Hypoaspis miles -Keeping

[Snipes]

I will be getting an order of these guys in soon. Considering their price, I was wondering if anyone has been successful in keeping these guys alive for a long time. It would be useful to have a colony on hand just in case. How would I provide sufficient food for them?

 

[Snipes]

no one has kept them?

 

[Gsc]

Back in the mid-1990's there was a dealer out of LA by the name of Mascarino that used to be HEAVY into inverts- well ahead of their time... used to produce a small periodical that was awesome... They would sell small groups of these predatory mites to customers .... I talked with them about culturing the mites (I've tried twice to culture them...didn't pay enough attention to keep the colonies going...)... Try coco peat bedding (they need to saty semi moist) with some rotton leaf litter on the surface (maybe DON'T sterilize the leaf litter so there are other micro organisms for them to feed on)... toss any uneated dead crickets/roaches in with them... maybe "bad mites" or other organisms will feed on the decaying prey items thus providing food for yourr Hypoaspis miles...

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I just found this online:

"This tiny (0.5 mm) light-brown mite naturally inhabits the top 1/2" layer of soil where fungus gnats, as well as springtails and thrips pupae dwell. The female Hypoaspis mites lay their eggs in the soil, which hatch in 1-2 days, and the nymphs and adults feed on the soil-dwelling pests. Populations of Hypoaspis include both sexes, but the males are much smaller and rarely seen.

Each Hypoaspis mite will consume 1-5 prey or eggs per day. They survive by feeding on algae and/or plant debris when insects aren't available. Their entire life cycle is 7-11 days."
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THAT being said, there are a few dealers selling springtail cultures (ie Double D's , etc.)....

Article also mentioned them feeding on plant debris- hence maybe my rotton leaf idea may work in more than one way!


Good luck!

Graham

 

[Galapoheros]

I tried the same thing Graham did. I also didn't keep up with it. I never could really get them going in a container by themselves very well. They seem to do best in containers I have my pedes in anyway so I stopped trying to raise them by themselves. Other than taking care of the centipedes with food and moisture, I don't do anything different to keep the good mites going in those containers. Since I have Hypoaspis mites, I don't dry out the sub, that will kill the mites too. Sometimes it looks like they are dying out and I only see a couple in some of the containers. Then in a week or two, I may see a bunch of them. I guess the mites are getting food from the leftovers from the pedes and maybe from bad mites that are on food I feed the pedes. I should say that I had the mites I'm calling Hypoaspis IDd by Biocontrol from a picture I sent them. It's possible they may have incorrectly IDd them since I didn't send them a specimen. They run around on my pedes and will stop where a bad mite is and shrivel it up.

 

[Snipes]

cool, hopefully i can keep them going in my pede cage then.