Bugs!! Gross!!

[KingWheatley]

Fricken pests. What are they? what do they do? And how the hell do I get rid of them!?

This is the first time I've seen them. Picked Cookie up to check up on him and I spotted movement scurrying away from the light. My heart jumped out of my rib cage, for fricken sure.



I'm about to completely trash this tank and just get a whole different one. They look like gnat babies. And there was a flying one just now that I squished.

But they might be those scale bugs...

Anyone care to clarify what type of bugs these are and also how to get rid of them?


Herp Derp

[CALM Pythons]

Those are long little buggers. I hate bugs. I've had some friends getting bugs and with their substrate etc... I wonder if it came from a bag of those chips?

[joshuapittsburgh]

I have some special spray that is guarenteed to kill any type of bugs and is not harmful to the snake or you!!
I used it on our banana pied and it got the mites completely taken care of!

Message me if you are interested

[PitOnTheProwl]

The little white bug moving along the paper, looks like I may be a wood mite.
No problem or worries.

[fourward]

I don't know what it could be, but I would:
1. throw away the current substrate.
2. Put the woodchip substrate in the freezer for over 24 hours.
3. clean the tub and whatever that is inside the tub.
4. Spray a herp-safe insecticide accordingly to the tub, substrate (the one you will use while the infected substrate freezes in the freezer), and hides (I use Reptile spray (c) and provent-a-mite (c)).
5. let the insecticide dry for about 10-15 min.
6. place everything back inside and let the snake back in.
7. after 24-48 hours, place the infected substrate in the tub and repeat steps 4-6 again.

If there is an insect on the chip, it would most likely be dead and be safe for the snake.
if you don't want to use the same substrate, just throw that one away and buy a new one and freeze it before you put it in the tub.

[KingWheatley]

The little white bug moving along the paper, looks like I may be a wood mite.
No problem or worries.

Thank you. Still creepy to see when you aren't expecting it...


Herp Derp

[Vipera Berus]

I occasionally got these with my corn snake. I noticed that it tended to be when the substrate was too humid in its container. Only time I have seen it with my BP is when its time to clean out her vivarium.

A solution that seemed to fix it was ensuring the substrate was totally dry for at least 2-3 days before I added it to the vivarium, tended to fix it till more turned up - seldom got more than every 3-4th batch of substrate. I have been using orchid bark (at least it looks like that), this means I can lightly bake it to try it out faster.

[KingWheatley]

Got rid of the substrate and switched to paper towels. Added more objects to clutter up the environment (including a paper towel tube... of all things).

I had to clean with a chemical. No bleach in the house or anything other than just water. I watered the cleaner out and used very little of it, then used water to rinse off the cleaner (it was scented... so I made double sure I couldn't smell anything.) and so far no signs of them.


Herp Derp