Pests in my Tokay and Tree Frog cage?

Tokayy

Tokayy

New member
I hope this is in the correct section, if not, im sorry and could you please place it to where it should be.

My issue that I have noticed within my frog and Tokay cage are little critters such as pests buried in the substrate. In the frog's cage they are very small white bugs with pointy heads almost. In the Tokay cage they are very small bugs that could almost pass off as baby crickets, but I highly doubt they are as crickets don't spend a long time in the Tokay cage. So my question would be what are these bugs and how are they caused? Both reptiles needed to be misted daily as they are require the water and are from tropical climates. I was using cypress mulch as well as beaked moss in both cages. I have currently removed the cypress mulch from the frogs cage hoping to see a difference. I am contemplating just using frog moss with the frogs and strictly beaked moss for my Tokay cage. This I hope will fix my issue with these bugs that I have seen on a few occasions now.
 
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nater

New member
Tokayy said:
My issue that I have noticed within my frog and Tokay cage are little critters such as pests buried in the substrate. In the frog's cage they are very small white bugs with pointy heads almost. In the Tokay cage they are very small bugs that could almost pass off as baby crickets, but I highly doubt they are as crickets don't spend a long time in the Tokay cage.
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How small is "very small"? My first thought was springtails, but those are tiny. My other guess was wood mites. Without a picture or better description I can't tell for sure.

*edit*
Picture references for you to compare against:
Springtails - ENT/rsc-33
What “Mite” those White Bugs Be?
 
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Tokayy

Tokayy

New member
In regards to the frog cage, yes they must be wood mites as they are very small white dots that do jump around. However, for my Tokay cage, they bugs are not white, they are like a standard brown/gray like that of a cricket yet very small, almost the same size as the wood mites that were seen in the frog cage. Is there a solution for this? Should I be removing the mulch and use strictly moss as a substrate within the two cages, thus removing the problematic issue of these pets lingering at the bottom.
 
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Tokayy

Tokayy

New member
Riverside Reptiles said:
They might well be pinhead crickets.
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How would pinhead crickets just start appearing in my cage? What causes this? If it is in fact pinhead crickets in the tokay cage. Also I guess this wouldn't be a serious concern either as they are just crickets right?
 
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nater

New member
Tokayy said:
How would pinhead crickets just start appearing in my cage? What causes this? If it is in fact pinhead crickets in the tokay cage. Also I guess this wouldn't be a serious concern either as they are just crickets right?
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I was guessing that those were the springtails.
 
Riverside Reptiles

Riverside Reptiles

Administrator (HMFIC)
If you feed crickets, it's not unusual for them to occasionally lay in the tank. You'd have to post pics up though. But you said that you feed crickets, and said they look like baby crickets, so it may be circkets.
 
Tokayy

Tokayy

New member
Looked at them today, seem to have gotten
bigger so a little easier to see, yeah they do look like crickets.
 
Tokayy

Tokayy

New member
hexentanz said:
The small white things you see jumping around in your frog tank are springtails.
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They seemed more like mites as they were only small white specs. Springtails looks more like an insect, these were just small white dots. Anyways, the mites are non existent in the frog cage after the substrate was converted to just moss.
 
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hexentanz

New member
Tokayy said:
They seemed more like mites as they were only small white specs. Springtails looks more like an insect, these were just small white dots. Anyways, the mites are non existent in the frog cage after the substrate was converted to just moss.
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Yeah, but the mites do not jump and springtails come in many sizes.Good to read whatever it is that it is under control now. :)
 
aquamentus_11

aquamentus_11

New member
do you have living plants in your frog tank? a lot of times they'll become infested with whitefly. the mites can be little dots and the flies are tiny and appear to hop.
 
Tokayy

Tokayy

New member
There is no live plants in the frog tank. Only natural
moss and bark. Also a natural soil background that can grow plants but I'm yet to do it.
 
Tokayy

Tokayy

New member
aquamentus_11 said:
get a magnifying glass and take a look. if you have living, photosynthetic substrate (moss), i bet they're whiteflies. my buddy gets them on his plants all the time.

Whitefly - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Click to expand...

They are for sure not white flies as suggested. I cannot go back to look at the frog cage as I have removed all bark and mulch thus eliminating what ever the white specs may have been. However, there is still beaked moss within the frog cage, but I'm yet to see any pest issue.

There were no pests originally in the Tokay and if both cages, the frog and Tokay, would they not have technically the same pests within the cage? The Tokay was narrowed down to baby crickets cause eventually they did grow bigger and started to chirp, but that cage never experienced the same issue as the frog cage. I just wanna make sure what is in there is not harmful and if there is a way in deterring such pests.
 
Eilidh

Eilidh

New member
Remove the animals into tempoary accomodation, remove all substate and put it in a non-holed plastic bag and seal it tight then dispose of it in a trash can outside your house, if possible burn it. Then remove everything from the vivs and disinfect it all whilst rinsing it down, make sure to get in every little nook and cranny, disinefect the vivs, including food bowls/acessories/etc, absolutely everything, and dispose of any living plants (disinfect false ones), also disinfect equipment such as feeding tongs.

Thatll kill the buggers :p
 
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