yet ANOTHER mite thread

[Lawra]

*rolls eyes* ok yep here I go...

My snakes have mites. It started three weeks ago and I have been scrubbing and using F10 on their enclosures daily and spraying with the yellow TOD mite insecticide every 7 days up til now.

Fast forward to today when I took my 13mo jungle and woma to the vet because:

a) the mites are still present

b) jungle won't eat and has lost condition

c) they're both visibly dehydrated - jungle moreso than woma

The jungle was given a Fortum injection today and I have two more to give in 3 day intervals with another vet trip scheduled in 9 days time.

I was also given "0.5ml Ivomec 5litre Oral" with the following instructions:

"Sponge onto patient with a cotton wool ball every 5 days for three weeks please"

I share most of the concerns in the link below and also worry that since Fang has seriously lost condition (only weighs 100g) that this will make him worse.

I trust my vet but I did let her know that I hadn't heard of Ivomec before so was going to look it up... Which I have done and wanted to ask you guys before I ring her up and ask for some Permoxin instead (which I saw on a shelf during the examination) just in case it really is ok to use. She's been great and charged me barely anything today so I don't want to insult her intelligence for nothing.

http://www.aussiepythons.com/forum/herp-help-38/ivermectin-ivomeca-dosage-rates-160938/

 

[saximus]

I can't help with the Ivermec vs Permoxin thing but if you're still having trouble with the mites, you either aren't breaking the breeding cycle or you aren't getting every place that they're hiding. Where are the snakes kept? Mine have their own bedroom so I found the easiest approach was to move all of the occupants into tubs and let off a flea bomb in the room. That guarantees you kill all of them and it breaks the breeding cycle for you. While they're in the tubs you also need to treat them individually using whatever method you prefer.

 

[xAshx]

Im sure ivomec is fine, i bought a jungle once who ended up coming to me off the plane riddled with mites... I wiped her over with the ivomec, and it never had an ill effect on her. I also used ivomec to worm out my poorly treated bearded dragons when I got them, and used a small amount in a luke warm bath for them.. They didnt have mites visible at the time, but it was just to make sure...

 

[Lawra]

Thanks [MENTION=21544]saximus[/MENTION] they're in my room - live in a one bedroom unit. I made tubs for treatment so will put them in and bomb our bedroom. Have you found any particular one works better than others?
[MENTION=39374]xAshx[/MENTION] I know you mean well but I have to stress the point that my 13 month old jungle python weighs only 100g, is severely dehydrated, won't eat and hasn't in a month which usually wouldn't be a problem but s/he is clearly sick. Assuring me that yours was fine isn't much consolation I'm afraid, as I'm concerned that exposing him/her to chemicals will only worsen the condition.

 

[Snowman]

Thanks @saximus they're in my room - live in a one bedroom unit. I made tubs for treatment so will put them in and bomb our bedroom. Have you found any particular one works better than others?
@xAshx I know you mean well but I have to stress the point that my 13 month old jungle python weighs only 100g, is severely dehydrated, won't eat and hasn't in a month which usually wouldn't be a problem but s/he is clearly sick. Assuring me that yours was fine isn't much consolation I'm afraid, as I'm concerned that exposing him/her to chemicals will only worsen the condition.

Have you treated the enclosures with top of decent? You also need to strip them bare. I know you are one for decorating, but it's just a place for the mites to hide.

 

[saximus]

I used the Mortein one but I'm sure they all do the same thing. I wouldn't worry too much with the F10 and cleaning. That is best left till they're all gone as a bit of housekeeping. It sounds like it's taking a bit of a toll on you so you're better off concentrating your energy on keeping the animals healthy.

 

[Lawra]

Have you treated the enclosures with top of decent? You also need to strip them bare. I know you are one for decorating, but it's just a place for the mites to hide.

Yes Mr Snowman

I made click-clacks to put them in whilst treating enclosures and snakes separately.

Took all furnishings out of enclosure, soaked them in F10 in the laundry tub and after they dried I put them in a box outside where they've ben ever since. The only things in enclosures are hide, water bowl and paper towel substrate. I removed the coir peat substrate weeks ago (will never use it again!) and every night scrubbed the enclosure with soapy water, disinfected with F10 and when that dried I put hide, water bowl and snake back in. Every week I sprayed with TOD after disinfectant dried. During that time hides and water bowls soaked in F10 then hide went back in enclosure with snake who also got sprayed in the plastic tub. Water bowl went in the next evening after cleaning.

The nightly cleaning was purely to remove visible adult mites to try and get rid of it as quickly as possible. The coir peat took so insanely long to get out of Steve's enclosure that I can definitely see how mites could have hidden in it - never again!

I used the Mortein one but I'm sure they all do the same thing. I wouldn't worry too much with the F10 and cleaning. That is best left till they're all gone as a bit of housekeeping. It sounds like it's taking a bit of a toll on you so you're better off concentrating your energy on keeping the animals healthy.

Thanks, I'll get some tonight. I don't normally clean them every day, usually only once a week and change paper towel if they poop on it. Do you think my excessive cleaning could have prevented the mite spray to work effectively? There was always around 24hrs between each clean.

 

[Snowman]

Cool. As said though f10 won't kill them or the eggs.
Are the edges of the viv sealed with silicon or something? Another sneaky place for them to hide. Plus all the stuff in the bedroom and carpet. Hopefully the bomb kills em all.

 

[Lawra]

Cool. As said though f10 won't kill them or the eggs.
Are the edges of the viv sealed with silicon or something? Another sneaky place for them to hide. Plus all the stuff in the bedroom and carpet. Hopefully the bomb kills em all.

Yeah there's lots of silicone... Do you mean they burrow into it or something?

After I bomb do I then clean enclosures like I would the rest of the room to remove residue etc?

 

[andynic07]

While we are on the mites topic I have heard that a handful of diatomaceous earth sprinkled throughout the substrate will prevent mites as it will kill them. Has anyone else heard of this?

 

[Snowman]

Yeah there's lots of silicone... Do you mean they burrow into it or something?

After I bomb do I then clean enclosures like I would the rest of the room to remove residue etc?

Just hide in the gaps.

 

[junglepython2]

Have you been spraying the snakes as well or just the enclosures?

 

[Darlyn]

Hi Lawra, I have bombed my enclosures before to get rid of mites. I had a pet store bought animal
that was infected and it was doing my head in getting rid of them. I bombed the enclosure and soaked all the furnishings in
the laundry sink in water for 24 hours. Left the enclosure for 24 hours then gave it a good scrub whilst I treated the animal
separately. I have found this to be the most effective way to get rid of them. Can't help with the Ivermectin but I treated the snake with
water baths with betadine which was successful. Mind you that snake did love the water.

 

[raycam01_au]

ok here is what i did, had mites ONCE, lol not sure how I got them, no new animals, nothing out of the new, couple of snakie mates said it was more than likely something outside bought them in!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
did alot of research on here n the net n friends, a great article i read, and then went a local mate at a pet shop who knows his stuff and this is what got rid of them in 2 week period.

Only found the little buggers when I pulled out my female Albino darwin, and throught she had alittle shed left on her or dirt, n realised it was alittle mite, saw the bugger sneak under her scales, I had 15 snakes, in 3 separate enclosures, so not ever having them was alittle OMG.......
ok
bought 2 products that were the BOMB (brilliant)

So firstly I bought a few plastic tubs to isolate the snakes out of my garage and into a spare room,
White butchers paper (great to see the mites fall off) and water tubs thats all
made up a solution of the Perxoxin\water, and used the diluted solution to rub the snakes down, I repeated this twice and then placed the snakes into a freshly sprayed click clack (Mac mite spray)
Left them alone for the night.

Now with the Garage, I bleached all the bowls, glass and enclosures, wiped them all down as best I could in a Heavy bleach solution.
then I bombed the room 3 times over the course of the 2 weeks, twice in the first week, and once midweek in the last week.

did the bleach in the enclosure again, and rinsed out and soaked the bowls again,

with the animals,

I checked these daily and could see the mites dying right from the first day, i bathed them in the solution 4 times over the course of the 2 weeks followed by the might spray.

after 2 weeks, I sprayed the enclosures out with repti clean, and then put them all back together

its been about 3 months with no signs of mites, and the whole process was easy as

HTH's


ray

 

[Chris82]

Hi, have you read this??

Reptile Mites - Karingal Vet Hospital

 

[Lawra]

Hi, have you read this??

Reptile Mites - Karingal Vet Hospital

Yes, that was one of many articles I read, however Dr Shane just told me that he would be more worried about TOD being applied directly to reptiles than Ivermectin. [MENTION=1912]junglepython2[/MENTION] yes I was treating snakes as well as enclosure.

Thank you so much [MENTION=24884]Darlyn[/MENTION], I am holding out hope that my continuous soaking and scrubbing will work.
[MENTION=29766]raycam01_au[/MENTION] the first pic is a similar product just different brand to what I was using initially. The second pic is what I was eyeing off at the vet's. Good to know I'm on the right track

I'll try the Ivermectin tonight and hope for the best. Thank you to everyone for your suggestions.

 

[tahnia666]

Good luck !!

Sent from my HTC Velocity 4G using Tapatalk

 

[Pythoninfinite]

Laura, remove the snakes and bag them up in pillowcases, remove from the room, and treat separately. Open all enclosures fully, DON'T remove decorations or substrate from your enclosures, and leave everything snake-related in the room. Depending on the size of the room, use one or two flea/cockroach bombs (from supermarket) as directed on the cans. Leave the room closed for 3-4 hours. This will kill all mites in the room/cages/carpet, and leave a residual NON-TOXIC hormone-based insect growth retardant (it stops the emerging babies from moulting into the next phase of growth). This is absolutely the best way of dealing with a persistent mite problem as it kills all mites in the room and enclosures and prevents hatchling mites from developing into the next phase.

Treat the snakes by placing them in a shallowish tub of lukewarm water to which has been added a drop or two of dishwashing detergent (this breaks the surface tension on the water and ensures the mites on the snake drown quickly). Allow an inch or two of air under the tub lid to let the snake put its nose out of the water, and leave them in the water for 3-4 hours in a warm place. This will drown all mites on the snakes. As you remove snakes from their pillowcases, place the pillowcases into a bucket of HOT water with a good amount of the detergent to kill any mites left in them. The mites don't lay eggs on the snakes, so you will kill all stages of growing mites on the snakes by doing this.

After 3-4 hours, allow the room to ventilate, and only then should you remove any substrate, cage decorations etc for disposal. If you do this while the mites are untreated, you'll just distribute them all over the place. Make sure you've killed them beforehand. Don't wash the enclosures out after the room has been treated, just replace the substrate and decorations (and clean water of course).

The insect growth retardant is non-toxic (it's a hormone, not a poison) and has a residual effect for 3-6 months, so you should not see mites again in your collection from this infestation.

The use of all these vet & keeper-recommended chemicals directly on snakes has to be a bad thing. Water with a minute amount of detergent is going to be far less harmful in the long run, and if you don't treat the whole room as I suggest, you'll have constantly recurring reinfestations.

Good luck, Jamie

 

[andynic07]

This was my suggestion but using olive oil instead of water on the snake.

 

[The_Geeza]

Laura, remove the snakes and bag them up in pillowcases, remove from the room, and treat separately. Open all enclosures fully, DON'T remove decorations or substrate from your enclosures, and leave everything snake-related in the room. Depending on the size of the room, use one or two flea/cockroach bombs (from supermarket) as directed on the cans. Leave the room closed for 3-4 hours. This will kill all mites in the room/cages/carpet, and leave a residual NON-TOXIC hormone-based insect growth retardant (it stops the emerging babies from moulting into the next phase of growth). This is absolutely the best way of dealing with a persistent mite problem as it kills all mites in the room and enclosures and prevents hatchling mites from developing into the next phase.

Treat the snakes by placing them in a shallowish tub of lukewarm water to which has been added a drop or two of dishwashing detergent (this breaks the surface tension on the water and ensures the mites on the snake drown quickly). Allow an inch or two of air under the tub lid to let the snake put its nose out of the water, and leave them in the water for 3-4 hours in a warm place. This will drown all mites on the snakes. As you remove snakes from their pillowcases, place the pillowcases into a bucket of HOT water with a good amount of the detergent to kill any mites left in them. The mites don't lay eggs on the snakes, so you will kill all stages of growing mites on the snakes by doing this.

After 3-4 hours, allow the room to ventilate, and only then should you remove any substrate, cage decorations etc for disposal. If you do this while the mites are untreated, you'll just distribute them all over the place. Make sure you've killed them beforehand. Don't wash the enclosures out after the room has been treated, just replace the substrate and decorations (and clean water of course).

The insect growth retardant is non-toxic (it's a hormone, not a poison) and has a residual effect for 3-6 months, so you should not see mites again in your collection from this infestation.

The use of all these vet & keeper-recommended chemicals directly on snakes has to be a bad thing. Water with a minute amount of detergent is going to be far less harmful in the long run, and if you don't treat the whole room as I suggest, you'll have constantly recurring reinfestations.

Good luck, Jamie

fantastic read thanks... I can also confirm these bombs r the bomb... I have 2 dogs one of which lives with us part time and I kept getting fleas regardless of treating the dogs so I also left dogs outside for couple days treated and bombed all rooms in house ... Not seen a flea since... And u be amazed at all the insects that were hiding in your house come out and die all over the floors.. Ta Jamie that will help a lot of people

thanks
Pete