Vinegar Eels for The Aquarium

Vinegar eels are fundamentally fry food, & simple to grow. They are not eels, but are classified as a minute nematode worm (Turbatrix aceti. & feed on vinegar or acidic, fermenting vegetable matter. These small roundworms are bilaterally symmetrical, about .08 in. (two mm) long, & lives for around ten months with a maximum hard work of care.

To cultivate, fill a gallon jar with a quart of undistilled apple cider vinegar, a quart & a half of aged icy tap water, & an apple cut in to 6 sections. If your water is usually hard, increase the apple cider vinegar to a 60% ratio. Introduce your vinegar eel culture to the container, & cover with a piece of cloth, held in place by a rubber band to keep flies out of the culture.

Wait & see with the culture, as it may take up to a month for the culture to be strong to see the eels in massive numbers. When you can see them in quantity, it is time to harvest & feed to your fishes.

Harvesting vinegar eels is perhaps the most challenging part of the whole process. The simplest way to accomplish this is to draw the eel loaded liquid up with a small baster, such as is used for basting chicken or turkey. Transfer this liquid in to a funnel lined with a coffee filter placed over the opening of the culture jar to return the excess liquid to the container. When you feel that you have harvested for a feeding, gently rinse the coffee filter under a stream of icy freshwater for several minutes. Swish the inverted filter in your tank, & feed the fishes. If feeding several tanks, swish the filter in a beaker of water, & feed the eels using an eyedropper.
Vinegar eels will stay near the surface of the water, so are not lovely food for bottom feeders. Surface feeders such as rainbowfish will benefit greatly from feeding vinegar eels, but lots of cichlid fry are bottom feeders. This is why a variety of live foods is important to feeding fry.

In case you do not feed vinegar eels on a regular basis, don't be concerned. The culture will keep indefinitely for a year with small care needed. A couple of times per year, narrow out the culture by using a coffee filter & funnel, remove about half the media, & replace with fresh media in the proper ratio. You can then gift a fellow aquarist with the culture to start a vinegar eel colony of their own.