Mites, oh boy

[big J]

Yeah I just recently bought some baby kenyan sand boas, cool little guys. I always separate the newbies to the collection but for some odd reason I slacked off and didn't seprate these guys. I gave them the once over when I picked them up from a guy who breeds them locally but I guess I missed the mites. After about three weeks since I had the sand boas I found a couple mites in their water dish so i checked everybody else thats is also housed on that rack. sure enough the mites had spread to 9 other snakes on the rack. So now instead of treating 2 snakes for mites, i am treaing the entire rack of 15 snakes including some radix, sirtalis, and some albino checkereds. I said all of that to say "always separate the newbies" because you never know if the one time you slack off will create a disaster or not.

[Stefan-A]

Thanks for the warning.

[adamanteus]

Sound advice!

[Sid]

Definitely good advice. I was out during a warm spell and found a Black Rat snake, caught it to photograph and released it. After getting home, I handled one of my gravid Easterns and guess what! Yep, I infested her, now I'm treating all mine.

[Snake lover 3-25]

my female was infested when she was gravid two years ago... Can this cause problems with the young?

[adamanteus]

As far as I am aware, no. Of course there is the small risk that the mites could pass something nasty into the blood of the mother, which might then be passed on to the unborn young.... but I'ver never heard of that happening.

[aSnakeLovinBabe]

the only real damage mites can do is if they are carrying and cause your snake to become ill with septicemia... the dreaded blood disease.

mostly, they are just a MAJOR pain in the butt!!!

[aSnakeLovinBabe]

and they are probably even more annoying to the poor snakes that have them... can you imagine having little bugs crawling on your skin and hiding in your crevaces???!?! ewwwww!!!

::chills::

[drache]

eeek
I had a dream last night, in which I discovered the place I was staying at had bugs
I've never seen a bed bug, but in my dream I was sure that's what they were

mites can also cause anemia and dehydration in younger snakes

[zooplan]

Mites can be traveled by soil or other stuff from the pet shop as well.
For that I buy my materials from other selles when possible.
Most of it, i storage for a month or longer because mites opr thier egg can not survive more than a month without a snake.