Mites originated in India. Outside of there, they're only found in people's collections and on captive snakes.

As for ticks... well, if you were unlucky enough to get a tick on your snake, they wouldn't reproduce and thus cause an infestation. You'd probably catch it before it got big anyway, but I'm not aware of many (if any) ticks in Houston.

I'm very careful with fire ant nests though.

But yeah, I take them outside to give them some exploring time. And great pictures of course!