How to culture Orange springtails

[@bradleyhumphrey4505]

I just ordered some orange springtails they are quite pricey but certainly are a beautiful species!!! I have never cultured them before, so thank you for the useful tips and tricks !!! I am looking forward to upcoming videos, my friend. hope all is well for you and your family. Take care !!!

[@4me]

Thank you very much! Happy holidays to you and your family!!

[@Kat-qj6sl]

I’ve been looking forward to this video! I use a small paintbrush to move my freshly hatched caterpillars, but I never thought to try it with springtails. Thanks for the idea, it worked perfectly! 😁 Much easier than using a small spoon haha. I moved them into a jar just like the ones you’re using, I was worried because it doesn’t have air holes but after reading the comments you’ve written I feel better about it. Thanks for another great video 😊

[@4me]

Interestingly, initially I want to use a cover without holes to prevent white and silver springtails from sneaking into the jars with orange - they do it anyway 😂 I don’t really want to make fully enclosed terrariums. Feeding a couple times a week and occasionally adding or removing something is much more interesting to me.

[@rewhsrihusx5160]

Nice I was just about to start a new terrarium I need these things

[@4me]

You will enjoy them!!

[@Dane411]

It would be nice if you could link here to the video where you explain how you deal with the mould

[@4me]

The video is scheduled and already uploaded for publication on June 11th.

[@rgilroy1909]

no breathing holes in lids? please explain

[@4me]

You noticed it too! Great!! It's my first attempt on a building fully enclosed terrariums. I did it with aquariums years back in a plastic bottles - discovered some interesting effect related to internal air pressure. It actually steered me away from building fully enclosed aquariums. So, now I've been exploring the same possibility with terrariums - fully enclosed for days/weeks. So far the results looks good for extend of a couple days. I only open the small terrariums shown in this video for feeding (takes a couple minutes at a time0) springtails 3 times a week. The longest period between opening was 72 hours - enough to leave them for a long weekend 😉I think it would be safe to keep them closed for longer time in a larger sized jars. That's my side project. I am not sure if I would get time/space to test it any further. Definitely not this Summer. Anyway, I hope other people may find it useful.

[@incredible5587]

I can give you a good answer and a little in depth, but parson my bad speech to text skills!! LOL Springtails dont breath a lot of oxygen and when people breed them they often to set up to feed every 2 or 3 days and just opening it every few days is enough to refresh the air. They will die if left like that though. Also the big mistake people make is with food. they eat mold and that is true, but they dont eat all mold and the mold can grow faster than they can consume and vent CO2. Then the CO2 can kill them quick and a vent hole will help. So it does not hurt to have breathing holes. I open mine daily but i do have some larger containers that i cut a 1//4" hole or two and i tape a piece of thin cloth over it. i just tape the sides so it can get fresh air still but not run always. (I use a table cloth, that was cut up, thin material but tight but also allows flow) I did order some online once and get lost in the mail and were in a water tight container with charcoal and it took a solid two weeks and i got them and they were thriving. So unsure how long but they will run out of air at some point but two weeks in a 16oz jar and there was about 5k of them in there.

[@incredible5587]

The one with all the white ones in it was very populated, are there tropical or temperate springtails mixed in? EDIT neverminded i rewatched it. Id be curious just using orange springtails, the added springtails breed a lot faster than those. I was looking into breeding the orange ones. I breed the mixed culture of tropical pinks and whites and temperates. I use the charcoal method. It works great and I use one piece to feed on and then after a couple weeks i take that one and use as a seed and words very well.

[@4me]

I have mixes of temperate white, silver and orange. I tried culturing only orange. The white jumpers moved in a matter of first couple weeks. They are really-really great explorers 😊

[@UmamiPapi]

😁

[@4me]

😊

[@gayefanner731]

Hiya Michael I was hoping for another video from you! Thank you! What a wealth of springtails you have ; you know exactly what they love and how to provide it, well done👌I suppose it’s taken forgranted that the lids are pierced? Maybe not as you’re feeding 3X per week.🤷🏼‍♀️ God bless you 🙏✝️. ✌️🇷🇺☮️🇺🇦✌️. 🙋‍♀️🤍🇮🇱✌️

[@gayefanner731]

Would fine ground coir be a reasonable substitute for peat? It’s virtually unobtainable here in England and probably in much of Europe, for conservation reasons ✌️

[@4me]

Hi there! I am glad to hear from you!! There are a couple things I forgot to mention in this video. One is about the lids as you noticed. I actually did not make any holes in the lids for this setup. All my previous terrariums had holes in the covers. This time I decided to check if it would work without the holes. I only open the jars for feeding. It takes 5-10 minutes or even less. 3 times a week. And it seems working well. It's my...side step project 🙂 I still experimenting with springtails - mostly toward using them for self-feeding aquariums - that is my primary project. And the other thing I did not mention is about breeding rate. Orange springtails breed much slower than the white and silver. This actually one of the reasons I consider orange springtails more as pets. They look very nice in terrariums, they don't jump. Nice pets, but not so much as a source of food for my fish (because of the slow breeding). I am more interested in silver springtails. Silver are smaller than orange, but larger than white springtails. Silver move fast, breed fast and...they seem to be feeding on variations of fungus that orange and white avoid. That's make them more desirable for my long term self-feeding projects.

[@4me]

I've never tried coir to tell you for sure. Though, I tried many other mediums for springtails and grindal worms. And I think springtails would be fine on coir. Coir is not much different from dried leaves or polyester foam I tried them a couple years back 😉✌✌

[@gayefanner731]

Dear Michael, I definitely did reply to your comprehensive and fascinating response to my comments, but on going back over your information just now I find no evidence, censored yet again! I wish I could remember exactly what I said, sometimes it takes me several goes at getting my messages through!! ✌️

[@4me]

KZbin has automated system in place for censoring comments and everything else - very annoying to me too!✌✌