Little white bugs in Roach Colony

[Morgan]

I have tons and tons of these super small white bugs. There are so many of them that it looks like I have fungus growing in the container. When I took a much closer look they move. They kind a smell also. I have tried to get as many as I could out but they just keep coming back, millions of them.

What are they?

and

How in the world do I get rid of them?

 

[Jesse607]

You have mites. The best way to get rid of them is to have better ventilation and/or cut down on the amount of moisture in the enclosure. Let everything dry out completely for awhile (until they are gone).

 

[VesAn]

I had a small number of them in my little b. giganteus colony. I took all the substrate for a couple of weeks, stopped misting during the 1st week the substrates were out and now they are all gone. Not sure if this would work if you have a lot of them, though.

 

[Mister Internet]

I know it's "recommended" to mist some roaches, but honestly, they can withstand nuclear fallout, I'm hardly certain they will go legs-up if they can't drink standing water. Try no substrate and no misting, and your mite problem will go away... just use water crystals instead.

 

[Buspirone]

I've gone over a month without feeding or supplying water to my orange head colony and it is just fine.

 

[Morgan]

Thanks you guys very much. I am really impressed by the knowledge on this forum.

 

[james]

Mites

All the above info is great. Keep it clean and dry and they should be gone in no time. I have also heard that pillbugs eat the mites and people sometimes keep them with their roaches. Never had mites yet to try this, but always wondered if it was true.
James

 

[conway]

remove ALL dead things, wet food like tomatoes or anything else with lots of water in it, they go mouldy extremly quick, just keep removing dead carcases and you should be fine

 

[ghost_tomb]

i've not had my colony of roachs long enough to see a dead roach but i thought that they ate their dead?

 

[dangerprone69]

I'm curious as to what I have.

There's tons of these little bugs that first appeared with my blaptica dubias. They don't seem to bother the roaches, they congregate in whatever foodsource I give the dubias. I changed their enclosure and the little bastards reappeared.

At first I thought they could have been early stage dubia nymphs, because I found a dropped ootheca. I'm pretty sure they're mites, and now I'm afraid of them getting into my T enclosures. I honestly could care less about the roaches, since the only reason I have them is as a food source for my T's. I wish I could post some pics of these things to get a better ID.

 

[Scythemantis]

They sound like the little white mites that breed in moist soil. As far as I know they can't hurt any other animal, but they do breed like crazy.

 

[Brian F.]

I can vouch for Mister Internet's post above. I had mites in my Discoid colony (Rubbermaid container with a large hole cut in the lid). I just took the lid off and stopped misting them altogether. They dried out in about a week or so and I haven't had any problems since. I haven't misted them ever since either!

 

[Scythemantis]

My lobsters go months and months with no water in any form. When I do put water in there or mist them a little they only seem casually interested in it, like they get enough from the air.

 

[dangerprone69]

Thanks guys!! Good to know that they're relatively harmless. The last thing I'd want is to lose any of my T's because of these mites.