Reptile & Amphibian Forums

stuff....is there anything else i can do?

unfortunately no petstore had the stuff in stock and i couldnt find the stuff at my walmart, so instead of taking chances, i ordered stuff from lllreptile but it is taking forever to get here

do i do anything while i wait?

someone told me that mites came because of temps being too low...is this true? they also said to raise the temps to help get rid of them.
stuff i saw/read didnt say anything about temps and mites connection.
thanks for the help

Mites can come from bedding the food. She could have had them before you got her. This will be tough with her being at the school but soaking her And getting all the bedding out and washing the tank out would help for a few days . I think your temps are fine, from what you posted before , I may be wrong but I do not think that temps cause the mite, nor will upping the temps take care of them.I am sure she will be ok if you wait till you get the spray, it is just creepy knowing she has them and wanting to help her.. I just went through the same thing. i felt like I was crawling with.

I'm so sorry for you!
I just went through this... I still get all itchy just thinking about them.

They are not caused by temps, they are caused by coming in direct contact with them, or their eggs. Usually through prey (live), another animal, or possibly you could bring them in if you came in contact with a contaminated animal at a show...

FYI There is an interesting article about them at VPI's site

I was advised to be very aggressive with these parasites, or they can easily get out of control.

Provent-a-mite worked for me. Luckily one of my snake buddies had some on hand, so I didn't have to wait for it to arrive.

While I was waiting for the cages/racks to dry, I soaked the animals in a warm (not hot) tub of slightly soapy water.This will drown live mites (but not eggs). I also used reptile relief (available in most pet stores)directly on the animals.I found it much easier to to saturate a paper towel with the reptile relief, and then wipe the (dry) animal down. (instead of directly spraying the animal).

Make sure you read the directions on all mite treatments carefully!

I switched all the substrate to unprinted news print ,so I could more easily see any new mites (and happily mite carcasses)I treated everything in sight ( all animals, cages, rack, nearby carpets etc..),
The entire treatment should be repeated 2 weeks later in case any eggs survived.
So far so good for me!
Good Luck!
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"There is a fine line between a hobby and mental illness"
COLD BLOOD.........WARM HEART

Like mentioned before, nope, no connection that I know of between mites and temperatures.

And as also mentioned, the soakings do help considerably. When I worked at a petstore and our entire snake bank came down with mites we soaked everyone about every other day in lukewarm water for 15 minutes. Kept everyone on papertowel (the white background made it easy to see the black mites) and took out any porous materials like wood. I'd recommend using stuff you can either bleach or throw away until you get the mites taken care of.

I don't know if anyone mentioned this before, but people can't get reptile mites Just in case you had any concerned parents/teachers/kids.

~jenny
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1.2.2 normal ball pythons (Cindy, Darwin, Periscope, and dah bebbies)
0.2 rescue chinese water dragons (Yoni and Linga)
0.0.1 Mountain Horned Lizard (Freckles)
1.0 rex rat (Scurvy)
1.0 gerbil (Yerbul)
0.1 mice (Cute Girl Mousy)
0.1 bunny (Spazz)
1.1 betta fishes (Vicious and Killer)
2.2 great danes (Shasta, Odysseus, Merlot, and Watson)
1.0 fat fuzzy mutt (Smokey)
1.1 cats (Thidwick and Turtle)
3.0 horses (Buddy, Sam, and Scout)
1.0 goat (Billy Jack)
0.0.1 chupacabra (it ate our chickens)

jenny.thegreenes.org

im glad to nkow im doing the right thing in teh mean time.

it helps to know others went through the same thing.

i have not come in contact with any other animals and i feed frozen mice only...so it either came from items bought in the store or from Kaa itself

and thanks for the nifo on mites, i have already informed teh kids about what they are (compared them to fleas on dogs and cats sothey woudl understand and also about how they only affect snakes)

thanks all...again

I found 1 in the first month I had my snake & was told it was due to the repti-chips (wood) I was using. I bought Mite Off from petsmart & changed to aspen chips. Worked for us.
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*newbie*