Post by peas on Jan 26, 2017 14:09:08 GMT
Last night I took my snails out of their house and noticed that they had a few tiny little mites running around their shells. They are tiny, smaller than a dot. Round, vaguely orange coloured. Certainly not springtails (as I keep those already) as they did not jump when blown on lightly.
However, the mites were mainly on the shells of the snails, and there weren't many, maybe 6 or so per snail that I could see and I have two snails. They weren't going in and out of the pneumostome from what I could tell (but the pneumostome was mostly closed when I was holding them), they also weren't really going on the body, a few were. But still mostly on the shell. So I'm not 100% certain if these are parasitic yet or not.
If they are parasitic the next problem comes is that my enclosure is very bio-active using springtails, woodlice and worms to keep the place fresh. So realistically I can't do a proper fully clean out, since the decor such as the cork logs have many woodlice living inside, and don't want to ruin the balance.
Obviously I'd want to use hypoaspis miles if these mites are parasitic, would they do a good enough job of keeping the snails clear from mites even if I don't do the whole "nuke the enclosure from hell with a million hypoaspis and baking all decor"? Like if I bought a tub of 1000 and put them in.
Another thing with hypoaspis comes with the bio-activity I already have, I love my little woodlice and would hate to have their babies predated on by the hypoaspis. So has anyone used hypoaspis is the same enclosure as woodlice to any ill effect? The woodlice are porcellionides pruinosus if that matters.
Also, I already know they'll eat my springtails but how badly will they effect them? I already have quite a lot of springtails but would hypoaspis wipe them out or like severely limit their numbers that I end up needed to replace them?
Here's a picture of one of the mites if anyone can maybe tell me if it is riccardoella limacum, or perhaps even some hypoaspis that came in for my springtails. Unfortunately they're so small it's hard to get a good picture, also that one looks quite white, but when I looked at them they were more orange-y to my eye.
i.imgur.com/3EvBwzi.jpg
Oh yeah, I also found this website bioactiveherps.co.uk/ which sells hypoaspis in tubs of 1000 rather than the usual 10,000 which seems like a better number to me for my enclosure. Is this a decent site, has anyone used it before?
However, the mites were mainly on the shells of the snails, and there weren't many, maybe 6 or so per snail that I could see and I have two snails. They weren't going in and out of the pneumostome from what I could tell (but the pneumostome was mostly closed when I was holding them), they also weren't really going on the body, a few were. But still mostly on the shell. So I'm not 100% certain if these are parasitic yet or not.
If they are parasitic the next problem comes is that my enclosure is very bio-active using springtails, woodlice and worms to keep the place fresh. So realistically I can't do a proper fully clean out, since the decor such as the cork logs have many woodlice living inside, and don't want to ruin the balance.
Obviously I'd want to use hypoaspis miles if these mites are parasitic, would they do a good enough job of keeping the snails clear from mites even if I don't do the whole "nuke the enclosure from hell with a million hypoaspis and baking all decor"? Like if I bought a tub of 1000 and put them in.
Another thing with hypoaspis comes with the bio-activity I already have, I love my little woodlice and would hate to have their babies predated on by the hypoaspis. So has anyone used hypoaspis is the same enclosure as woodlice to any ill effect? The woodlice are porcellionides pruinosus if that matters.
Also, I already know they'll eat my springtails but how badly will they effect them? I already have quite a lot of springtails but would hypoaspis wipe them out or like severely limit their numbers that I end up needed to replace them?
Here's a picture of one of the mites if anyone can maybe tell me if it is riccardoella limacum, or perhaps even some hypoaspis that came in for my springtails. Unfortunately they're so small it's hard to get a good picture, also that one looks quite white, but when I looked at them they were more orange-y to my eye.
i.imgur.com/3EvBwzi.jpg
Oh yeah, I also found this website bioactiveherps.co.uk/ which sells hypoaspis in tubs of 1000 rather than the usual 10,000 which seems like a better number to me for my enclosure. Is this a decent site, has anyone used it before?
I'm sorry I can't ID the bug for you though as that would help you determine what to do.