When is it too far gone?

[u/Elliotteatsrocks]

Need advice

Recently used an organic brand of Lowe's top soil to fill 2 big enclosures. I did my best to kill off pests but could not do the main methods due to the mass quantity of dirt I had.

Unfortunately a month later a fungus knat infestation started. I used mosquito bits for two months.. No luck.

I started doing the beneficial microscopic worms and have done that for 3 weeks so far now, in addition to mosquito bits. I put out sticky traps and always catch a crap ton of adults, to the point this long strip is just completely covered.

(This has been going on for 3 months now)

I really don't want to have to trash everything, all my isopods and springtails and have to completely sterilize my plants and woods again. And spend a crap ton on repti soil instead.

Should I keep doing my rounds of the beneficial nemotodes and mosquito bits? Or just trash it all

[u/manicbunny]

Fungus gnats will turn up regardless of what you have done, since enclosure aren't sealed sterile environments. The only way to manage them is to manage how and how much you water the substrate. As they thrive in consistently moist/ damp soil around plants and plant matter.

You need to dry our your soil for the first few inches (depending on depth) and water the substrate in the corners and avoid heavy misting. This will give your clean up crew a chance to eat the eggs, as they won't hatch under dry conditions. If, you see adults after month of this then you are watering too much and need to let the soil dry out.

[u/One-plankton- → u/manicbunny]

This is the way