Clean-up Crew: Springtails & Ants

[Sam_the_Ant]

So for the past couple of months, I have been trying to find ways to keep my ant colony nice and healthy. They have a dreadful habit of dragging prey down into the soil and I cannot get the corpses out unfortunately. This obviously causes mould growth and can be quite deadly to a colony if left unchecked.

So I was at my local pet store and having a look at all the bugs they had (because I'm studying towards Entomology) and I noticed they had a culture of Springtails!! Now these little white critters are known for eating things like mould, poo and other bad things inside terrariums for amphibians and reptiles. Anyway I bought them, and got them straight into my colony to see if this would fix my problem, without having to dig up the entire nest.

Since I have put these in, these springtails have done wonders for the colony, and now my ants are beginning to come back to life. They are deep down in the nest, seen enjoying munching on the rubbish left by the ants.

The ants have no quam with the springtails being around, and I'm guessing that they welcome them into the nest. Its a great alliance, just like the aphids, and now I have started cultivating them to help produce a healthier life style.

If anyone is ever worried about mould, or feel that their colony could use a little helping hand in the cleaning process, I would highly recommend using the Hexapods to give the ants a lesson in being tidy. But these are not a one off solution, and still require you to get out as much rubbish yourself as possible.And possibly the white mites I got worried about long ago, were these little critters! Hope this helps someone


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[TenebrousNova]

The lawn topsoil that I use for my Lasius niger and Messor barbarus came with a number of little white springtails, who have propagated within both nests. I agree, they cause absolutely no harm to the ants, who leave them alone. They act like a tiny rubbish collection service. When my Messors declined a cricket a few days ago, I found a group of springtails eating it.

[baggers]

Where can you these little critters in the garden, What type of pet shop sells them?

[Wood~Ant]

Worth thinking about getting some of these little guys to help my velox tank keep clean, as lately a number of old workers have died and as this colony is inside a tank the ants have no way of removing dead carcasses. 

[crockatt]

I had posted about these a while ago, not knowing what they were and found out about them being found in ants nest, my lem queen nest is full of them and can only imagine they were in a bag of damp compost that I used, they also need moist conditions to thrive, and you can end up with hundreds of them very quickly, which would be ideal for larger colonies

[Sam_the_Ant]

Well you can buy them online, possibly ebay! But independant pet shops normally stock them, or like someone said, you can find them in the soil, as they like moist, dark area's. If you check under leaf piles you're sure to find some, and they hop and jump (obviously springtails lol).

Yes I had seen them before in my nest, but was not sure of what they were, until I saw them in this pet shop in Surrey.

There are also dwarf woodlice, which are another clean up crew. Very small and white too. But they breed like no mans business, so its not hard to keep them going! ;D

Really fascinating to watch and very helpful in my colony at least.

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