# Unidentified Possible Food Source



## bluetip (May 18, 2004)

Hi guys,

another question, I have my viv setup for about 3 months now, with no frogs. I'm seeing these small insects on the driftwood and wanted to ask if maybe you could help me identify what they are.

For lack of a digital camera, they're really small gray insects, somewhere about 1mm in length. They really look like springtails from all the pics that I see but they're gray. Or maybe they are springtails?

Would you have any idea what they are? They move around on the wet driftwood as I have a fountain feature. There's a possibility that they came with the moss bedding that I bought about a month ago.

Thanks

Bluetip


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## bluetip (May 18, 2004)

I think they are not sprintails after all as I live in the Philippines and springtails apparently don't live here due to warm weather...now I don't know what they are!

Their bodies don't look curved at all either as I've read in one of the articles off the net.

thanks
bluetip


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## ckrupke (May 28, 2004)

Need a better description... but they sound like springtails. They could also be mites. Are they round or elongated? It probably does not matter much what they are, if they are small and palatable the frogs will eat them.

Whoever told you springtails don't live in the Philippines was mistaken. They live almost everywhere on earth, pole to pole.


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## EDs Fly Meat (Apr 29, 2004)

I will go out on a limb and say that they are pill bugs or sal bugs, also called rollie pollies. Some can curl up into a ball. They sound like isopods from the description and the young ones are commonly mistaken for sprintails.


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## Guest (Jun 28, 2004)

Are they gray or black and shiney so they reflect the lightand look kinda of gray? I had some small insects like that in the bambo tubes that make up my waterfall. I was really worried and "sterilized" the tubes, much to the dismay of th insects :twisted:. However now i have found some small white/gray insects in the place of the other ones much to my dismay.


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## bluetip (May 18, 2004)

Hi guys,

I think I deduced that they're not springtails because all of the culture instructions that I've read say they will only breed somewhere at 24C (low 70s F ) More or less temps here in the Phils is somewhere at 28-35C (high 70s to high 80s F). My wrong assumption  

I checked google for pill bug images and sad to say, they don't look like them at all. 

They are elongated. They look gray to me, not black and shiney bec there is a distinct color difference between them and the driftwood that they are on. I would not want to sterilize bec they might actually be a good food source. 

The reason I want to find out what they are is because after id, I might be able to find some resource on how to culture them. They do have antennae. 

To decribe them, their bodies (torso and abdomen) look like a grain of rice (top view) with a head region, dark gray in color, with a pair antennae. And like I initially described somewhere at 1mm in size.

thanks

Bluetip


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## Ryan (Feb 18, 2004)

Sow bugs are like you described, related to pil bugs.


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## bluetip (May 18, 2004)

Well, I saw this link:

http://www.southfield.k12.mi.us/shs/sci ... sInfo.html 

for sow bugs, these seem quite big compared to the ones I have in the tank. The bugs in my tank could fit on a ballpoint pen tip. If they are sow bugs though, can they be fed to darts as well?

thanks so much

bluetip


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## Ryan (Feb 18, 2004)

I have seen sow bugs all different sizes, and darts should be fine eating them, they have alot of calcium, and also if they eat too many may get impaction.


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## Christian (Mar 8, 2004)

What is impaction


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## Derek Benson (Feb 19, 2004)

Impaction is when an object is lodged inside of the frog and cannot be passed, it blocks passage ways and they frog will starve.


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## Arklier (Mar 1, 2004)

Death from impaction comes from waste building up inside the animal. They can still eat when they have it, but can't go poop. Eventually the built up waste either poisons the animal, or starts to rot their insides. In larger herps, it usually requires surgery to correct, but some people have had success force feeding the patient cooking oil. I don't know if surgery would be possible on an animal as small as a dart.


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## steelcube (Mar 17, 2004)

Springtail is a common name for collembola... There are thousands different species... with different colors, body shapes, temp and food requirement. Check this site: http://www.collembola.org

A way to find out if it is a springtail is to see if it could jump. Sort of a defense mechanism. They jump away to avoid predators.

I've found several different springtails, but have not been able to culture them. It seems that the hobby is lucky to have the white ones eating almost everything.

The ones that I found are pretty neat looking too, one of them are even smaller than the white ones.


SB


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## Randy (Mar 18, 2004)

Could they be fungus gnats? I've often had colonies of fungus gnats in my wetter vivariums on driftwood and grapewood branches. I like having them in there since it's just one other variety of food that spices up their life. :wink:


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