parasites in captive bred Ts

[Adam Smith]

One of my spiderling maculatas was dead last nite and had no idea why, the temp and humidity was fine and had seen it eat just the other day. This morning I looked at it again and saw a white spot on its foot and one on the mouth opening, further inspection I found 2 of them crawling round on my hand. How could a captive bred sling catch parasites such as the mites (dont know what the name or species of the mites are). Could it be from the food? I recently received a culture of wingless fruit flies through post and the cardboard box was damaged and the tub was wet, smelling stale, like beer. I dont know whether the maggots of wingless fruitflies need to be kept moist as they dried out when transferring them to different tub. So could it be the food I fed the spider that passed on the nasty critters? Ive disposed of the live food and as Im aware though I gave each spiderling one each the dead one was the only one a actually saw eating one so im hoping the rest are ok. Any ideas on this would be great and any suggestions on preventing cross contamination on al my spiders. Would it be an idea to clean, change and sterilise all my collection or is that extreme?

[Ray Hale]

Hi Adam sorry to hear of your problem.

The mites that you spaek of have probably come from the crickets. If a cricket dies in the tank they have an uncanny knack of appearing.

Although not all mites are harmful to the tarantula it is best to try and avoid them. Regular removal of debris such as dead crickets or discarded food matter will help.

As a tip I dont feed and water at the same time as damp substrate coupled with cricket and heat can cause problems. I feed them first and then if the cricket has been taken the next day I spray the tank thus avoiding wet crickets.

I find this helps and lose few spiderlings.

Hope this help[s

Ray

[Adam Smith]

Thanks for that Ray, spoke to Richard about this and said the mites probably are the beneficiary ones that will have appeared after the slings death and feeding on the dead spider. As for the advice on feeding and water wil definitely take in to mind. My main concern was that they were parasites that may have been harmful and didntwant to risk anymore from my collection. Better to be wary and question everything than being sorry later.