What else can I do til PAM arrives?

[Emily Hubbard]

My poor snake has mites, as I have stated before this week, and I think I finally got to the bottom if it. They must be wood mites that came in on a box of sphagnum moss from PetCo. I am fairly certain they are wood mites because I am not seeing them on my snake (except for ONE) only in the enclosure, ESPECIALLY the humid hide.

They don't seem to be bitting her, but I think they are starting to reaaallly annoy her. All day, she has been nosing at the glass like she just wants out. I feel sooooo bad for her. I ordered the PAM 3 days ago, and in the meantime, I just don't know what to do for her.

Because I couldn't do nothing, I just cleaned the cage, even though I know that won't get rid of the problem, I figure it might lessen it for a day or two. I removed the humid hide entirely for now. I do not have any wood substrate, I use felt carpet. I do however have two driftwood pieces. I am afraid if I remove them, she will be even more stressed because she is a largish set up, but she has always done fine in there with the driftwood and plant cover, but without the wood I am afraid she would feel too exposed....

I soaked her with a drop of dish soap as suggested and there was not a single mite in the water, further strengthening my hypothesis that these are wood mites.

Do you guys have any other suggestions of what I can do to help her until the PAM comes? She is obviously unsettled because she is extremely active today I just hate seeing her obviously unhappy and not being able to do anything.

[Vypyrz]

What do the mites look like? Wood mites are usually a whitish color. Since they aren't getting on your snake, they very well could be wood mites. Some things that you can try would be to:

1) soak the wood pieces in a diluted bleach/water solution, and then rinse thoroughly and let dry. Make sure that the bleach smell is gone.

2) disinfect the wood pieces with Isopropyl Alcohol. The alcohol will dry fairly quickly, especially if you use a fan or blow dryer. Either way, let it dry until the fumes are gone.

3) place the wood pieces on a cookie sheet and place in the oven on about 150-200F for maybe 20 minutes or so. I've also heard of people placing the wood in boiling water for a few minutes.

The Isopropyl Alcohol is what I use to disinfect my wood pieces when I do cage cleanings. I just put it in a spray bottle and spray them down.

[Emily Hubbard]

They are black, so maybe I am wrong. I just think it's odd that I am not seeing them on her, I check all the time. Even so, she just will not settle down and go in her hide, and I can't say I blame her, I just feel terrible. I contemplated buying a bottle of PAM when I first got her, "just in case," but I naively assumed it would be impossible for her to get mites unless I brought home a second snake that was infested. Very naive.

[FrankieCarbone]

i went thru the EXACT same thing, my BP wanted out of the tank to bad i caught him a few times in between the cover or the tank the the plexi glass cover i have under it.

They were all over the place, a few on my BP but not many and they were mostly crawling on her, not sucked in to her like regular mites do. Some where black and some of them where whitish. I too got caught in this problem without PAM at hand, and when i ordered some the expected delivery was like 12 days!

Anyways what i did was transfer her to my old setup 10gallon tank i had in the mean time, and lined that with paper towels and soaked her in a bath for a few minutes, then spray down with reptile relief. Like you i never saw a mite on the paper towels after doing this. Meanwhile back in the old setup i started checking everything, and of course, this big piece of wood decor i had was INFESTED with mites. They where in all the nooks a crannies. Since this is my THIRD incident with wood mites on wood decor/bark,i decided to just dispose of the wood decor. I notice that the dark wood decors as opposed to the light more flaky ones are the problem. I still have a branch decor which is the lighter white wood ones, and that i placed in boiling water. Pam finally arrived, cleaned the tank with chlorexedine, pam'd it up, and havent had a problem since.

[Vypyrz]

Meanwhile back in the old setup i started checking everything, and of course, this big piece of wood decor i had was INFESTED with mites. They where in all the nooks a crannies. Since this is my THIRD incident with wood mites on wood decor/bark,i decided to just dispose of the wood decor. I notice that the dark wood decors as opposed to the light more flaky ones are the problem. I still have a branch decor which is the lighter white wood ones, and that i placed in boiling water.

I know what you mean about getting rid of the wood pieces. I haven't had mites in mine because i periodically treat them, but I hate constantly having to scrub the urine,feces, and the occassional rat blood out of them. Hopefully, this weekend I will be finished with the new perches and climbing sticks that I am building. They will be much easier and quicker to clean and disinfect.

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