Im going to be getting a colony of spring tails tonight any tips?

RoachCoach

Arachnodemon
Joined
Sep 2, 2019
Messages
703
Sorry, I was absolutely horsed out of my head last night. @Frogdaddy pretty much summed up everything I was going to say, so thank you for saving me from typing it up. But, I'm lazy. I wouldn't even have had used bullet points.
Also @Polenth nailed it. As far as a camera and macro lens, go mirrorless. It will cost a lot more but if you plan to get into shooting stuff @Arachnid Addicted and a couple others can show you way of macro. I only got dope shots because my brother is a photographer and he gave me his old gear for presents. The lens will be a huge bank killer. BUT, lenses(especially) mirrorless will not depreciate in value if they are kept well. Do your DD. There are a ton of YouTube photographers that have very good recommendations. Some get a kickback on linking the less quality Chinese made lenses. I would recommend Sony even though I have all canon gear now. Canon is still producing DSLR. It should have been phased out a couple years ago.
 

Malum Argenteum

Arachnoknight
Joined
Dec 16, 2020
Messages
284
"Brewers yeast", unless purchased in a homebrew shop, is not viable. It is dead, scraped from the bottom of the fermenter. Live brewing yeast would be cost prohibitive to use as springtail food -- it is a very specialized product, with strains specifically bred to fine-tune beer flavor. One pound of bread yeast is around $6; 500g of dried brewing yeast -- not even the good refrigerated strains -- is about $90.

"Bread yeast", purchased from a grocery store or similar, is viable -- it is alive, and will reproduce (to some extent) in a spring cx.

I strongly prefer bread yeast for feeding springs (over brewers/nutritional yeast), and I'd estimate dart frog keepers are pretty evenly split between the two. It does not carry nor attract mites, and it is harder to overfeed the cx with bread yeast (which will remain alive) than with brewers yeast (which will fester).

FWIW, many folks have slightly better luck with 'temperate' springs (Folsomia candida) than with tropical (which I've seen referred to as SInella sp.), but YMMV.
 

Polenth

Arachnobaron
Joined
Sep 29, 2018
Messages
460
Do you know if they will do fine on normal bread yeast?
I've never kept springtails with charcoal or anything of that nature. I got them in substrate and added it to other enclosures (I mainly keep woodlice and millipedes). That means the springtails eat whatever everyone else is eating. But at risk of upsetting yeast fandom, I give the animals baker's yeast sometimes and the springtails are happy to eat it.
 
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