Hey all i recently acquired a ball python, his name is scotty, and he looked fine when i got him.He is 18-20 inches. He acts normal, looks normal, drinks, eats like a garbage disposal, but has mites... or ticks. My question is how to tell the diffrence from the two? when i think of a tick i think of the little bug that digs under my skin when i go hiking, and the bug i picture is way bigger than the bugS on him. So if ticks are just like that than he has mites. The bugs he has are very tiny white-beige colored and many of them crawling over him, and yesterday i noticed that some of them were actually a blackish red and a bit bigger (im assuming larvae-adult mites). thats just what i came up with in my head, but im looking for someone to tell me yes it is mites, or yes it is ticks (i havent found one yet that has "dug" under his scales, thats why i think mites)
So my question is based on that info do you guys/gals think its mites or ticks? and if so does this require a trip to the vet or do the mite treatment stuff at my local petstore work, ive already made a appointment with my local herp vet to check out his crap sample in 2 weeks (hopefully he will crap by then) so i could push it up to 2 days if he requires vet assistance. Any help/advice would be appreciated
-PJ