Mites... Confusion.

[jxl]

There are plenty of how to's on this forum. I've posed my thread here for you to check beside others.

Here's a HOWTO guide by AaronP which you can use.
http://ball-pythons.net/forums/showt...it-with-AaronP

Hope it helps and clears things up

[JRBrett]

Does anyone have any experience with Callington Mite Spray? My local reptile shop sells it but it isn't cheap. Don't want to buy it if it is substandard/ poorly thought of/ dangerous.

Thanks for that jxl. I saw your previous thread, informative.

[Pythonfriend]

some photography with high resolution and/or a macro lens would certainly be helpful right now.

generally, a hard shell and a hard body tends to be bad news, because blood-suckers and parasites tend to wear armor like that. the harmless ones often have a body that is so soft that they turn into a smudge, you dont feel them with your fingers because they are too soft and your finger is too hard.

[JRBrett]

Definitely hard bodied and 'feelable'. Took my fingernails to pop, currently at work but will try to upload some photos this evening. I am pretty sure they are snake mites after trawling the forums/ google images etc, but I just confused about how few there were and how little evidence there was in the viv. I do keep a pretty sterile set-up which I guess is good of things like this but I would have expected to see some.

It it okay to remove the for a couple of days hides whilst I am diagnosing? I don't really want to stress her if I can help it but I dont want an infestation.

[Pythonfriend]

Definitely hard bodied and 'feelable'. Took my fingernails to pop, currently at work but will try to upload some photos this evening. I am pretty sure they are snake mites after trawling the forums/ google images etc, but I just confused about how few there were and how little evidence there was in the viv. I do keep a pretty sterile set-up which I guess is good of things like this but I would have expected to see some.

It it okay to remove the for a couple of days hides whilst I am diagnosing? I don't really want to stress her if I can help it but I dont want an infestation.

for mites, when you strip down the enclosure, the minimum is 1 water bowl with fresh water, 1 hide, and paper towels as substrate.

i would recommend you use PAM, provent-a-mite, follow the instructions to the letter. do not use a variety of products, and using any product directly on the reptile will not be necessary, using anything directly on the reptile will only increase risks. mites are difficult to exterminate, but when there are only a few right now, you can definitively hold out for a few days until provent-a-mite arrives.

additional hides and decoration and fake plants can be treated, just spray it with a bit of PAM, and then bag it up airtight in plastic bags and store it away for a month. after a month or two of starvation, dehydration, and toxicity against insects and arachnids, anything remotely resembling any insect or mite will be dead, and you can take it all out of the bag, wash it, and use it safely. so there is no need to throw stuff away, you can cure it.

overdoing it with too much chemicals and combining many different products is more dangerous for your snake than the mites themselves, some people manage to poison and kill their reptiles this way. so keep a cool head and buy the best product and follow the instructions, and even a 10-day-delay is no problem.

(there only is a hurry when someone has a large collection, because mites can bite one reptile, then walk to the next enclosure and bite a different reptile, transmitting diseases while spreading through the collection. with 1 snake this is not an issue.)

and keep in mind that while i now think it may really be reptile mites, we are not sure about that, but it now seems likely. insects with hard shells are bad news.

[MarkS]

This is what I've been using lately. Picked it up in the camping supplies department at Walmart. Same ingredients but much cheaper then what you can find in a pet store.

[bcr229]

OP is in the UK. He doesn't have access to PAM, NIX, RID, or any of the other permethrin-based products available in the US.

IIRC Callington's is what the folks across the pond typically use to treat for mites - just follow the directions exactly.

[MarkS]

OP is in the UK. He doesn't have access to PAM, NIX, RID, or any of the other permethrin-based products available in the US.

IIRC Callington's is what the folks across the pond typically use to treat for mites - just follow the directions exactly.

Are there NO permetherin based products available in the UK at all? I didn't know that.

[jxl]

some photography with high resolution and/or a macro lens would certainly be helpful right now.

generally, a hard shell and a hard body tends to be bad news, because blood-suckers and parasites tend to wear armor like that. the harmless ones often have a body that is so soft that they turn into a smudge, you dont feel them with your fingers because they are too soft and your finger is too hard.

Can you check than this, which was taken high res with macro lens !
http://shrani.si/f/1o/uJ/4Dr9PxhU/timg3072.jpg
http://shrani.si/f/z/lj/3xaj1WMG/timg3078.jpg
http://shrani.si/f/1s/96/1VTTzevZ/timg3079.jpg

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As far the thread goes

OP should have access to BioKill it's sold widely over Europe. I had the same problem except that NIX could be found at some pharmacies. And I also wrote a thread ~ 1 month ago about this substitute. It's permethrin dilluted with water.

Here's the link for one online store from UK that sells it so I presume it's available everywhere like here where you can get it mostly all grocery shops.

http://www.suttons.co.uk/Gardening/G...ler_240855.htm

And here's the link to what this actually is:
http://www.jesmond.co.at/wp-content/...BKC-MKTG-E.pdf

[bcr229]

Are there NO permetherin based products available in the UK at all? I didn't know that.

I'm not saying there won't be any permethrin products at all, just that they will have different brand names. The products specifically named "PAM", "NIX", and "RID" may not be available overseas.

He could look for the 1% permethrin head-lice treatments in the drug stores, mix 60 ml of product to 4 liters of water, which is the equivalent of our 2 oz of product per gallon, which yields a 0.015% permethrin solution.

Concentrated permethrin is often found at farm/livestock stores, the OP could try to find it there, and dilute it. Here in the States you can get Permethrin-10 which is 10% permethrin, 8 oz is about $8 at Tractor Supply. Mix 3 ml of that in 2 liters water gives a 0.014% solution, which is the same strength as the NIX/RID solution.

While PAM is a 0.5% permethrin solution, which is very strong, only a light spray is used. The NIX/RID/P-10/etc are mixed with water and applied with a squirt bottle, so a lot more liquid is applied to the surfaces of the enclosure.

And with all of these I don't recommend applying any permethrin product directly to the snake. I know some people do it, but I won't, as permethrin poisoning can cause permanent neuro damage.

ETA: Just saw the link for the BioKill. That will certainly work, OP just needs to realize it's a 0.25% permethrin product, which is quite strong.