Tiny white bugs in soil

[LydiasMom]

So, this morning I noticed tiny white bugs swarming a dead cricket in Lydia's old house, which has become her dining room, essentially. They're the shape of a grain of rice but incredibly smaller.

I use the e-coco substrate and there is local moss and chameleon plants growing in there.

Is there a way to tell what they are when they're too small for my eyes to see well? The soil in there isn't very damp anymore, so I'm thinking they aren't springtails, also they were all over that dead cricket. I haven't seen them in Lydia's main house, which has nice, moist soil. So I'm not crazy worried. But I'd like to know what they are. My other guess is newly hatched crickets, because she doesn't always eat all of them, so there's usually a couple continuing to live in there for a day or so, adult crickets that is.

Otherwise I'm assuming mites and if so do I need to worry about them bothering Lydia? She's an American toad, about 3inches long now.

*edit
P.S. I left that dead cricket for now because it's drawing them out of the soil where I can see them

[Larry Wardog]

So, this morning I noticed tiny white bugs swarming a dead cricket in Lydia's old house, which has become her dining room, essentially. They're the shape of a grain of rice but incredibly smaller.

I use the e-coco substrate and there is local moss and chameleon plants growing in there.

Is there a way to tell what they are when they're too small for my eyes to see well? The soil in there isn't very damp anymore, so I'm thinking they aren't springtails, also they were all over that dead cricket. I haven't seen them in Lydia's main house, which has nice, moist soil. So I'm not crazy worried. But I'd like to know what they are. My other guess is newly hatched crickets, because she doesn't always eat all of them, so there's usually a couple continuing to live in there for a day or so, adult crickets that is.

Otherwise I'm assuming mites and if so do I need to worry about them bothering Lydia? She's an American toad, about 3inches long now.

*edit
P.S. I left that dead cricket for now because it's drawing them out of the soil where I can see them

They are Springtails which is a small isopod that eat decaying plant matter and dead insects and your toads poop. They are good. I purposely use them in my setups. They help keep the enclosure safer and healthier for the toad.

Sent from my BLN-L24 using Tapatalk

[LydiasMom]

They are Springtails which is a small isopod that eat decaying plant matter and dead insects and your toads poop. They are good. I purposely use them in my setups. They help keep the enclosure safer and healthier for the toad.

Sent from my BLN-L24 using Tapatalk

I am under the impression that springtails prefer moist environments? This enclosure is rather dry now.

Also that if you spray springtails they will spring. I tried that test and they didn't, the scuttled back down into the soil instead

[Reptilian Feline]

Springtails are a large group, not all jump. They are all over the dead cricket and that's what they are supposed to be... they clean up. They get moisture from the cricket, but if it gets too dry they will leave or die or hibernate.

[LydiasMom]

Thank you! Been keeping an eye on them and wow they housed that cricket. So fascinating.

I'm happy to have them there to clean up in Lydia's dining room, particularly any cricket feces. Glad to have that being removed without my needing to remove soil

Thank you, again!