# Mites on giant african land snails?



## Wyrdsister (Dec 2, 2019)

I've had my two giant african land snails for around eight months, and for the first six months everything was fine. I keep them on coir substrate, cleaned and changed their tank regularly and they grew and seemed happy.
Two months ago I decided I wanted to try and set up an eco-setup, and did some research before buying some orange woodlice to put in with my snails. For the first few weeks, everything seemed fine.

Before the introduction of the woodlice the tank was sterile apart from my snails and I never saw anything else in the tank or crawling in the substrate, apart from the occasional fruit fly.
Since the woodlice introduction however the soil in my tank is full of inverts. In particular there are hundreds of tiny white crawly guys speeding their way through the soil and more fat round ones which congregate on food.

There doesn't seem to be that many on the snails. Which is why I didn't think they were snail mites at first. I've now become concerned and have seperated the snails from the tank. I gave them a full shower last night and gave them a completely new, clean tank and substrate. I checked this morning and found one small white crawler on a piece of food.
I've looked up videos of mite infested snails and my snails are nothing like that, I've checked them all over and can't actually see any insects on them, I'd only seen them on them before when they were in the tank and one ran over their shell when they were in the soil.
Are they mites? I would post a picture but they're just too small. If they are mites, what can I do?

I have heard that predatory mites are the way to go, but where do I get them from? Has anyone here had any experience from buying from a particular site which I can trust?

I really want to stop this in it's tracks before it becomes an actual health problem for my snails. I'd also love to clear out the woodlice enclosure so that I can introduce them again one day without worrying about introducing the mites again too.

For now I'm going to shower them every night and give them clean substrate every day for a few days and see if that helps. As I said, there doesn't seem to be any on the snails, but I know they can hide inside them.

Any advice or help would be very welcome!


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## **louise** (Nov 10, 2010)

Sounds like springtails which are harmless and used as part of a bioactive clean up crew along with the woodlice. I myself have grey woodlice and springtails in my GALS tank. 

I will often see hundreds of springtails on the leftover veggies I feed my snails.

I'll see if I can get a picture so you can compare it to what you have.


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## **louise** (Nov 10, 2010)

Here you can see a few hanging round the salad and when I lift up the salad leaves you can see loads of them!


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## elishacoombes9 (Sep 5, 2017)

Agree with Louise. 
Those are springtails  
We have some in with ours! 


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## Wyrdsister (Dec 2, 2019)

Thank you so much for the advice and picture!

I think some of them are springtails, I had a good root around in it today and there are definately springtails in there. How they got in I don't know!

I think I also have some wood mites as I have a lot of wood in there for my woodlice. Ordered it online, but it might have had mites on anyway. Those were the ones that were worrying me as I had no idea what they were, but as I say I didn't really see any on the snails.

I also have found some clear, very thin white worms deep in the soil through the sides of the tank. I've looked online and they seem to be white worms, not snail worms. Most sites say they are harmless to humans, but should I try to get rid of them anyway?


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