12/30/2024 – The diatomaceous earth trick worked! I started seeing this grey stuff all around the fruit fly cultures and when I examined it under the microscope it was all dead mites! Pretty gross, but great to see it working.

I just have to be very careful not to get any of this stuff near the feeders themselves or the spiderlings. If you didn’t already know, diatomaceous earth is the fossilized remains of algae that died millions of years ago. On invertebrates, it basically acts like razor wire, cutting through their exoskeleton. When I made a new culture a few unfortunate fruit flies fell in and were immediately mobilized. They rolled around in place for awhile and then died. Don’t get it near your spiders!

Of course this only keeps mites from spreading between cultures. I’ve since received new cultures from New England Herpetoculture and those have been mite-free. I’m using DE to keep mites from getting in the new cultures.