How to raise your own livefood. Live  food  is the best  source of  nutrition for finches and seedeaters, fish, frogs and reptiles. In some species such as the waxbills and softbills it is  essential in  their diet.   It  needs  to  be supplied during  the breeding season to stimulate breeding as well as being a chief source of food for their young.  Starting your pets on a live food diet doesn't have to send you broke. Mealworms: Mealworms are the larvae of the beetle CLICK HERE for detailed instructions on how to raise them. Grasshoppers: Both locust and grass- hoppers are used by aussie aviculturists CLICK HERE  to find out how to keep them.   Gentles: Gentles is just a nicer way of  saying maggots. CLICK HERE for info from a commercial website. CLICK HERE for more tips. See Warning Note Below White Worms: Buy these from the  Aquarium shop. CLICK HERE  for info on how to culture them. Moths/Flying Insects: If you have the space  CLICK HERE .  Otherwise for a more manageable solution CLICK HERE Woodies: Woodies are actually Cockroaches. CLICK HERE to see how to raise your own colony or CLICK HERE  to see another article. Crickets: A good source of protein . CLICK HERE for detailed instructions on how to raise them. For more information CLICK HERE  and if  that's not enough CLICK HERE Fruit Fly: Here are a couple of Fruit Fly sites. CLICK HERE to see how to establish a colony or CLICK HERE for an article on preparing food for a Fruit Fly culture.  Here is a site with great step by step video clips, CLICK HERE to view . WARNING: Please note that there is some debate over the use of gentles (maggots). Some argue that it can lead to paralysis caused by botulin poisoning. To lesson the risk of this,  you need to put the gentles on a straight diet of bran mixed with water, as they eat downwards into the bran, the meat is cleaned out of their gut.   If you are really concerned about this issue,  I'd recommend that you don't use maggots, alternatively, you may want to open up a discussion on the forum and see if anyone has encountered problems.