Mites on snake eye

[Planky]

Just wondering the best way of getting these little f'ers off my snakes eye just noticed his eye scales lifted so I checked only to find 3 mites. And yes I am going to spray the tank and all that for mites too

[RSPcrazy]

Hold the snakes head, pull it's eye scales to the side (so you can see the skin in the eye socket), then get a wet cotton tip ear bud and gently scrape them out. Then soak the snake in a container of water with some betadine in it. The mites will just fall off in the betadine.

[Marzzy]

How do snakes get mites ? When there inside ? Sorry for the hijack

[RSPcrazy]

How do snakes get mites ? When there inside ? Sorry for the hijack

When mites got into my collection, about 3 years ago now. They were brought in on a person that came to checkout my collection and held a couple of snakes. As it turned out, that person had mites in their collection and didn't disinfect them selfs or change the clothes they were whereing when they held their mite infected reptiles.

[Bluetongue1]

How do snakes get mites ? When there inside ? Sorry for the hijack

At certain stages and after a feed, the mite tend to drop off and wander, looking for a new host. They can travel quite a few metres in a relatively short time, although they prefer dark, moister areas. So they can readily re-infest the original host or transfer themselves to nearby clean snakes in a collection. They can also be carried on items from within the vicinity of any infested snake, in particular cage furniture and enclosures. And as RSPcrazy pointed out, this includes careless keepers.

Blue

[Darlyn]

I read that mites can travel 8 inches in a minute, that's pretty swift moving.

[Albino93]

a few weeks ago i found a white bug on my snake, a day or two before i found it one of my brothers friends held her, and i didnt know at the time but apparently their house is riddled in little white mites, however they dont own any reptiles, their house isnt the cleanest house either. Luckily i only found one so i could control it.

[Ramsayi]

a few weeks ago i found a white bug on my snake, a day or two before i found it one of my brothers friends held her, and i didnt know at the time but apparently their house is riddled in little white mites, however they dont own any reptiles, their house isnt the cleanest house either. Luckily i only found one so i could control it.

Probably not mites but if they were then not the type that infects reptiles.

[Albino93]

Yeh im not really sure what it was, but i found it on the underside of her belly. I know its not the type that infects reptiles but id say it just crawled off the person onto the snake and before it could crawl back onto the person she got put back in her enclosure. Apparently all the people that live in that house find them crawling around on their skin.

[Bluetongue1]

Unfortunately I lost half my post and did not have time to retype it. Snakes can a variety of mites. The red or orange ones that are often found in skin folds of lizards, and around the eyes of snakes, are not of concern. The Snake Mite, Ophionyssus natricis, is of concern. It can carry and transfer disease as well reach numbers that have a debilitating effect on the infested animals. To the unaided eye the animals look black or dark brown and are most often found under ventral scales where they actually cause the scales to sit up off the skin. So if it was white, whether it was a mite or not, you have nothing to worry about. You can tell if it is a mite because the adult possess 4 pairs of legs. It they only have 3 pair, it is some form of insect.

Darlyn, You may have read that in the Barker’s article on snake mite. That is where I saw it. It equates to 48 feet per hour or 14.6 m per hour. That is a gravid, engorged female. Apparently they can walk for several hours. So potentially could travel 60 m or more, which is a bit of a worry. The only positive in that is that they require the right conditions of temperature and humidity, otherwise they will die. Worth noting that an unfed female can travel at 11 inches per minute or 16.7 m per hour. Pretty damned mobile!

Blue

[Darlyn]

Hey Blue,
The article I read was written by Melissa Kaplan (I saved it).

It also says that betadine in water is for anaesthetic purposes rather than killing the mites
which I found interesting. In a way I guess that suggests that drowning mites is an effective treatment rather
than using chemicals?