MSU OPM: How to Rear Nematodes for Biocontrol

[@JeffTheHokie]

Rather than two dishes and a one-month wait between generations, could you use a freshly-dead or dying host to infect a dish full of new hosts? You might lose some verifiable purity, but this would also selectively breed nematodes for maximum contagion.

[@HousesBuiltTiny]

Great job John! Really need to know information from a farmer's perspective. Could you comment a little bit on collateral damage to earthworms and any research that you might know of applying nematodes on a mycelium rich soil Bass?

[@tedkraft6416]

Nematodes are pretty species specific, that is they various nematodes have specific hosts and don’t effect or infect others outside of the specific class, or species. Earthworms aren’t on their menu. I’ve used them small scale in gardens and on specific plants for caterpillars (tomatoes/tomato horn worm as well as on my lawn and area around my kennels for fleas (different nematode from the ones on the tomatoes) safe for us hell on the target species.

[@__-pl3jg]

Awesome! Thanks for taking the time to organize this tutorial.

[@K1ck1992]

I would like to try this just for fun some day

[@beachin4664]

Great video! I have a question: can you also use this method (with wax worms) on the nemaslug nematodes ? The species is called:Phasmarhabditis hermaphrodita. I tried this with slugs, but no nematodes emerged in the white trap... Any idea how to grow them?

[@robs9574]

what is the purpose of the filter paper?

[@HavanaWoody]

Thank you for this procedure, I was inspired to multiply the Heterorhabditis indica i had ordered to control small hive Beatles, so i can inoculate some large areas were i have regular issues with army web worms and cucumber borers as well. Your method is great for production in a lab , i am experimenting with a terrarium with glass beads and a sample of the maggots and infected honey comb to produce massive amounts in a continuous breeder, im anxiously awaiting a time lapse of the process so i can better understand the entire cycle. Hopefully I can find a way for beekeepers everywhere to control these awful pest. I am wondering if i might be able to grow infected maggots that i feed to birds so they can help spread them locally. Ill be looking into other nematode species when i have successfully developed this experimental method. Thank you for the inspiration and basic methodology.

[@felixpfeiffer9863]

that is amazing! i cant really imagine how glass beads and a terrarium are used with honey comb... do you have any more insights to this?

[@alexyello5208]

Any Idea if you can raise more than one species in the same petri dish?

[@opticallama3576]

Hello 👋☺ great tutorial, thank you kindly! Question 🙋 Is it okay to use meal worms as hosts as I know where to find those, not sure about availability of wax worms where I stay.

[@DannyTillotson]

Did you find the answer to your own question? I'm wondering the same.

[@BlaisZeroni]

Did you find the answer to this question? Wondering the same

[@zedmeinhardt3404]

Any update? I'm wondering the same

[@Sammus7t]

@@zedmeinhardt3404 Hopefully the other commenters are notified of this answer. Seems tagging multiple people isn't a thing on youtube anymore. Anyway, you can, yes. From what I've read, meal worms and superworms are preferred to wax worms for automated in vivo culturing because their bodies are less fragile than wax worms. Only real downsides to meal worms/superworms are that the yield will be lower per host, since they're smaller than wax worms. And their tougher bodies make them more difficult to infect, so your infection rates won't be quite as high as they would be with wax worms. They're cheap though, so it's not a big deal.

[@marcopaganelli6059]

Hi these nematods can be dangerous for butterfly pupae or caterpillars?

[@matthewking2209]

Do they need to be stored in tissue flask or can they be applied right away?

[@pankajgopatwar8105]

Hi thanks for such a nice video. Can you make any video on fishing nematodes from soil suspension?

[@Igetsomuchbrain]

Could you help with retailing nematodes, what is the market?

[@squeaks321]

What size tissue flask?

[@jwchitwood]

Is there anything magic about the filter paper..... would any substrate do? for example regular paper towel

[@CSFRazielCSF]

Would Reverse Osmosis water be an acceptable substitute?

[@zedmeinhardt3404]

For anyone still wondering, de-chlorinated tap water has been used successfully by others at home. Or bottled distilled water. May not be ideal but has proven successfull elsewhere.

[@dougbrown6952]

can u just add the wax worms to your inoculated soil?

[@robinslof657]

I hope somebody will reply: How could the nematodes travel to the outer petridish during the white trap? I thought the white trap was performed using whatman filter paper to connect the inner petridish to the outer petridish. In this movie, the nematodes magically travel to the outer petridish. Can somebody explain the white trap to me?

[@MSUOPM]

Thanks for your question. Believe it or not, the nematodes crawl over the lip of the smaller petri dish into the water in the larger petri dish. We've been using this method for years now and can attest that it works! 

[@robinslof657]

Thanks for your reply! I'm happy to hear it is that easy. I would like to do this for application in horticulture. These little creatures are very expensive when I want to buy them by a manufacturer. But it's very easy to make them myself, when I ordered 1 batch of nematodes. Do you think I can use toilet paper in stead of Whatmann filter paper? I suggest this filter paper is used to provide a stable environment for the nematode to migrate towards the moths, because they can not move properly at plastic? Then it would be a very easy and cheap procedure to multiply this very nice nematodes!

[@MSUOPM]

Robin Slof Hi Robin, We have successfully used both paper towels and coffee filter material in place of filter paper.

[@antoniotesta1647]

+Robin Slof Robin, We do this at Cornell and have a slightly different way to rear our "persistent" nematodes vs. the ones mentioned here which are purchased through a company. We also find the interior petri dish holding the white trap unnecessary. We also do our culture in soil. we have been working with greenhouse people for a few years. If you would like additional information, please contact me at the information found on the videos we have online.

[@MrJim217]

Matthew Grieshop Thank you very much for the knowledgeable information is there anyway I could purchase all four types from you?

[@nicklarsen7125]

i love to see something like this: =. Im from denmark and im looking for a way to kill Arion vulgaris, Deroceras reticulatum, Deroceras agreste. Do you think using Wax worms would make it posible to breed them to be used at our farm ?.... They eat alot we have tryed nemaslug but its way to expensive :/....

[@AnimeShinigami13]

siiiigh, I can already tell that this is beyond my means is an urban gardener in a tiny old apartment.

[@justindougherty6465]

Its not though you can do this in a closet or a kitchen cabinet most expensive things gonna be the dishes and micro pipettes

[@justindougherty6465]

And a microscope

[@AnimeShinigami13]

@@justindougherty6465 there's a phone microscope I've been eyeing for 12 bucks. attaches to your phone and shows what it sees on the screen. I keep meaning to order one so I can look more carefully at plant pests. I'm a lot more worried about sterility. I'm not the neatest person on the planet and if I struggle to keep things clean enough for growing mushrooms you can bet these guys would give me trouble. I wanted to see if it was feasible to do on a low tech scale without much sterilization because my apartment is infested with shore flies. ;.; I spent years just trying to find out what they were!

[@DannyTillotson]

@@AnimeShinigami13 You can do it. I wouldn't worry about being too steralise. These nematodes multiply in dirty plant soil if they find insects there so it's not absolutely essential at all. Just try and keep chlorine away from them that's all that's put in tap water - either boil the tap water first and let it cool down or let the tap water be left for 24-48 hours before using. I'd say that's about as sterile as you need.

[@AnimeShinigami13]

@@DannyTillotson i bought distilled water. and now i have a waterfilter which removes "chlorination byproducts" and has a nice light to show me its working.