Well, when I got the baby red tail boa, I checked for mites and never seen any. Last night I picked up Scout that is housed next to the red tail boa and she has MITES!!!
I'm SO NOT HAPPY!!! I wanna choke that jerk that sold Ruppert to my hubby!
I ripped apart all 6 tanks last night. Spayed everything and anything I could with Reptile Relief. Stuffed the freezer full of other tank stuff. Scrubbed until my hands couldn't anymore, then sat down and cried!!
I'm always so careful about things like this but these mites snuck up on me....
I know, yell at me for not quarentining Ruppert first! I should have, but I didn't see ONE little speck on him, not even with the magnifying glass! And I inspected him like Sherlock Holmes even before I brought him into the house!!!!
I think I'll go clean and cry some more.....

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Some think they can. Some wish they could. Some do.

So sorry for your bad news,. don't blame yourself, the little critters are evil, and anyone who owns snakes probably suffers from them at some point. We've suffered from them so many times, a couple of times really bad infestations across our collection. You'll get rid of them, don't worry.

Us Brits seem to turn to tea at times of stress, so go put the kettle on and relax

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"If you know everything you may as well blow your brains out because the reason for existence is to learn more everyday." - Mark O'Shea, 2004

Don't cry There are worse things than mites. *hugs Jem*

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Official hostage of the GFWD
"The truely dangerous people are the ignorant ones."
Founding Member of Logical People Against Arcane Boa Subspecies Classification (LPAABSC):
B c.c 1758, B. c. i. 1803 B. c. o. 1873!
"A BOA CONSTRICTOR IS A Boa constrictor!"

Sorry Jem. You might want to add a few mothballs to your vacuum bag and do a quick once over the house,,,,It really does control what's not in the tank. Those nasty buggers can travel through the entire house in 1 night.

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Ken
" The United States Marine Corps......sure we are a department of the Navy,,,,,,we're the MENS department "

I HATE THE EVIL THINGS! I brought home my BP, and he had them, I went crazy running around the house cleaning and spraying just like you did, ugg.....they are the worst! It'll be ok, it doesn't seem like it now, but it will be.

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0.1.0 Bearded Dragon "Reka"
2.0.0 Ball Pythons "Cupid" "Quigley"
1.0.0 Redtail Boas "Mosi"
0.2.0 Leopard Geckos "Techo" "Gidget"
1.0.0 Crested Gecko "Spiderman"

So sorry to hear about the mites, Jem. I think I finally got rid of my infestation -- same thing: my new BP looked perfectly clean and mite-free and then there were mites everywhere!
Don't cry! As frustrating as it is, it's not the worst that could happen!
The reptile relief is a great product and I think it helped get rid of them.

Here are some tips from my latest mite infestation: (Anyone else, feel free to add or correct anything)

I would recommend immediate, separate quarantine on all your herps now:


* You'll need 2 plastic containers for each of them: just newspaper or paper-towel as substrate, a water bowl and a hidebox. And some kind of heat source and thermometers. These need to be sprayed and cleaned often too.
* Every day give the herp a bath (some mites will fall off in the water. You can rub the herp down with paper towel to dry and some more might come off.) Monty didn't like his baths but relaxed if I held onto him while he was in the water. Some people recommend adding a drop of olive oil or some betadine solution (the color of weak tea). I tried both of these, but found plain water worked just as well and I didn't have to worry if my snakes swallowed any of it.
* Change the container and sterilize the old one (alcohol or diluted bleach -- rinse VERY WELL!). The mites have to crawl off the herp to lay eggs, so within a few weeks of baths, daily container changes, and the reptile relief, they'll probably be off the animals. (The life-span of an adult is 32 days; so the longer you can quarantine, the better).
*In the meantime, "nuke" the terrariums with permethrin and let it dry on for a few days or so. Then rinse it all out well before re-introducing your herps.
* I also froze all of the terrarium furniture that would fit in the freezer... you'll need to keep it in there for at least 10 days. For the bigger stuff, I sprayed it with diluted permethrin or Reptile Relief and then rinsed well.

Good luck!!! Keep us posted. I didn't believe Bitis when she told me that all of this would just be a distant bad memory before long -- but she was right!!! Life is good again with my snakes..... FINALLY!!!

PS -- We've downloaded TONS of info on reptile mites from the internet, so if you want to research some of it yourself, PM me and I'll send you the addresses.

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Andrea

Ok Jem relax and breathe deeply! It really isn't the end of the world. And stop beating yourself up! There has been more than one keeper that ended up with mites just from walking thru a pet store! And not even buying anything! Sometimes every precaution you take is not enough!
It happens.
The RR should take care of it for you.

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Merlin,
What's Life Without A Little Magic!

I've ripped my house apart cleaning again, (all the while looking for my missing baby corn and have finally finished), just to start all over again soon....
Mites are NASTY!! I have the heebie jeebies in my own house!!

Then my kids stopped over today and ask "Why are you cleaning so much? Who's coming over?" I wasn't impressed!!! Dang brats!!
I handed them rags to wipe stuff down and they left in no time flat!! lol
I'll just keep plugging away here....
Can my dogs, cats or Iguana get these nasty things too?

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Some think they can. Some wish they could. Some do.

Yes, acutally I think it's more common in mammals then reptiles. So make sure you clean them some how too. All of my cats have had ear mites and I treated it with this medicine you put in their ears. They hate it and tend to be alot less active until mites and treatment have stopped.

Your Iguana can too.

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The more you whine, the worse it will get.

I am sorry Jem, hope your babies will be ok soon, not something I have experienced, and hope never to experience the little blighters