Tiny White Bugs?

[CoolioTiffany]

The other day I had noticed my male normal Ball had a few or so tiny white bugs crawling on him. I've seen external parasites before and cured little black mites on him when I first purchased him, but never have seen little white bugs before? Just was curious on what these things are.. I did end up spraying some mite-killer stuff in his enclosure in case it happened to be mites. I did not see any in his water dish either.

I also checked the other Balls and they seem to be clear of the bugs, so I suppose it's just my normal male currently with the problem.

[mues155]

Ive seen little white bugs before if i dont keep my insect cages clean.
These may be very different however, Ive never seen them near my reptiles.
The bugs I get sometimes are super tiny, when i take a macro shot of them and zoom in on the computer there still isnt much detail to identify the bugs. I have yet to figure mine out too. Ill be interested to see if anyone has more advice for you and maybe both of us can find an answer.

[Foschi Exotic Serpents]

Wood mites? They are not dark, more like a light beige or tan and are very tiny. Also not very round like snake mites are but rather slightly more oval. If you use any type of wood based bedding, you'll get some type of wood mite eventually.

[Lucas339]

could be wood mites or spring tails. wood mites are described above. spring tails are long and skinny. both are harmless. mites are specific to their food source. hence, a wood mite won't prey on a snake and a snake mite won't go after wood.

[Adam Chandler]

Sounds like wood mites, which do not feed on reptiles. However, regardless of what kind of mite it is PAM will take care of them (I don't like any bugs in with my BP's, harmless or not).

[kitedemon]

What kind of substrate are you using?

[LadyOhh]

Wood mites...

They are not fun to see, but they are not harmful either.

[Severa]

Funny enough, I just purchased some aspen (Petco brand) and cleaned all the cages last week. Two nights ago I was doing maintenance and I noticed the little white bugs crawling on the dark water bowl. I knew they weren't reptile mites and have heard of wood mites and figured that what they were. I checked out my ball and she had none on her. I did however take the aspen out and administer her cage with PAM and once dry, put the aspen back in.

Severa
FB Eco Severa

[RichsBallPythons]

No matter what bedding you use or house you live in, you will see wood mites if you looked for them... Not good for the wood in house, but wont harm your pets..

I had them on my rodent rack when i first built it, Sprayed pam, on towels and wiped rack down with it.

[meowmeowkazoo]

I *freaked* out the first time I saw wood mites in my live planted vivarium (which at the time held my first and only ball python). Good luck with getting rid of them!