To maintain an active culture of vinegar eels is
simple and they are an excellent backup plan for feeding betta fry.
However, they should not be the only food you are feeding betta fry. Brine
shrimp are the best food, but microworms and vinegar eels are necessary
for the interim time when baby brine shrimp are still too big for the betta fry
to eat.
All you need to maintain a vinegar eel culture are the following:
1. A mixture of apple cider vinegar and water, at a 1:1 ratio.
2. A large surface area container and a flask.
3. Some floss.
We use the simplest way possible to maintain and harvest our vinegar eels, so
that is the method we will share with you (although there are many methods
available elsewhere). You start your culture in a container with a large
surface area. You should fill it with a
50/50 mixture of apple cider vinegar and water, and the 4 oz starter culture. When
the solution becomes slightly cloudy, you should pour the solution into a flask
or long neck bottle; just filling to within the neck. Push a wad of floss down the neck of the bottle until it barely
contacts the surface of the solution. Add water to the
neck to fill it to the top. As the worms increase in population, they will
wriggle up through the floss into the clear water. At that time you may
easily suction the worms out with an eyedropper and feed them to your fish.
As the solution evaporates, simply add more water.
The initial solution will work for months. If the solution gets too cloudy
and full of mulm, make up a new batch in a quart jar and seed it with some clean
eels. You should then replace the "dirty" culture with the clean new one
as soon as the population appears to be growing OK. Vinegar eels are
incredibly easy to maintain and so easy to feed.
Same temperature principles apply to Vinegar Eels as
to the Microworms! Remember these are "live".
