Reptile & Amphibian Forums

My beardies have mites, I've posted here before and got some tips on home remedies. We tried a lot of them, including coating the mites with olive oil and trying to pick them off as they smother. I used the Zoo Med product Mite Off, which we personally found to be useless. The problem is that there are quite a few more mites than before and picking them off individually would take hours, and my dragons don't have the tolerance for multi hour long treatments. Plus who has time for that? So now I'm looking at Provent-a-Mite, but I'm worried that it will harm the dragons in some way. Anyone have experience using this product on beardies?

I had mites on my hedgehog so I got prevent-a-mite.

For me it seems like a preventative measure and not a 'medicine' to dose the dragon with.

After each cage cleaning for all my animals I do a fast 3 second spray of the cage and allow it to dry for 30-60 min.
I do not know how to use preventamite to treat a dragon for mites though, I believe the spray is just good for destroying mite eggs that are laid all over the cage.

I've never had mites on dragons. TG. I received (2) Trapelus Savignii's and they were covered with a very small mite. I tried reptile relief but for all the accolades it did no good at all. I went with Ivomec that I received from my vet and it took care of it. Mites are a hassle but if you are going to go through all the trouble, get what works. Do not use Ivomec internally as some inexperienced vets may suggest! Use it externally on the animal. Use it on the furniture too but after baking in the oven.

Don't spray Provent a Mite onto a dragon or any other lizard or snake. Follow the directions on the bottle. To get the mites off your dragon, soak him in luke warm water for about 10 minutes, this will drown the mites.

For mites on your dragon's head and beard, you can use olive oil or mineral oil.

Clean the cage completely, if its glass or resin/PCV wash it completely by filling it up with hot soapy water, rinse then soak it in a bleach solution (one part bleach to 10 parts water) for about 10 minutes or so, to completely disinfect it. Rinse completely and then rinse some more. Let air dry. Do the same for all non wood cage furniture. It may be necessary to toss out unsealed wood and replace with something new.

If the cage is wood, whether its been sealed (ie clear varnish or paint) or melamine, soaking is definitely out of the question. Wash the surface with a cloth as well as you can. Once completely dry, read the directions on the Provent A Mite can.

Spray the cage down with PAM (Provent a Mite), let dry. Once it is completely dry, put your animal into the cage and water dish (if you use one with your dragon). If you have a bad infestation, you will have to repeat this process again once a month for 2-4 months to kill off any hatching mites which may have been laid elsewhere in the house. If you have more than one lizard, treat all their cages too, even if they are housed in a different room.

One final note, move all insects as far away from your dragons as possible, or get rid of them all if you can't move them into a completely different room or floor. PAM will kill feeder insects and even pet insects (ie Tarantulas). Also don't use PAM on any gecko species, as these mite sprays have caused problems in gecko species. Not sure why geckos are more susceptible to toxicity than other lizards, but when I had to use PAM to deal with snake mites, I made sure my geckos were all in a completely different room before spraying.

After having to deal with mites once, I now spray the cages of any new arrivals, as a preventative. Its much easier to spray a new cage and let it dry even before I go out and buy my new addition, than after an outbreak occurs. I pretty much just add this to my usual quarantine procedures with any new arrivals.
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PHLdyPayne

I have done the soaking, the olive oil treatment, and washed/bleached the cage.

The challenge I have had with soaking lizards is that they hate the water and stand up as tall as they can to avoid their stomachs hitting the water. Also the mites move up farther towards the head when the lizard is put in water. I don't want to add so much water that the lizards are floating. They are juveniles and I don't want to risk drowning them!

We've done the olive oil treatment, it did cause lots of mites to detach but they are still embedded under the scales and can't be picked off even though they are detached.

I have used Black Knight spray on the cage, and waited until it was dry to put the lizards back in. My husband uses it with snakes, he actually fogs a plastic tub with the product and then drops the snake in. So I am wondering if it is safe to do the same thing with lizards and Provent a Mite. The top of their cage is mesh, so there would be more ventilation than there is for snakes who get this method used on them in a plastic box.

Strange more often than not dragons love the water. I'd check what the temp. is. Perhaps it's too hot or cold. 83-85 is a comfortable temperature for them. Higher than 85 and they try to jump out.

Otherwise I would really try the vet option I suggested earlier. I wouldn't guess with unproven treatments. Maybe the black night treatment worked but you don't know what the long term issues for the snake could be from breathing the fumes.

What your husband is doing with his snakes is risky, as inhalation of the 'fog' could end up being toxic. Black Knight may not be as potent as PAM...but from what I have heard of it, its nearly identical, or is the exact same product under a different label. I am not sure with.

The mites still on your dragon will die after the cage is treated. Any that don't fall off on their own, will need to be carefully pulled off so you don't leave mouth parts embedded in the skin between the scales. A vet can remove these for you so infections don't get into the skin. If your dragons are near to shedding, all the dead mites etc. may come off with the shed.

There is no mite spray that will make every single mite vanish in a couple days, you have to wait a few months, maybe more, to completely eradicate mites, especially if there's been a heavy infestation. Mites have many stages in their life cycle..about 4-6 stages only one which feeds on a host. Once they past the feeding stage, adults drop off the host and go find a place to lay eggs. Even if every single adult is dead, if any had time to lay eggs, they will hatch and mites will return to a host once they enter the feeding phase. Hence why I recommend repeating the PAM treatment every month for 3 or more months.
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PHLdyPayne