On Sat, 20 Sep 2003 11:14:05 +0100, Alison wrote:

Does anyone know what the little blackish/dark greyish insects are that
sometimes live in soil (usually around sickly plants)? They jump about a
bit if disturbed (they're not fleas). I've always thought they were
springtails but I now realise these are white.


If you thik they are springtails, and look like them but the only
difference is the colour, then they almost certainly are. Springtails come
in various colours, but mostly either pale (those living underground) or
dark greyish (those living near or on the surfac). Some can be very small
and some quite a bit larger, but generally around flea-size. They never,
ever have wings, of course.

If you look on a stagnant rock-pool on the beach, you'll often find whole
rafts of grey springtails floating on the water.

There are some basics here :
http://web.missouri.edu/~bioscish/coll.html

and he http://www.ams.rdg.ac.uk/zoology/hopkin/
(especially the photo at the bottom of the page)

--
Tim.

If the human brain were simple enough that we could understand it, we would
be so simple that we couldn't.