
They CAN'T go in the fridge. I'm still in trouble about that
little incident with the worms and the spanish rice.
Which begs the question, how do they regain their wings ?
Is this a mutation that ``fixes'' itself ?
A prompts response would be most appreciated, as, judging from the number
of pupae in and around the container, there are going to be a LOT of
flies when I go into work monday.
--
``You must have an IQ of at least half a million'' -- Popeye
richard@gryphon.CTS.COM {backbone...err, well connected site}!gryphon!richardmeo@stiatl.UUCP (Miles O'Neal) (11/14/88)
In article <8648@gryphon.COM> richard@gryphon.COM (Richard Sexton) writes: >I'm having a problem with fruit flies. ... >A prompts response would be most appreciated, as, judging from the number >of pupae in and around the container, there are going to be a LOT of >flies when I go into work monday. Obviously you never heard about Ignorantzi Casserole's work with fruit flies. This exact experiment was performed exactly ONCE in all of recorded history, and resulted in: a wine smell that brought connoiseurs and lushes alike from over 50 Km away on a windy day, the only recorded 73 kg goldfish on record, and the world's worst recorded plague of fruit flies, which, fortunately for southern Italy, were blown across the Med into North Africa, where they turned the beautiful, lush "cradle of civilization" into the humongous desert it is today. Oh yeah, some of the flies mutated (evolved? devolved? were undivinely refashioned?) into very sick facsimiles (technology even then!) of men, who are alive even today in that corner of the world - the most prominent going under the human-names of Khadaffy and Arafart. *I'm* getting my family's tickets to Iceland RIGHT NOW! GOOD-BYE!
markk@iscuva.ISCS.COM (Mark Kimmerly) (11/15/88)
In article <8648@gryphon.COM> richard@gryphon.COM (Richard Sexton) writes: > >I'm having a problem with fruit flies. > >Apparantly they are a wonderfull food for tropical fish, so I set >about recently trying to establish some sort of practical method >of culturing them. > >.... > > What is it they are attracted to ? I can't give you any scientific answers, but according to rumors, there's a woman at work here who is supposed to be able to attract flies just by uncrossing her legs. I don't know how she does it, maybe she just has a way with nature or something. If you want, I can find out who it is and send you a phone number or address. -- Markk (professional smart-ass)
bgt@homxc.UUCP (B.TONGUE) (11/15/88)
-In article <1483@stiatl.UUCP>, meo@stiatl.UUCP (Miles O'Neal) writes: -> In article <8648@gryphon.COM> richard@gryphon.COM (Richard Sexton) writes: -> >I'm having a problem with fruit flies. Just remember folks, Time flies like an arrow! Fruit flies like a banana! -- %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% %% The Speaking Tongue, AT&T %% C Code. C Code Run. Run, Code, RUN! %% %% (..att!..)homxc!ela0!bgt %% PLEASE!!!! %% %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
jennifer@uokmax.UUCP (Moira K Nightfall) (11/16/88)
The Fly
- Karl Shapiro -
O hideous little bat, the size of snot,
With polyhedral eye and shabby clothes,
To populate the stinking cat you walk
The promontory of the dead man's nose,
Climb with the fine leg of a Duncan-Phyfe
The smoking mountains of my food
And in a comic mood
In mid-air take to bed a wife.
Riding and riding with your filth of hair
On gluey foot or wing, forever coy,
Hot from the compost and green sweet decay,
Sounding your buzzer like an urchin toy --
You dot all whiteness with diminutive stool,
In the tight belly of the dead
Burrow with hungry head
And inlay maggots like a jewel.
At your approach the great horse stomps and paws
Bringing the hurricane of his heavy tail;
Shod in disease you dare to kiss my hand
Which sweeps against you like an angry flail;
Still you return, return, trusting your wing
To draw you from the hunter's reach
That learns to kill to teach
Disorder to the tinier thing.
My peace is your disaster. For your death
Children like spiders cup their pretty hands
And wives resort to chemistry of war.
In fens of sticky paper and quicksands
You glue yourself to death. Where you are stuck
You struggle hideously and beg
You amputate your leg
Imbedded in the amber muck.
But I, a man, must swat you with my hate
Slap you across the air and crush your flight,
Must mangle with my shoe and smear your blood,
Expose your little guts pasty and white,
Knock your head sidewise like a drunkard's hat,
Pin your wings under like a crow's
Tear off your flimsy clothes
And beat you as one beats a rat.
Then like Gargantua I stride among
The corpses strewn like raisins in the dust,
The broken bodies of the narrow dead
That catch the throat with fingers of disgust
I sweep. One gyrates like a top and falls
And stunned, stone blind, and deaf
Buzzes its frightful F
And dies between three cannibals.
-----
--
Moira Nightfall
sun!texsun\ | FLASH! Intelligence of mankind decreasing.
>!uokmax!jennifer | Details at ... uh, when the little hand is
att!occrsh/ | on the ....