watertiger21

Welcome to the forum! I was an intern at Butterfly Pavilion a few years ago, and I absolutely LOVED it. I miss it everyday!

Thanks everyone! This has been a great help. I've removed the substrate and am now keeping my hissers dry. Later on I may try to go back to a natural setup, but I'll introduce isopods to maintain any mite problems. The mites appear to be in my Gyna lurida colony too. I've always kept them humid because I thought this species needed it. Do they? Or can I convert them to a dry setup as well?

I have a handful of G. portentosa adults. In the past few weeks I've noticed a weird white "dust" on one of my males. Not a single other roach has this... just the one male. I've gently given him baths and have entirely cleaned and sterilized their enclosure several times, but the "dust" comes back within a few days. Whatever this dust is, it's TINY. There was one occasion where I thought I could vaguely make out a little white mite walking around, but this dust stuff is sooooo tiny I'm not sure that's actually what I saw. Additionally, I observed my affected male doing some weird behavior the other day: breathing heavily, holding is butt straight up in the air, and flexing his body... I found it very strange and it's hard to describe exactly what he was doing. My impression is whatever this white dust is was bothering him (he had quite a bit on him and I had to bathe him again). Any suggestions on what this is? Grain mites? Fungus? Overgrowth of symbiotic mites? What's the likelihood of this infecting my other roaches of the same colony or moving into my other roach colonies? Thanks!