Invertebrate Food and Supplements

For a detritivore, the substrate is the diet. Leaf litter and rotting wood are not bedding that happens to be edible: they are what isopods, millipedes, springtails and most display roaches evolved to eat, and a colony with good litter available is never going hungry. Everything on this page is food, from the staples that make up most of what your animals consume to the protein and calcium that drive breeding and moulting.

If you want the short version: leaf litter and flake soil as the base, cuttlebone left in permanently, and a protein source once or twice a week. That is a complete feeding routine, and it costs a few pounds a year to run.

The staples: leaf litter, wood and flake soil

Leaf litter is the single most important thing in the enclosure. It is food, cover and humidity buffer at once, and it should never be allowed to run out. Ours is mixed broadleaf from Southern England woodlands, processed to be pest-free. Crushed leaf litter is the same material milled finer, which suits mancae and works well blended through rather than sitting on top.

Shredded rotten wood is the other half of a natural diet, and the part most keepers under-supply. White-rotted hardwood is softer, more digestible and considerably more nutritious than sound wood, and millipedes in particular need a lot of it.

Fermented flake soil sits somewhere between substrate and food. It was developed for beetle larvae, it holds moisture like coir, and unlike coir it actually feeds the colony. It is the one item here I would not run a colony without.

Bamboo leaf litter breaks down more slowly and holds its structure, which makes it useful in a display setup. Asian leaf mix and magnolia leaves are tougher, longer-lasting leaves that give a mixed litter layer some variety and structure. Lotus pods and beech seed pods are grazed slowly and double as cover for smaller species.

Calcium, permanently available

Isopods and millipedes rebuild their exoskeleton every time they moult, and a failed moult is usually a calcium problem rather than a humidity one. Millipedes need more of it than anything else we sell. Put a piece of cuttlebone or a scatter of crushed oyster shell in and leave it there. It does not go off, and the animals take what they need when they need it. Limestone does the same job and doubles as climbing structure, which cave species in particular appreciate.

Protein, in small amounts

This is the single biggest lever on breeding rate. Dried calciworms, anchovies, sprats and silkworm pupae all work. Offer a pinch, on the drier side of the enclosure, and take out whatever is uneaten within a day or two before it moulds. More is not better: too much protein is the most common cause of a grain mite bloom.

Worth having, not essential

Kinshi and the seven-mushroom blend are readily taken by almost everything and add variety without adding protein, across isopods, millipedes and roaches alike. Bee pollen and brewers yeast are traditional conditioning foods, used sparingly. Bat guano is a supplementary food for cave-origin species, closer to their wild diet than anything else here.

The fish foods are here because they work, not as a novelty. Spirulina wafers, oak and algae wafers and the flake foods are dense, cheap, keep indefinitely and are eaten readily. A tub lasts most keepers a very long time.

How often to feed

Less often than you would think. Keep litter and a calcium source permanently available, and treat everything else as a supplement rather than a meal.

• Leaf litter and wood: always present, topped up when it visibly thins.
• Calcium: permanently available, never removed.
• Fast breeders (Dairy Cows, Powders, dwarf whites): protein twice a week, and they will process it.
• Armadillidium and most Porcellio: once a week is plenty.
• Cubaris and other slow builders: once a week, small amounts, and be patient.
• Millipedes: rotting wood always available, and calcium more generously than you would give an isopod.
• Springtails and roaches: they will take most of the same foods, in much smaller quantities.

Remove uneaten fresh food within 24 to 48 hours. If you are getting mould or mites, you are feeding too much rather than feeding the wrong thing.

What you do not need

Charcoal is sold widely as an isopod additive and sits firmly in the "does not hurt, is not essential" category. Good ventilation, a sensible moisture gradient and a springtail population do far more to keep an enclosure fresh than charcoal ever will. The same goes for most vitamin powders: an animal eating varied leaf litter with calcium available is not short of anything.

For the full picture, what do isopods eat covers the diet from the ground up, and the calcium guide goes deeper on supplementation than any product page sensibly can. For the hides, moss, tubs and tools that go around the food, see drygoods and accessories.

Everything here ships from the UK, Monday to Thursday, alongside any livestock in the same order. If you are not sure what your species needs, ask me before you order.