Advice needed on mites

Advice needed on mites

Postby XaXas » Tue Jul 23, 2013 1:34 pm

Hey guys
So i've had my first emperor scorpion for about 4 months now and i've noticed for a while now there's little mites in his enclosure, I've googled around a bit and got some info on it but I'm not sure what can be classified as good mites and what as bad mites, as the pictures they show all seem to be under a microscope and I'm just judging based on my eyes. :D

So firstly there's the little white specs that runs around in the enclosure, I think they are harmless, as when I dry out the enclosure they disappear but when I dampen the enclosure again the appear, they dont really crawl ontop of the scorp, just in between the substrate and they tend to flock to left over food, which I then remove. Can anyone correct me if they're not harmless?

The other type i've noticed is little greyish dots on the scorpion itself, there's quite a few of them bundled around the scorp, at first I didnt think much of them as some google results said that they're just cleaning him,etc, but lately it seems like he's itching and he seems restless. I can try and take photo's if needed and any input on which is bad and which not will help.
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Re: Advice needed on mites

Postby Lillypod » Tue Jul 23, 2013 1:37 pm

Best will be to replace your substrate. Microwave your substrate and let it cool before using.
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Re: Advice needed on mites

Postby ColinWa » Tue Jul 23, 2013 2:22 pm

I had Mites on my emperor scorpion for well over 8 months and I could not rid of the buggers untill they eventually killed my scorpion. What I thought was harmless mites as they would flock to the leftovers of the scorpions crickets, were not so harmless. After replacing substrate, after trying to lure them out with dead crickets I went to a Scorpion forum who advise me on a method with is quite contraversial. You can literally drown your scorpion in luke warm water in an attempt to drown the mites on him (changing substrate won't help if they're on your scorp). So after about 20 mins in luke warm water my Scorp was motionless (bare in mind that they do somehow survive this procedure). When the Scorp was, what seems to be unconscious I put him on a dry paper towel and removed any mites I saw on him with a tooth pick, and I covered the mites that I couldn't remove with a toothpick with vaseline in an attempt to suffocate them (obviously not over the lungs). Needless to say two weeks later the litthe bugger died, He never wanted to eat with the mites on him, and I think they pretty much sucked him dry.

You can try this method with caution, fair warning though, when these things get out of controll they border on impossible to rid of.

Keep us updated.

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Re: Advice needed on mites

Postby XaXas » Mon Sep 02, 2013 2:47 pm

Ye take it I had the bad mites, my scorp died last week, I take it it was from the mites...I tried cleaning it off a bit just with a wet earbud, it didnt clean up as easily as I thought so I left him with quite a few on still. Now I know for next time tho, I'll start fresh and take all the precautions like heating the soil first and all that. :)
Thanks for the input tho guys!
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Re: Advice needed on mites

Postby ColinWa » Tue Sep 03, 2013 10:35 am

Thing is, I noticed the mites don't really come from substrates as much, but rather from the feeder insects which is unavoidable. I breed my own feeder roaches now and it works out much better this way if you have complete controll over everything. Sorry to hear about your scorp though, we all learn this way!
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Re: Advice needed on mites

Postby Foxticity » Tue Sep 03, 2013 11:39 am

I might be wrong on this, so somebody must please correct me if I am but won't the Diluted Frontline trick for snakes with mites work for Scorpions aswell?
Surely you can dilute the Frontline a bit more and then treat the scorpion ??
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Re: Advice needed on mites

Postby ColinWa » Tue Sep 03, 2013 11:41 am

I'm sure that would kill the mites quite quickly, not so sure how the scorpion will react to that though. I haven't heard of it being done before.
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Re: Advice needed on mites

Postby Bushviper » Tue Sep 03, 2013 8:08 pm

Nope Frontline will KILL YOUR SCORPION.
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Re: Advice needed on mites

Postby Foxticity » Wed Sep 04, 2013 8:32 am

Thanks Arno. As I said, I was not sure and experienced keepers can advice you on that.
Good luck mate and hope you get him sorted out.

I have been using peat in most of my lizard cages but I see that ants love to nest in it so just beware of that as well.
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