isopods and spring tails

[rullom]

Hi all, anyone have any suggestions regarding keeping isopods and springtails alive - I dont really see them - I tried lifting some dirt up. The bottom of the cage is around 67-69 C - 3 foot tall cage - top near 80 with basking spot 85.
Humidity reading 40ish near bottom with periods reaching high when misters and fogger go off.
I can see the odd springtail but zero isopods - I put 2 cultures of each about 15 days ago

 

[MissSkittles]

As my chameleons have figured out they have bugs in their enclosures, they do hunt and eat them. I keep some decently sized pieces of cork bark for the isopods to hide under and they do tend to hang out under it. Some will dig themselves down in the soil. Having a good layer or leaf litter will help them both to keep their soil moist and to eat. While I know almost nothing about keeping various types of isopods, I do know that some are needing certain conditions in order to thrive. It was recommended to me to use giant canyons, which I do and am now up to my eyeballs with. At one time I had some powder orange and zebra isopods, but the giant canyons outcompeted them and they are no more.

 

[EmilioTheAnkify]

I’ve had my enclosure setup for a little bit over a year now and I’ve noticed a reduced amount of orange powder isopods.
I can’t say for sure but I feel like after I introduced them to the repashy morning wood they died off.

 

[jamest0o0]

Generally with springtails you can add like a tiny cup of them and they’ll eventually populate throughout. Some isopods will outcompete them though so numbers could be low which is fine. For the isopods, it depends which you have. 15 days isn’t long enough for them to establish, but some will thrive more in enclosure conditions than others. Some breed much faster than others too.

@MissSkittles those giant canyons are no joke lol. Yeah forget having any other isopods or probably even that many springtails with them, but they really do seem to dominate the cleaning job in bioactives. I bet you can’t even find poop these days? I was thinking for a future enclosure of maybe trying to get a more unique species to populate. Would take some time and enough hiding places, but would be cool to eventually see hundreds of colorful isopods crawling around in the leaves.

 

[MissSkittles]

@jamest0o0 I have only ever gotten the giant canyons from you and now have thousands of their offspring. Not only are they in all of my enclosures, but I have 3 bins of them in the garage plus a bin that is giant canyons mixed with Surinam roaches. Yeah…you missed when I dumped the whole bin of isopods in a new enclosure and found that there were Surinam roaches in it (offspring from the ones I got from you). That was a fun day. Sold off the whole Surinam colony, bin and all last year, so it was quite a surprise to find them. Your bugs certainly are hardy!

 

[jamest0o0]

@jamest0o0 I have only ever gotten the giant canyons from you and now have thousands of their offspring. Not only are they in all of my enclosures, but I have 3 bins of them in the garage plus a bin that is giant canyons mixed with Surinam roaches. Yeah…you missed when I dumped the whole bin of isopods in a new enclosure and found that there were Surinam roaches in it (offspring from the ones I got from you). That was a fun day. Sold off the whole Surinam colony, bin and all last year, so it was quite a surprise to find them. Your bugs certainly are hardy!

Oh yeah two super hardy species right there… I’m probably going with ember roaches next time, pretty much more brightly colored Surinams, that are less adventurous, and without nymphs that can climb.

I posted how the giant canyons survived winter in my garage too lol. They make good composters if you get a big colony of them in a bin.