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Springtails

There are thousands of virtually identical species of springtail and your chance of identifying them accurately is close to zero. Springtails turn up naturally from the potting compost used to make grindalworm/whiteworm cultures and I encourage them by keeping the cultures on the wet side. The are fed and harvested in exactly the same way as grindalworms - just blow them off the glass into some sort of collecting vessel. Like other soil arthropods, springtails are relatively rich in calcium.

I culture springtails in sealed plastic boxes (no ventilation) filled with washed barbeque charcoal ("lumpwood", not briquettes). Put a few centimetres of water in the bottom, add some springtails and feed with some sort of organic matter. Most people recommend using some sort of carbohydrate such as dried pasta, and I seem to have best results using ReadyBrek. To harvest the springtails, wash them off the charcoal by pouring water over it then strain through a fine net. Add some more water to the container, sprinkle with ReadyBrek and replace the lid tightly.

Springtail culture

coverBreeding Food Animals: Live Food for Vivarium Animals
Ursula Friederich, Werner Volland, Hinrich Kaiser

Without doubt the most comprehensive and useful book on this subject. Think how much money you'll save breeding your own! (Amazon.co.UK)

Easily the most productive springtail in culture is the cosmopolitan species Folsomia candida:

Folsomia candida

This species has been employed in hundreds of laboratory experiments as the 'standard' springtail. It is white with a maximum length of ~3 mm and reproduces very rapidly under warm (25-30oC) conditions with saturated humidity.

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