Hey all this is my first post of many to come in the future, unfortunately this is a rather worrying first post. I need some advice please for my pied as she's really taken a bad turn
Situation right now is she stopped eating about 2 months ago, she's eaten 1 small weaner rat in that time (she's nearly 2yrs and I've had her for 8 months). Here in England it's winter and the weather has made humidity drop, i thought this was the reason why she stopped eating as humidity had been around 43% for quite some time despite misting everyday. (Her hot side is 88 and her cold side 82.5 degrees.) So I bought some damp sphagnum moss sealed from the manufacturer at the exotics shop, and put it straight in her viv, low and behold the damn stuff must have contained mites and I noticed she had mites only 2 weeks later.
Then, last weekend I treated her and my other ball python (who also caught mites from the moss but was eating up until then) with Callington mite spray, then this is when I really start to worry badly. After boiling their furniture and putting them on paper towels I sprayed both pythons and then they seemed to change their behaviour dramatically. They just laid there lethargic and listless for hours, my other one looked tense in his muscles but eventually started to move about 4 hours later, and yawned a bit and rubbing his head on everything. After she came back around she has been pacing her viv relentlessly and is really grumpy. I thought this was due to hunger but she still won't eat and gets frightened when I offer her food,now she is just lying in the open again with her head and neck down, she looks really unwell and is losing significant weight.
I feel so terrible and upset that I've done something wrong as they were both healthy before and now they're both off their food. I'm due to respray them with Callington on Friday but I fear maybe they are having a bad time with the treatment? There was quite a bit of condensation after I sprayed their vivs and I really hope they didn't ingest any when they put their noses up to the window. I feel like a terrible person if anyone could please help advise what I should do to help them get back to health I would appreciate it so much or else I feel I'm not doing what's right for them and I don't want them to suffer anymore.
This is the second time I've had a mite infestation from sphagnum moss although I thought seeing as this bag was vacuum sealed I'd be safe but never again. Does anyone else have problems in the UK with winter humidity problem?
Thank you all and God bless