Soil mites in coco identification

[MarshallB]

Throughout out the whole grow I never seen any mites until it was time to flush. A few hours after the flush I noticed a ton of tiny white mites on the pots. The plant have since been harvested and I dont reuse coco but Im sure that their is still a few in the tent as they were in exodus mode and they were everywhere if you looked hard and long enough. Im hoping that they are the H. Miles since they will eat fungus, mold and whatever else. I used a bunch of great white and voodoo juice throughout the grow so if it is them it makes sense thats what they are doing in the coco. On my yellow stickies I did find about three two dotted spider mites but no webs or anything. I also had a few fungus nats in the middle of flowering but they disappeared. We have a bunch of tulips in front of the house and Im really hoping these aren’t bulb mites. I still have two coco samples in ziplocks and could get more picks soon but this is the best one. The thing that worries me here is that they have the brown legs, I haven’t seen any H. Miles with brown legs but their are various stages of development so nothing is definitive. Any help would be greatly appreciated thanks!

 

[013]

I can’t identify them by sight either. I had soil mites and nuked them but they eventually won out. So I tossed my old soils and started over with living organic soil armed with nematodes and hypoaspis miles. I’ve never used this link before so let me know if it works out Outside link to identify pests

 

[MarshallB]

You know going to soil is starting sound better and better all the time. I found that site about a week ago and it doesn’t seem to be so helpful. They need to add in more options for that finder to be useful. It definitely could just be me and my ignorance though. After quite a bit of research I’m leaning towards Tyrophagus putrescentiae. I’m thinking when you add a ton of beneficial fungus and what not you are creating a huge food source for these guys. I’ve read these guys mentioned on this site but their isn’t as much as I’d expect since using beneficials is so common. Though if you did not flush and tapered feedings off you may never see them

These mites are also called cheese/grain/mold mites. I threw in into youtube and saw a vid where a girl finds them all over her terrariums and they are commonly found in Superworm containers.....ok check that box, we have a bearded dragon. Then theres another vid of a family that had a flower deliver and got them....lol check that box too because we just got flowers in the mail two weeks before the infestation was found. I read they are commonly found in dog food too....damn check that one too, we have three bulldogs chompin dog food and leaving crumbs everywhere.

Basically from what I gather is that they don’t eat roots. Ive machete’d the 7g coco root balls and they are clean and healthy so this seems to be looking good for Tyrophagus putrescentiae. Now I just have to keep a close eye on that dog food and everything. They only appeared in exodus form when I flushed so they were probably robbing my bennies for a long time. Come to think of it, there wasn’t any bennie fuzz on the roots either but there was on the outside of the pot, white and the rusty colored kind. I did flush a little heavier than usual so I very well could have just rinsed it out. Also now that I’m really thinking about it, the mites that we’re on my fabric pot bennie fuzz when I first noticed them were not moving fast or at all like the ones that were traversing the coco, tent floor, walls and irrigation lines. That leads me to double down on they we’re just hanging out at the outdoor fungus bistro while the others were on the move for food and shelter.

This has been my first mite “aware” grow so far, who knows if Ive had them in the past. But damn mites suck. I have been excema free for years and this last two weeks of mite research has completely F’d my skin. Im itchy all the time now lol. Ignorance was bliss. Now mites are everywhere, theoretically. Ive digital micro scoped the whole house and didn’t find anything but I’m still itchy lol....F!