Springtails in coco

Anyone ever notice lots of springtails in their coco mix? I was watering last night and noticed 1000's of little white thing( I guess spring tails) doing the backstroke. I read up and it seems they are not harmful . They just eat fungus and decaying matter, and actually may be beneficial.

Yea. I got 1000's too. Never caused a problem..

Sometimes I have them, sometimes I don't. They never seem to do any harm.

About had an anxiety attack at first! I thought root mites!! No maybe root aphids!!



Thanks

Had them. The predatory mite Hypoapsis works well against them in veg.

Do springtails actually "jump"? I saw some lil white things that looked lime springtails appear to jump around on my coco ...like a flea right after I watered.

GrnEyes said:

Do springtails actually "jump"? I saw some lil white things that looked lime springtails appear to jump around on my coco ...like a flea right after I watered.

Click to expand...

Never noticed that. Usually you see hundreds of them floating and squirming in runoff. For some reason the float in a group.

From wikipedia -

Members of Collembola are normally less than 6 mm (0.24 in) long, have six or fewer abdominal segments and possess a tubular appendage (the collophore or ventral tube) with eversible sticky vesicles, projecting ventrally from the first abdominal segment. The Poduromorpha and Entomobryomorpha have an elongated body, while the Symphypleona and Neelipleona have a globular body. Collembola lack a tracheal respiration system, which forces them to respire through a porous cuticle, to the notable exception of Sminthuridae which exhibit a rudimentary, although fully functional, tracheal system.[10]
Most species have an abdominal, tail-like appendage, the furcula, that is folded beneath the body to be used for jumping when the animal is threatened. It is held under tension by a small structure called the retinaculum (or tenaculum) and when released, snaps against the substrate, flinging the springtail into the air. All of this takes place in as little as 18 milliseconds.[11]
Springtails also possess the ability to reduce their body size by as much as 30% through subsequent ecdyses (molting) if temperatures rise high enough. The shrinkage is genetically controlled. Since warmer conditions increase metabolic rates and energy requirements in organisms, the reduction in body size is advantageous to their survival.[12]

Yeah spring tails jump, hence the reason they are called spring tails lol

I made this video of springtails in a dwc system