Reptile & Amphibian Forums

this is the bottom of a water bowl. i know it's not a very good picture, but are these mites or what? they're super tiny and white, but you can see them moving. i'm really worried because i just spent $25 on Provent-A-Mite and sprayed all my enclosures the other week. any ideas or suggestions? i appreciate any help/advice!

thanks!

greg

If you squish it and it pops, it's a mite. But if I where you I'd use a microscope or something.

Can't see anything else in your photo. If they are moving around as you say, then they are probably all over the cage. What substrate are you using?

-Joan

hi! sorry i'm so late getting back. i work second shift. to answer your question, i use aspen bedding. should i put fresh bedding in all my enclosures or switch to another substrate?

thanks again!
greg

Hi Greg –

Like I said before, I can’t really tell anything from that photo, but I’d hazard a guess that you might have grain mites. If that is so, they are not parasitical on your snakes, but they can build up to huge numbers. I used to get them when I used wood products like Sani-Chips or aspen. They were always worse in high humidity situations. I stopped using anything but paper and CareFresh for a while, but recently went back to Sani-Chips for burrowing snakes. And the grain mites came back. So I started back fresh by first treating the bag with Provent-a-mite. But I see the grain mites are just beginning to come back again, so I guess I’ll have to treat all the enclosures – and probably more than once. There is no reason that Provent-a-mite wouldn’t kill them, but these mites are so tiny and sort of clear or straw-colored that it is easy to overlook them and so not treat as aggressively as one might for snake mites.

I can have side by side cages, one with newsprint, one with Sani-Chips, and only the Sani-Chips (or whatever wood product) ever has the grain mites. The easiest cure is to switch to plain paper substrate. No food to munch on so the mites die off and don’t come back. I just can’t believe that more people don’t have this problem! Are these critters just too small for most people to notice?

-Joan