Mites....

[Snakegirl2017]

We have had Tesla since January 13...he had no sign of mites when we bought him or after...until two days ago. We found ONE little black bug on my daughters hand. Killed it. Still wasn’t certain it was a mite because after a very thorough inspection we didn’t see anything else that might raise a red flag. Well...today after he completed his first shed with us “YAY!”...we noticed teensy tiny moving specks on his shed as we were unrolling it to show off...so off the get mite spray I go. After two weeks these jokers are just now appearing...I have read the pinned article and feel confident we know how to get rid of them at this point but I am a little disturbed that they have been “invisible” up until this point. Did they come on him or something that we bought that same day...I guess we will never know...
Gave him a through look over after checking out his shed and still not a black dot anywhere...🤔
Needless to say the shed went outside in a bag to the garbage.☹️

[c0r3yr0s3]

Did you inspect the water dish?

[Snakegirl2017]

I did...it was clean...no mites in there. We found two that we squished on a paper towel (one yesterday) and then one today when we took his shed out..it was on the underside of a wooden log hide that we bought him from Petsmart after we brought him home. Then we noticed the teeny tiny grey-ish ones moving on his shed as we were straitening it out shortly after. We immediately took the log out of the house and removed the shed as well. We bought mite spray and treated the entire habitat and Tesla as well. Until we know he is mite free he has a clear water dish and two plastic clear/white hides. We will retreat the habitat tomorrow. We took a paper towel sprayed with the mite spray and rubbed it down his neck/belly/tail but there was not ONE black dot of anything anywhere on the paper towel. We rinsed him gently with lukewarm water and put him back in his barren habitat. Poor guy...he is looking around like "what the heck...where's my stuff".

[CALM Pythons]

I did...it was clean...no mites in there. We found two that we squished on a paper towel (one yesterday) and then one today when we took his shed out..it was on the underside of a wooden log hide that we bought him from Petsmart after we brought him home. Then we noticed the teeny tiny grey-ish ones moving on his shed as we were straitening it out shortly after. We immediately took the log out of the house and removed the shed as well. We bought mite spray and treated the entire habitat and Tesla as well. Until we know he is mite free he has a clear water dish and two plastic clear/white hides. We will retreat the habitat tomorrow. We took a paper towel sprayed with the mite spray and rubbed it down his neck/belly/tail but there was not ONE black dot of anything anywhere on the paper towel. We rinsed him gently with lukewarm water and put him back in his barren habitat. Poor guy...he is looking around like "what the heck...where's my stuff".

Are you sure they are Snake mites and not wood mites? Ive seen and heard of mites people get from wood Decor etc..

[Snakegirl2017]

I am not sure now...lol. They were two little black bugs (the one visually saw on our hand and then the one on the wood itself). The smaller grey-ish ones were on his shed (which was actually under to wooden log). I will look up wood mites, but we treated him and the habitat just to be safe.

[CALM Pythons]

Black or Reddish are snake mites.. White or Grey wood. Sounds like someone brought them home from the Pets store to me. You'll have to be careful not to touch other Reptiles & wash after being anywhere that you can transfer them from.

[Snakegirl2017]

We just instituted "the change and wash before handling rule" for those days we have gone to pet stores...lol. I am concerned about substrate now. How do I know if it's "clean". We bought a block of cocochip. We only broke off what we needed to his cage, the rest is stored in another part of the house. Do I toss it? If I buy a new block, how do I know it's not carrying eggs from wherever it comes from. He will be using paper towels for a while, but the cocochips really work well keeping our humidity in check.