Crap. Are They Mites?

CHRISANDBOIDS14 · 02-07-04, 12:58 AM

K i just got a wood cage(used to have a hedgehog in it) yesterday from my uncle. I bleached it out, put some new carpet in it, then i put all this clean stuff in it, set the temperature. I put her in this morning, and now(10:30pm) i go to pick her up and as soon as i pick her up thes little tiny bugs less than a millimeter in size start crawling around(about 5-10). I think they are mites, im dumping the carpet and everything in the cage, im gonna rebleach the cage thoroughly and then possibly put the blood back. Anyways i thought mite were under the scales of snakes not crawling around on them. So do you think these are mites? The hedgehog died in that cage and i got it so maybe they came from the hedgehog? Thanks.

Chris

CHRISANDBOIDS14 · 02-07-04, 01:04 AM

Ok i just put her in a warm bath, she pooped, now i see like i think 10 more mites that have fallen off(5 already fell off) so i think she had big time mites. She hates the water. Anyways, ANY HELP ASAP IS APPRECIATED!!! THanks.

foman · 02-07-04, 01:05 AM

Sounds like mites to me. the best thing to do is to browse the forms here, there are alot of threads about mites. Nix works well.

CHRISANDBOIDS14 · 02-07-04, 01:23 AM

I see that they dont die in the water. They are still alive when i pick them up but i know they die with bleach so i put in some bleach. Anyways, i juts found out about them on her today, and i just got the cage yesterday some im gonna go through my basement and clean as much as i can.

foman · 02-07-04, 01:29 AM

DON'T use bleach......that is crazy. Go to shoppers drug mart tommorrow and buy some nix, it's like 12 bucks a bottle(get the cream style and lather your hands and let the snake rub through your fingers for like a half hour,then rinse the snake under water.

CHRISANDBOIDS14 · 02-07-04, 01:33 AM

ok i cant do that, the snake has a blood python attitude. The snake is not in the water. Should i just get the stuff you mix with the water? Then spray everything? Including the snake? Im gonna bleach out the enclosure again anyways. But yes i will get some nix tomorow. Alright thanks.

Chris

Matt_K · 02-07-04, 01:42 AM

Mites are host specific, so i highly doubt they came from the hedgehog.. I would have to agree with you going and getting some nix as soon as possible.. There are a ton of threads on here about Nix, just click on search and type in Nix.. You should find some in no time.. if that doesnt work, try searching 'mites'

CHRISANDBOIDS14 · 02-07-04, 01:47 AM

Thanks. I did. Well i strongly dout that the mites came from my blood since she has been in quarentine for about 36 days and in a whole other part of the house and i have been watching her closely and she has not shown any signs of mites till today then suddenly WAM all these mites. Anyways i will get some Nix tomorow.

Tim_Cranwill · 02-07-04, 01:53 AM

I also doubt that the mites would have come for the hedgehog. Have you recently bought any new herps or bedding?

You have to dilute the Nix with water though. 1/64 worked for me. If you just rub the Nix on your hands and then rub the snake down, you'll probably kill the poor thing.

Like Matt said, there are a dozen great threads on the subject. You'll find all the answers you need there. Good luck. Mites suck!

Matt_K · 02-07-04, 02:10 AM

Tim, i edited your post to say 'like Matt said'. LOL, the avatar prolly threw you off.. I think it's time to switch it

haha

Tim_Cranwill · 02-07-04, 10:37 AM

Well, maybe if you had a GI Joe or Transformers, heck, even a Smurfs avatar, mistakes like that wouldn't happen!

asphyxia · 02-07-04, 11:05 AM

I think they are wood mites. Any new wood material in the enclosure?

What I would do is Get the NIX delute it with abiut 1/3 water put in a Spray bottle and spray woun the enclosure down

Good Luck
Brian

tHeGiNo · 02-07-04, 11:23 AM

Quote:

DON'T use bleach......that is crazy. Go to shoppers drug mart tommorrow and buy some nix, it's like 12 bucks a bottle(get the cream style and lather your hands and let the snake rub through your fingers for like a half hour,then rinse the snake under water.

Do not use undiluted nix. Put the whole bottle of nix into four liters of water, and spray down the snake on the enclosure. Make sure you remove the water bowl, so the snake doesn't soak and take off all of the solution. In addition, you risk her drinking the water after she sits in it. Also its not a good idea to use bleach on wood. Even diluted bleach - it stays in the pores of the wood for quite a while.

Scales Zoo · 02-07-04, 11:34 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by tHeGiNo
Do not use undiluted nix. Put the whole bottle of nix into four liters of water, and spray down the snake on the enclosure. Make sure you remove the water bowl, so the snake doesn't soak and take off all of the solution. In addition, you risk her drinking the water after she sits in it.

This is the method I use.

Since you won't be using the whole 4 litres (~1 gallon) of nix solution, you can store it in a cool dark place and it will last.

Stronger concentrations of nix can burn your snake, to be on the safe side we always mix 1 bottle of nix into 4 litres of water.

Also, spray down the whole enclosure with the nix mixture.

When we buy a snake, we put it in a rubbermade or aquarium with papertowel and nix everything. I then put papertowel over the snake, and spray that too. If there are mites on the snake, a close inspection of the papertowel after an hour will let you know.

I then repeat this process every week, for 3 weeks.

As regular maintenance and to make sure we never find mites sneaking back into our collection (people visiting the zoo could potentially bring them with them) - we spray everything, every 2 weeks. By doing this, we have not seen a mite on one of ours snakes for a very long time.

Ryan

djc3674 · 02-07-04, 11:34 AM

Quote:

Go to shoppers drug mart tommorrow and buy some nix, it's like 12 bucks a bottle(get the cream style and lather your hands and let the snake rub through your fingers for like a half hour,then rinse the snake under water.

FOMAN..you really should do some research before giving people BAD advice. NIX is a pesticide used to kill head lice on humans. Rubbing this stuff (in its purest form) on a reptile would almost definately kill it. However, diluted correctly people swear by this stuff. I myself have not used it yet.

Perhaps, you can ask Invictus to post the URL that he has on using NIX. I read through it and it is very informative.

From the info that I have found on mites. They are an ectoparasite that feed mainly on snakes. Here is a pretty informative article on mites.

http://www.vpi.com/9VPITipsAndTechs/...owTheEnemy.htm