show me some mites, in pictures, please :)

I dont know, but i think there is a severe lack of understanding on what blood-sucking mites are and how they look like, and also about harmless springtails and harmless mites.

I think the way to sort it out is by using photography. Please share microphotography that shows either harmless or harmful insects in detail here. With a few really nice images of the bad guys, and a few really nice images of the good guys, we will have a reference that lasts. I will try to contribute.

Best Regards, and, why not?

springtail party, length up to 1 mm, all harmless:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...raAquatica.jpg

Common sense dictates that a snake in your collection won't be covered with "harmless" mites. Just smash one and see.

i have never seen the blood-sucking ones do the jesus thing, i mean, walking on water like its solid ground. like in the picture above. Heck when the harmless ones walk on water, they can still jump like 2 inches into the air from the water surface, repeatedly.

harmless mites or springtails will occasionally be on the BP, but they have nothing to gain from it, there isnt anything in it for them. Only blood suckers have a motivation to stay on the snake.

EDIT: there are more species of mites on our planet than there are species of mammals, or reptiles.

Personally, if there are any type of bugs in my ball's enclosure, I wouldn't waste time trying to figure out whether it's harmless or not. Out they all go.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Archimedes

Personally, if there are any type of bugs in my ball's enclosure, I wouldn't waste time trying to figure out whether it's harmless or not. Out they all go.

---

that is exactly what i never want to do. i want to differentiate it into 3 categories: beneficial, neutral, harmful. And i want to intervene only when my identification says harmful.

its always the first impulse to kill everything. but they can help with smell reduction and cleanup. why is it always the first impulse to kill everything? is it just to be on the safe side, or is it to spare you the effort of taking a closer look?

anyway, i still would like to see pics of harmful reptile mites, so that i can properly see them.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Pythonfriend

that is exactly what i never want to do. i want to differentiate it into 3 categories: beneficial, neutral, harmful. And i want to intervene only when my identification says harmful.

its always the first impulse to kill everything. but they can help with smell reduction and cleanup. why is it always the first impulse to kill everything? is it just to be on the safe side, or is it to spare you the effort to take a closer look?

---

Absolutely the safe side. I have a ball python because I'm willing to care for it and put in the responsible effort to maintain cleanup and smell reduction myself. I don't need bugs that do it for me. Like I said, not worth the risk. Once one parasite gets in, symbiotic or not, there's room for others to get in.

there is an informed safe side: Kill what can harm your BP.

and there is an uninformed, ignorant safe side: kill everything. no matter what it is, no matter what it does, just kill anything that crawls or walks.

depending on your level of knowledge, both are equally safe.

EDIT: and what exactly is a symbiotic parasite, other than an internal contradiction?

Mites look like black poppy seeds that crawl on your snake and enclosure. Think miniature ticks. Juvenile mites are reddish brown in color too. They can also be seen between scales, in the vent, and in the heat pits too.

http://home.comcast.net/~mickeysnigh...tes/Mites1.jpg

Mites in the vent and on the guy's fingers.
http://bamboozoo.weebly.com/uploads/...092112.jpg?585

Juvenile mites:
http://bugguide.net/images/cache/50Y...W03R7QORXQ.jpg





Sent from my DROID RAZR using Tapatalk 2

"Symbiosis (from Ancient Greek σύν "together" and βίωσις "living")^[1] is close and often long-term interaction between two or more different biological species. In 1877, Albert Bernhard Frank used the word symbiosis (which previously had been used to depict people living together in community) to describe the mutualistic relationship in lichens.^[2] In 1879, the German mycologist Heinrich Anton de Bary defined it as "the living together of unlike organisms."^[3][4]
The definition of symbiosis is controversial among scientists. Some believe symbiosis should only refer to persistent mutualisms, while others believe it should apply to any types of persistent biological interactions (i.e. mutualistic, commensalistic, or parasitic).^[5]
Some symbiotic relationships are obligate, meaning that both symbionts entirely depend on each other for survival. For example, many lichens consist of fungal and photosynthetic symbionts that cannot live on their own.^[3][6][7][8] Others are facultative, meaning that they can, but do not have to live with the other organism.
Symbiotic relationships include those associations in which one organism lives on another (ectosymbiosis, such as mistletoe), or where one partner lives inside the other (endosymbiosis, such as lactobacilli and other bacteria in humans or Symbiodinium incorals).^[9][10] Symbiosis is also classified by physical attachment of the organisms; symbiosis in which the organisms have bodily union is called conjunctive symbiosis, and symbiosis in which they are not in union is called disjunctive symbiosis.<sup>[11]"

Directly from Wikipedia.

I myself am of the school of thought that parasites, whether sybiotic or nonsymbiotic, have no place in the environment of my pet. It's my responsibility to keep their existence isolated and in that way unhindered and healthy.

We have that capability and responsibility as keepers to maintain the safest possible environment, and parasites do not play into that.</sup>

I personally don't want any kind of insect in my BP enclosures. Whether or not they're directly beneficial, neutral, or harmful, they can all be vectors in carrying disease and parasites.

Sent from my DROID RAZR using Tapatalk 2

the term "symbiotic" is defined as a relationship between two species that is mutually benificient. meaning both sides benefit from it. you have more bacteria in your guts than you have human body cells in your whole body. without them, you would be unable to digest much of what you eat; you would be on a very special diet or you would die.

when only one species has a benefit, it is called neutral.

it is parasitic only when one species has a benefit at the cost of another species, causing harm to another species.

the definitions of "symbiosis" and "parasitical relationship" are mutually exclusive. If one is true, the other cannot be true, and vice versa.

i guess im just a hippie and like nature too much. but then, in aquaristics: knock out the bacteria and make your aquarium sterile, and all fish die within a few days. For reptiles, these may be hypothetical ponderings, in aquaristics stuff like this is damn real.

Great thread. I agree, parasites by definition harm their host in some way. While some people might work to keep their enclosure completely bug free, it's nice to know what you are dealing with, since the way in which you deal with them is different, as is the urgency.

Snakes naturally do have a number of symbiotic organisms that they develop. This article by Melissa Kaplan sums it up nicely. Essentially, the snake's environment and stress level has everything to do with just how beneficial their gut flora is, which is why regurgitation is such a big deal in our world. Introducing an external factor such as common wood mites or springtails could provoke a loss of beneficiary gut flora via stress, allowing more malignant organisms to come forward. Gods forbid the "harmless" organisms have hitchhiking pathogens, even if their presence has little effect on the animal itself.

Too much to go wrong. Keeping snakes has been largely successful in the absence of saprophytic organisms. And snakes are equipped with enough symbiotic organisms to survive without adding external creatures that may or may not be helpful.

Well I'll be itching uncontrollably all over for the rest of the day after those pics Satomi, thanks for that.

One place to check for mites is the little cleft under the chin of the snake. They don't like you checking there, but it's definitely the most fool proof way of checking if there are mites present. If there are any mites in the cage or on the snake, they will definitely be in that cleft.


Also, lol Melissa Kaplan.

how can a hatchling develop a symbiote that has genetics that are 500 million years old?

no individual can develop this, it is acquired. a bacterium that carries in it between 500 million to 2 billion years of evolution does not simply develop in the guts of a BP within months. its borrowed from the prey animals, the rats and mice. And in nature also from the soil.