# Annoying Little Flies! help !



## SpiderGirl33 (Sep 2, 2007)

There are quite a lot of tiny little black flies in my room! :bash: 

I'm not sure where they're living, I think they may be nesting in the soil in my spare soil tub ? lol
They're the little flies that hang round in the gardening section of Wilkinsons :lol2: 

They're really little, about 1mm or so, and I couldn't get a photo of one.

I drew an extremely accurate lol drawing on paint!









Can anybody tell me what they are please? 
As I keep all my tarantulas in my room I want to be sure these flies aren't dangerous to them.

Cheers
Sam : victory:


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## spider_duck (Feb 25, 2008)

Keep the T's away from them if you can-we had tons of these flies and they killed my gals and Ive heared theyre really dangerous to T's too. You can remove the T's to another room, spray the hell out of your room and clean out ALL of the animals from that room. Alternatively, I left a glass of vodka in my room for 3 days, and it killed the lot


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## Lucifus (Aug 30, 2007)

Big problems here as spider duck said. 3 infested T cages as well as my own gals. Cleaned out the affected tubs which cut the spread but didnt manage to save 6 leopard gecko eggs from them. Seems they are going for damp substrate so cut back on moistening the substrate and more with the spraying.


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## SpiderGirl33 (Sep 2, 2007)

Thanks for your help! :notworthy: 

Any idea what type of fly they are? 

Might try the vodka thing, good excuse to buy a nice big bottle :no1:
:lol2:

What do you reckon they do to harm the animals then? 
Would they lay eggs in them or what?


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## Lucifus (Aug 30, 2007)

They laid eggs on the eggs, and ate through the shell and from the inside out. They also killed galls by eating them. Would happen to the T's too so avoid it.


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## PeterUK (Jun 21, 2008)

There are TWO types of annoying little flies.

1) *Fungus knats* which live in and eat moist substrate. These little sods *FLY* everywhere. Let the substrate dry out and they will die out very quickly. If you have these in your spider tanks you have the tank too moist and humid. Tarantulas DO NOT NEED constantly moist substrate (there are one or two exception like T. blondi ) If the spider is well fed and has a water bowl there is NO NEED to mist, spray or other wise let water enter the tank except into the water bowl.

2) *Phorid Flies,* these are the real pain in the #### if you have spiders.
These little flies *RUN *everywhere and only fly as a last resort. These eat dead insects (they DO NOT eat living animals) and the food bolas left over from the spiders meal and lay eggs on the spiders and the maggots congregate around the mouth parts of the spiders ...... Nasty things. Your tanks must squeaky clean, clean them at a minimumonce or better twice a week and by clean I mean totally empty and dispose of EVERYTHING inside of the tank.
If I was you, i would do a search on ALL of the Tarantula forums worldwide to find out how other people have got rid of this problem.


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## matto2k (Nov 30, 2006)

yeh they come from contaiminated substrait. the best invert friendly cure is clean the cages and buy a couple of those carnivouris plants and put them just out side the cages works for me


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## SpiderGirl33 (Sep 2, 2007)

They're living around the house, not just in my room where the tanks are.

I live in a wood, and there are loads of them outside too, I assumed they were a different fly but they're not. Probably with all the extra rain, there's quite a large population of them. 

I'm not keeping the tanks too humid, because I've seen them crawling around in my G.roseas tank which is bone dry. 
They sound to me like Fungus gnats, and look like them too. 

Thanks matto2k, looks like I'll be getting a carnivorous plant then! :no1:


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## macro junkie (Oct 27, 2007)

sounds like window nats..LOADS of them around this time of year..if you have your window open at night with the light on your get loads turn up..i dont think they can hurt your reptiles..its parasitic wasps you need to worry about.there bigger than window natts.

Window natts(not sure of there real name) will live in soil..to stop this you can add an inch of stones to the top of the soil..this stops them laying eggs in the soil.if you allready have them in the soil theres only 1 thing that can kill them. http://www.growell.co.uk/p/2476/Fungus-Gnat-Off.html you flush that stuff through the soil which kills the eggs...they wont hurt your reptiles tho so i wouldnt worry about it.this time of year they get every where..i also live in the woods.


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## Lucifus (Aug 30, 2007)

PeterUK said:


> 2) *Phorid Flies,* these are the real pain in the #### if you have spiders.
> These little flies *RUN *everywhere and only fly as a last resort. These eat dead insects (they DO NOT eat living animals) and the food bolas left over from the spiders meal and lay eggs on the spiders and the maggots congregate around the mouth parts of the spiders ...... Nasty things. Your tanks must squeaky clean, clean them at a minimumonce or better twice a week and by clean I mean totally empty and dispose of EVERYTHING inside of the tank.
> If I was you, i would do a search on ALL of the Tarantula forums worldwide to find out how other people have got rid of this problem.


My blondi has these. Just found more mites in the tub. Unfortunetly they are congregating around the fangs and it had problems catching its food. Take it its gona die? Moved it into a tub with paper towl and a small water dish and hope the lack of humidity kills the mites before they do the spider. Last animal i seen this in died of it.


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## macro junkie (Oct 27, 2007)

Lucifus said:


> My blondi has these. Just found more mites in the tub. Unfortunetly they are congregating around the fangs and it had problems catching its food. Take it its gona die? Moved it into a tub with paper towl and a small water dish and hope the lack of humidity kills the mites before they do the spider. Last animal i seen this in died of it.


 cant u wipe of the mites with wet tissue?


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## Lucifus (Aug 30, 2007)

Er, i think these are nematodes not phorids. The spiders buggered. Im going to do some experimentation as this is early stage and ill let everyone know how i got on. Unable to wipe mites off, the spider bolts.

edit: flys came from an infected cricket supply.

Edit: early stage infection, they are only small little things congrigating around the jaws, given enough time they turn into bigger things that can eat inside. Separated spider from collection, hope the mites die before they turn into bigger worms. However spider is unable to eat so i dont hold out much hope.

Edit: The flys infested the soil first with eggs, eggs hatched into small white things then infested the tarantula it seems.


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## Jade01 (Feb 21, 2007)

Lucifus said:


> My blondi has these. Just found more mites in the tub. Unfortunetly they are congregating around the fangs and it had problems catching its food. Take it its gona die? Moved it into a tub with paper towl and a small water dish and hope the lack of humidity kills the mites before they do the spider. Last animal i seen this in died of it.



ah man, thats awful, good luck with him or her. hope she/he pulls through


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## keeps2008 (Sep 22, 2008)

fly papers are best they will get rid of them or i use venus fly traps they are attracted to the smell of the damp soil pains in the :censor:


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## Lucifus (Aug 30, 2007)

Blondi being moved into a dry container overnight seemed to work. Two crickets i put in disappeared overnight but no signs of bodys at all apart from a odd stain in the kitchen roll. Salmon pink has stopped eating but it could be up for a moult and often refuses food up to 2 months before it sheds. Moved all t's to a different room and if i get all my animals out im going to gas this room with raid and wait 48 hours before moving T's back in. 

Hopefully the mites died rather than burrow into the T.


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## Lucifus (Aug 30, 2007)

Update: Its fine. Mites seem to have died from lack of moisture. And it just fed.


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## sage999 (Sep 21, 2008)

I discovered my E pachypus' tank was infested with these a couple of months ago. I moved my entire collection into small tubs and put them in another room. I then disposed of the substrate in all of my tanks and disinfected them. I gave it a few days before re-substrating the tanks and returning the spiders. To some this may seem extreme but i know for a fact these little b******s can infect an entire collection in days. Twenty quids worth of substrate and a bit of work was a small price to pay to safeguard my spiddies.


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