Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I just noticed that my cal king has mites. HATE those damn things! lol. Anyway... this cal king is the ONLY animal I have now. (I took in a rescue a few weeks ago that I found out had mites after I had it and the cal king was in next to it) I treated that animal and have since rehomed it. I moved the cal king into another room as soon as I found out but didnt treat the king. The mites must have made their way onto the king beforehand.

Anyway, this is my only animal I have now and I did treat the enclosure with prevent a mite and I plan to do so again in about three weeks or so. My question is though, do you think Ill be ok with leaving the rocks and the substrate in the enclosure like you see in this pic... or do I really need to keep the king on newspaper until I know shes clean?

I already treated the enlcosure, substrate, and rocks with prevent a mite.... but Im second guessing myself and wonder if I should just keep her on newspaper for a month or two while I treat her.

What do you guys think? If prevent a mite works for 30 days and kills them so well it really shouldnt matter if she has substrate in the enclosure instead of newspaper should it?

Then again... newspaper doesnt give the little buggers anywhere to hide. lol.

What do you think?

I would put the snake on white paper towels.

Also, I would spray 0.5% permethrin (Equate Bedding Spray from Walmart or Provent-a-Mite, same thing) in the area the cages that had the infestation were located. Mites travel in a straight line, and will cross the table, floor, etc to get to a living host.
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Bob/Chris
Pyromaniac AKA Greatballzofire

Personally, I wouldn't remove a thing for over a month-and-a-half. If the mites were in there long enough then they assuredly laid eggs. The Provent-a-mite (pyrmethrine sp?) works effectively for about three weeks. As soon as the three weeks is up, simply spray the cage again and it will kill any of the mites that have or will begin to hatch. Once the cage is mite-free for a few months then there should be no reason to worry about another infestation unless you bring in animals with mites. Therefore, if you like the setup you have...then keep it. Just make sure you spray throughout not just the lifecycle of the adult mites but of the eggs too.

Mitch

I agree with Mitch, keep treating everything as you have it currently setup. PAM is very effective for treating the enclosure and the surrounding area. I would suggest every 3 weeks for at least 2 more cycles and you should be good to go.

I'm anal about mites and I have seen animals nearly sucked dry from them. When I had my shop I developed a protocol for every new animal that came in along with regularly treating my whole shop both herps and rodents.

New herps would always get a bath before going to quarantine. Bathed in room temp water so they can drink and rehydrate 15-20 minutes should do. Then I would add 1 or 2 cups of my homemade "reptile relief." To 1 gal of water add 1 TBSP Dawn dish soap and 1 TBSP of salt and mix thoroughly. The soap breaks down the surface tension and waxy coat on the mites then the salt sets up and osmotic reaction that the mites absorb water until they burst. Works great.

Then into a clean PAM treated tank or tub with minimal but adequate furniture lined only with white paper towels. Mites show up great on the PT whereas they are a lot harder to spot on newspaper. Repeat the whole cycle every 3 weeks and within 2 months you should see nothing but clean PT.

Can mites travel? A good friend of mine works for the Dept. of Ag. He did an experiment with mites. They placed mites in a covered petri dish. Around this were several more covered petri dishes that had been baited but no mites. Each dish had a ring of flour around it. By the next day they could see tracks leading from the infested dish into each and every dish surrounding it. They determined that mites can travel 10' per hour. With that it doesn't take long for one infested animal to contaminate your whole herp room.

Hope this helps,
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BigT
There is a difference between ignorance and stupidity. The ignorant can be taught, stupidity is beyond our control.
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Thats what Ill probably do then, simply treat the enclosure as is for a couple more cycles. Then, when Im sure they are eliminated... Ill give everything a bleach bath and give her fresh substrate. Ive been meaning to get some aspen bedding anyway just havent gotten around to it so the regular potting soil has worked in the meantime.

I guess I am just paranoid about mites. I would deploy nuclear bombs against these pests if it were not for the collateral damage that would ensue. LOL! I only had this mite problem once and got rid of them with the .50% permethrin spray. Getting them off the snake and his habitat was no worry, but I was very worried the mites and eggs would also be in the carpet, etc, so I treated the area all round the cage a few times to eliminate any eggs hatching, also.
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Bob/Chris
Pyromaniac AKA Greatballzofire

I wish someone would create a Bomb-A-Mite spray or something of that nature that you can just put somewhere in your snake room and know it will work, lol. When my collection had mites a couple years ago, the whole room got sprayed down with provent a mite several times, but I ended up completely moving the snake room to another floor of the house after that. I would always think about how the mites are probably crawling everywhere still.
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Mike
KingPin Reptiles
www.kingpinreptiles.com

www.elawngarden.com/hiyield-total-release-indoor-fogger-containing-pyrethrin-permethrin-p-108.html?utm_campaign=google-simple&utm_medium=product_search&utm_source=google-simple
Of course you would have to take all the animals out of the room during treatment.

I also raise crickets so the crickets would have to go into a separate permanent room.

Just the thought of those creepy crawly bloodsuckers makes my skin crawl...I'd take just about any measure to rid the premises of them should I be so unfortunate as to get a repeat infestation.
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Bob/Chris
Pyromaniac AKA Greatballzofire