Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Thanks to all of you who posted and e-mailed me with advice. The Mites never got to my other BP, thank goodness! We decided to use the Reptile Relief that my fiance picked up, so this is how we did it.

Day 1: Warm bath with drop of soap.... sprayed some of the RR in the bottom of a tub, put her in and gave her a squirt... my fiance made sure she had the RR all over while I cleaned her cage with the RR, making sure it was rinsed well. Replaced her paper-towl and hides with new clean ones and left her water dish out.

Still saw mites, some live, some dead.

Day 2: Warm bath with a drop of soap.... rubbed down with olive oil... paper-towl and hides replaced again.

Still saw mites, most dead.

Day 3: Warm bath with a drop of soap.... rubbed down with olive oil... paper-towl and hides replaced again, water dish cleaned and reinserted.

Didn't see any mites.

Day 4: Still don't see any mites.

Day 5: Still no sign of any mites.

She seems to be more active than normal and I think (I know she is a snake and they are never "tame" she knows we got rid of those nasty things for her and the handling actually made her know we aren't going to hurt her (I have never seen a BP so people friendly, even my EXTREEMLY docile male jumps if you get too close to his head and tries to hide when you go to pick him up out of his cage). Now every time we look into her tank, she comes out of her hide and comes right up to the glass. My fiance is amazed at how much she acts like a dog LOL. She goes in her hide and lays her head out, she lays her head on her mid-body alot, and when we were trying to get a mite off of her chin she kinda looked like a cat when you scratch their chin (amazingly she didn't jump!). We are SO glad we treated her and didn't take her back. She is so beautiful and lively! I just wish we could find a place that sells live pinky rats or hopper mice. We got a small mouse and it was just too big for her and we got F/T pinky rats, but she treated them like they were rocks and just slithered right over them like they werent there, didn't even flick her tongue!

Again thanks to those who helped. All looks succesful so far!
-----
"Wanting to be someone else is a waste of the person you are." - Kurt Cobain

"You laugh at me because I am different; I laugh at you because you are all the same."

~~ Krystal ~~

If you are using f/t rats, and your snake is ignoring them: I have found that sometimes, the rats are not at a high enough temperature. Either the snake will ignore them completely, or he will constrict them and then have trouble finding the rat right after constriction, like the rat mysteriously disappeared! You might want to thaw the rat as normal, and then put the nose near a heat lamp for a little while to give it a really warm, but not HOT, temperature. This will give your snake a better heat-emitting prey item to focus on.
Good luck with the mites; they are a definate pain in the butt, but it sounds like you have things under control.
-----
2.1 Ball pythons: Goblin, Ashes, and Bela
1.0 Boa Constrictor Imperator: Apache Fog
0.1 albino Cranwell's horned frog: Bene
1.0 Tiger salamander: Slasher
1.1 breeding Clawed frogs: Mr and Mrs Piggy
1.0 black kittycat, Inky
A bunch of Oscar cichlids, one giant pleco, huge breeding lot of "fancy" (read: deformed) goldfish, and me an' the boyfriend.

in my previous post, I said "put the nose near a heat lamp." I meant the rat's nose, not the snake's!
-----
2.1 Ball pythons: Goblin, Ashes, and Bela
1.0 Boa Constrictor Imperator: Apache Fog
0.1 albino Cranwell's horned frog: Bene
1.0 Tiger salamander: Slasher
1.1 breeding Clawed frogs: Mr and Mrs Piggy
1.0 black kittycat, Inky
A bunch of Oscar cichlids, one giant pleco, huge breeding lot of "fancy" (read: deformed) goldfish, and me an' the boyfriend.

LOL thanks, I don't have a heat lamp right now, so I did the same, but with the heat tape. I don't like the F/T anyway, but I HAD to try it, she NEEDS to eat! I would MUCH rather P/K or live if there not able to harm her (pinkies). I will have to get ahold of a friend of mine and see if she has anything. Thanks.
-----
"Wanting to be someone else is a waste of the person you are." - Kurt Cobain

"You laugh at me because I am different; I laugh at you because you are all the same."

~~ Krystal ~~

>>Again thanks to those who helped. All looks succesful so far!

Did you know that a single surviving female mite will lay viable unfertilized eggs? Did you know the babies will all be males that will fight to mate with mom. The fertilized eggs will then be female. Now these females will have plenty of males around. Then there will be an explosion of mites. This process I describe takes two months. Furthermore, I promise you, you cannot see that ALL of the mites are dead. It only takes one female to start the whole process all over again.

These soap based treatments are really a cosmetic treatment. Killing many and making you feel good but in my extensive experience it is only cosmetic. The mites still remain. To see how I treat mites on my valuable animals check this out.

I see my customers get re-infections of mites all the time and the only reasonable explanation is the treatment did not get all the eggs or the two non-feeding stages of mite or a single female survived and went unseen. All of which are possible with a soap based treatment. Reptile relief is a soap. So you have done double soap treatments.

Re-infections always take two months. Mark your calender.
-----
AMAZON REPTILE CENTER

NAMED BEST REPTILE STORE IN LOS ANGELES

Well your treatment isn't exactly safe, considering the fact that pest strips give off toxic fumes that can harm your snakes. Just FYI. Krystal glad everything worked out for you.
-----
Jeff West

Thanks Jeff, I was pretty sure I knew better than to use the strips. Maybe outside of the enclosure just to catch the excapees? But I was told a long time ago not to EVER use them close to the snakes.
-----
"Wanting to be someone else is a waste of the person you are." - Kurt Cobain

"You laugh at me because I am different; I laugh at you because you are all the same."

~~ Krystal ~~

hey,

about the non-feeding thing, my ball will only eat if the mouse/rat is warm and if you use tongs to wave it in front of him. this way he thinks its alive.

dunno if that helps.

cat

Yeah my fiance tried to "wiggle" it in front of her face (it was warm) and she just kind of tried to get around it like it was in her way. I hope she eats soon though, I am going to make a call tonight and see if I can get a hopper mouse or something.
-----
"Wanting to be someone else is a waste of the person you are." - Kurt Cobain

"You laugh at me because I am different; I laugh at you because you are all the same."

~~ Krystal ~~