Please Help Me

[Craig Toon]

A couple of months ago I posted a thread regarding microscopic larve in water bowls. further to this on the 25/05/12 I completed a full clean out of all my Ts. I nuked all of the furnishings and removed all the substrate from the tanks and replaced with New materilas and new substrate. due to this issue before I have been very vigilant with my cleaning procdures. I remove all live and dead food items after 24hrs or as soon as the tarantula puts it down, I also have been removing water bowls before feeding.
As soon as the water bowls are dirty I empty clean and replace with clean water. Low and behold after an inspection this moring, the problem of the larve in the water has returned.

I have tried to take pictures, but the larve is very small and looks white, I can't fathom out why this keeps hapening to me and I am starting to wonder what more I can do to prevent or get rid of the problem.

Is there anyone I could send a sample of the water too to find out what the larve is? I personlly dont thinks its mites as I check the substrate at night for movemnet and see nothing I also check my Ts daily with a tourch.

In the last thread a member mentioned spring tails but when I touch the larve they dont jump they just disperse with the film of the surface water.

can some one please help me

[Peter Lacey]

Craig
have another read of the replies in your original thread

http://thebts.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?7851-Microscopic-maggot-s-larve-in-water-bowls&p=58681#post58681

Its very likely what you are worrying about is quite simply nothing to worry about and a natural occurrence. I'm almost certain what you have is springtails, they tend to sit on the water rather than around the edge.
As Ive suggested before you can nuke your whole enclosure/room/house but they will return.
Please don't consider them a pest, they're actually doing you a service.
I'm guessing if you had a good enough camera they'd look like this, although they might not be so pink:

http://www.livefoodcultures.com/springtails.html

[Craig Toon]

Thanks Looking at the picture's on the spiring tail link, they do look very similar but mine they seem more white than pink. You mentioned spring tails sitting on the water, again mine seem to be on the surface of the water but in the center of the water bowl its is hard to tell due to there size.

Peter once agian thank you for your reponse you have made me feel more at easie, I just want my T's to be healthy and to be kept in the best possible enviroment I could offer.

[Damian Storer]

Hello Craig

What you're describing sounds very similar to what i've encountered recently. The only difference was that mine were never near the water dish / bowl but instead were buried about 1 to 2 centimeters below the surface of the substrate against the side of the vivarium. I'm guessing, but i think these little white 'mites' could be larve and i suspect that the crickets i've been feeding my T have been little randy buggers and have been breeding! I've started putting one cricket in the vivarium at a time now to limit the amount of time the cricket has in there before they meet their fate. In their tub they can go for it, but only one cricket at a time now in with my T

[Damian Storer]

Well, additional to the above i've recently encountered mites in a bag!! I emptied half a bag of orchid bark into my newly cleaned tank to discover under an LED torch light that the bark was teeming with mites i have been using John Innes seeding compost as an alternative recently following advice from Peter Roach to get my T off bark, but had run out so decided to open this bag as a quick fix until i got some more, but i was just making the situation worse. So i emptied the tank immediately and gave it a thorough cleaning out with hot water, then did it the right way and got some seeding compost asap. I'm not sure if anyone else has ever encountered this, but the remainder of the bag has been thrown out. No more fine cut orchid bark for my T

[Ray Hale]

First of all I think you might be worrying yourselves needlessly. I use a John Innes compost and have no problems. The thing to remember is that in the wild tarantulas do not live in a sterile environment. I have seen them living in burrows crawling with mites, on trees surrounded by potter wasps and underneath stilt houses sharing their webs with other spiders. I agree with Peter on his use of compost. What ever you do the truth is that your substrate will have some sort of organism within. It doesnt mean that they will harm your spider. Dont get me wrong general housekeeping is important. Removal of dead crickets and old skins ect. I believe the secret is not to try and make too much of a science out of the hobby and enjoy it. I know when I first started I spent hours scanning the substrate of my Chile Rose looking for anything (other than the spider of course) that moved and then panicing if I saw something.
Damian has a good idea with single cricket feeding. If the cricket has not bee taken after two days I remove it. This reduces the chance of one dieing and getting stuck somewhere. You are right the mites appear when the cricket as started to decompose. Another trick you can try is to feed and water your spider at separate times. I water the spider (spraying) and the two days later feed it. This allows the atmosphere to settle and when you introduce the cricket it is less likely to "drown" as it absorbs the water filled air. It works for me and I dont have any problems with intruders.

Hope some of this helps and keep us informed. If you can get some photos lets have a look and see if we can be more specific. Happy Spidering guys.

Ray

[Peter Roach]

I really think that you are worrying over nothing and trying to micromanage your spiders enclosure and life unnecessarily.
Tarantulas have lived in the undergrowth with micro organisms for millions of years and have survived quite successfully without interference from us. Sometimes we as keepers have to interfere if the micro-organisms population has an explosion and there are just too many of them. The easiest way of controlling their numbers is to dry the substrate out by not spraying or watering and removing the water bowl.

i have been using John Innes seeding compost as an alternative recently following advice from Peter Roach to get my T off bark, but had run out so decided to open this bag as a quick fix until i got some more,

A bag of seedling compost will be enough for several tanks filled to a decent depth or a multitude of tubs. How come you ran out ?
Once a substrate is in one of my tanks/tubs . . . it will stay in there for at least a year and usually longer.

You emptied half a bag of orchid bark in a newly clean tank and you was surprised that there was micro bugs in it ?
Did you think that the company who bagged it up would have sterilised it first ?

I personlly dont thinks its mites as I check the substrate at night for movemnet and see nothing I also check my Ts daily with a tourch.

Really !! I've never done this in all the years that I've kept T's. (micro management again ?)
I think I checked mine about a week ago or was it the week before (cant honestly remember)

In the last thread a member mentioned spring tails but when I touch the larve they dont jump they just disperse with the film of the surface water.

If they are on the water surface, they CANT jump
They can only jump when on a stable and solid surface and water isnt either.

Is there anyone I could send a sample of the water too to find out what the larve is?

Yep. Send a sample of the water with the creatures to me and I'll take a look at them under a good microscope. No way am I an expert but I will be able to see exactly what they are and we can go from there.
If this is agreeable to you, PM me and I'll send you my address (or if you are about in central London or the the City I can meet you to pick them up from you)

[Aragorn Davies]

yer peter, peter and ray are absolutely right, springtails aren't a problem, under normal natural conditions they make up a large percentage of biomass in soil and munch all the decomposing matter and some fungus's they contribute considerably to the natural recycling process of soil, there are some species that eat nematodes also, so in reality they are the good critters and unless you make a practise of nuking your substrate every month and keeping it bone dry and ensuring there is no decomposing matter of any sort then you will have them no matter what in varying degrees, and don't forget that all soil or compost is composed of decomposing matter loam and biomass...so springtails aren't an issue...and if you are seeing them in your water bowl its because they are moving around the moist area of the substrate where you water because they prefer a moist substrate and as they hop about fall into the water or even climb the water bowl and get in it that way, in the right conditions they will breed extensively.

One thing i have noticed is to remember that the substrate will hold considerable moister for quite a long time given that there is no real drainage to the substrate system in a t enclosure, so over watering is actually very easy, there is a whole debate about moisture and humidity and the thing i have noticed is that air humidity can vary considerably but the humidity at the surface of the soil will remain high due simply to the moisture content in the soil and will stay that way even when the system appears relatively dry, if you worry about these things you could measure your humidity with a hygrometer (i wouldn't bother though)and the humidity will seem low but these are air values and will always be variable depending on many things but but even with low air values if you have been watering your substrate I'll bet the humidity at the surface of the substrate may be at 90%, i.e will have a high moisture content and favourable conditions for things to grow and breed things like fungus if the system is closed like t enclosures are and springtails because they munch on things like fungus and decomposing matter in soil...if the substrate feels dry and looks dry at the surface and you have a 5" layer you can bet its still holding moister deeper, if you dig in and its dry then it will need a bit of water....but basically be care full about over watering its very easy and will cause you problems and don't worry about humidity because you substrate will hold moister and contribute considerably to the humidity of a system,,,off course a water bowl for a drink will provide most of the moisture you require once every now and then you may want to run some water down the side of the tank into the substrate but thats it !!!

there are mites that you will need to worry about and i think the most common are these http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MF_CNOTpSEc...peter demonstrates very well the process for looking after your T in these conditions but generally i believe these are the most common to cause issues in your enclosure, and these would be the ones to worry about BUT i have never seen them yet in my enclosures and i think are actually not common at all.....if you look in fact these types are considerably different to spring tails and are easy to recognise.....

So to summerize.....these are spring tails..https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=sp...w=1366&bih=539

and will always exist in soil and substrate and are good guys, be careful not to over water your substrate, and unless you have those in the video don't worry and enjoy your T's, oh and listen to the advice given by the likes of ray peter and peter as they know their stuff....

[Damian Storer]

Thank you Ray for your advice, as a novice is does appear that i'm trying too hard to some extent and gaining concern over something that the T will cope just fine with. Peter Roach, i ran out of compost as i was changing it ever month or so due to cricket remains and an annoying habit my T has developed of always taking a crap (pardon my German) right on the edge of the substrate and mostly up the glass side!! After a while it just needs a clean out so i've been exchanging it quite alot. This also appears to be excessive as you are keeping the substrate down for a year? i'm learning all the time
Thanks to all in general for advice on here. I suppose on reflection, if i want to create an environment for my T that is as similar to it's natural home then no one comes along in the Chilean outback and digs up the T's home ever month or so do they? Patience is a virtue...

[Ray Hale]

now your talking Damian. Realx and enjoy. You know it makes sense.

Cheers

Ray

[Scott McGlone]

Mites etc

I've been keeping tarantulas for over twenty years and I have always used vermiculite for substrate and never had a problem! Never used compost but it maybe something I would consider.

[Damian Storer]

I've been keeping tarantulas for over twenty years and I have always used vermiculite for substrate and never had a problem! Never used compost but it maybe something I would consider.

I guess we all go through this at some point in discovering what seems to work best and what we end up sticking with. Perhaps the bag i opened recently was just a bad batch as i'd never seen this before. Onwards and upwards...

[John chambers]

I've used Irish peat and these little things came.. I changed to spider life and again they came ( because of wood chips ) I'm now using a triple mix of spider life ( wood chips removed ) core and vermiculite.. no more little bugs..


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[Damian Storer]

I've used Irish peat and these little things came.. I changed to spider life and again they came ( because of wood chips ) I'm now using a triple mix of spider life ( wood chips removed ) core and vermiculite.. no more little bugs..


Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2

I guess this alot of guess work then!! Perhaps there is no one singular answer to the best substrate going, but through advice, experimentation and sharing we'll all end up with a good idea of what works at the time for us and we should run with it. If it ain't broke... Thanks for the input John, the mix is working out! Is this the same for all your T's though? My Grammostola Mollicoma is supposedly a burrower, but would an arboreal still get the same treatment as a light covering at the base or is it far less important? Still might help prevent the mites...

[John chambers]

Yes all my lot are with this same mix..
It's a pain removing the wood chips.
But worth it..

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