Severe mite outbreak

[Saksida2000]

I noticed i have a very severe mite outbreak on my tarantula wardrobe that wasn't there a week ago. I was on vacation, and when i came back, i noticed little white spots on one enclosure. Investigating further, i noticed that they were on pretty much all enclosures. Investigating further, i noticed that the mites are all over the wardrobe itself, and they seem to come from mealworm colony. What should i do? How to eradicate them? Remove all tarantulas, wipe down the enclosures and wardrobe? It looks horrible and I'm really concerned, because it's a very severe infestation. Thank you.

 

[cold blood]

Well, I will start off by saying your concerns, while real, are over-blown. Mites are not a danger to the ts, they are detrivores, basically a clean up crew.

Now, it's basically impossible to completely eradicate them, mites are literally everywhere, but we certainly can do things to limit their numbers.

The easiest thing is to dry the enclosures out....mites don't survive well in dry climates....the other big thing would be to make sure the enclosures are kept clean...finding all the boli isn't always easy, dead feeders are usually easier.....without a food source, they cannot subsist. I have had significant outbreaks years ago with hundreds of enclosures and I never re-housed a single one of them and they haven't been something ai have noticed at all for a long time.

Now you certainly could re-house them as well, but IMO that would depend on how many enclosures we are talking about.

I would just clean them as good as possible and leave them to dry out completely...when things get dry, you will see them congregating around water dishes, I then remove the water dishes for a little while.... maybe a week .....You could also wipe down the sides of the enclosures (inside and out) just to remove the excess quickly and get a start on it

In the mean time, just know its nothing to freak out about.

 

[Saksida2000]

Well, I will start off by saying your concerns, while real, are over-blown. Mites are not a danger to the ts, they are detrivores, basically a clean up crew.

Now, it's basically impossible to completely eradicate them, mites are literally everywhere, but we certainly can do things to limit their numbers.

The easiest thing is to dry the enclosures out....mites don't survive well in dry climates....the other big thing would be to make sure the enclosures are kept clean...finding all the boli isn't always easy, dead feeders are usually easier.....without a food source, they cannot subsist. I have had significant outbreaks years ago with hundreds of enclosures and I never re-housed a single one of them and they haven't been something ai have noticed at all for a long time.

Now you certainly could re-house them as well, but IMO that would depend on how many enclosures we are talking about.

I would just clean them as good as possible and leave them to dry out completely...when things get dry, you will see them congregating around water dishes, I then remove the water dishes for a little while.... maybe a week .....You could also wipe down the sides of the enclosures (inside and out) just to remove the excess quickly and get a start on it

In the mean time, just know its nothing to freak out about.

Thank you very much. Rehousing everything would be a significant pain in the ass, as i have around 60 Ts. If nothing else, it looks absolutely horrendous, everything crawling on enclosures, on the wardrobe, everything you touch has mites on it. I'll probably also start by removing the mealworm colony, and start a new one, and vacuum/wipe down the whole wardrobe.
Cold blood comes to the rescue again, thank you very much!

 

[egyptiancrow]

the mites are harmless but its godawful annoying and gross, so you know

i use diatomaceous powder to keep mite infestation at 0 in my household. some people refuse to use d.e and it carries a very real risk. i however have never had an issue with careful management and have never seen another mite in my house since.

take a wet cloth and wipe away all mites and then rinse with soap water. continue to bring the number of mites down. do this daily and it should help a ton. if you wanna use D.E to kill the infestation, note that anything invertebrate that touches d.e will eventually be injured or die. this includes food prey and your Ts. this is why many people dont want to use it, but it only harms what it touches.

if you are careful and deliberate theres no chance of it getting on your pets, but its your own comfort level that matters. to use D.E i sprinkle it on the shelves and sit all containers in the powder. this kills them as they leave, and stops spread across enclosures.
if your infestation is severe youll notice them pile up, an orangey pink color in the powder. remove this powder and replace so the mites cant use the dead to walk across it. :I

good luck friend!

 

[Saksida2000]

the mites are harmless but its godawful annoying and gross, so you know

i use diatomaceous powder to keep mite infestation at 0 in my household. some people refuse to use d.e and it carries a very real risk. i however have never had an issue with careful management and have never seen another mite in my house since.

take a wet cloth and wipe away all mites and then rinse with soap water. continue to bring the number of mites down. do this daily and it should help a ton. if you wanna use D.E to kill the infestation, note that anything invertebrate that touches d.e will eventually be injured or die. this includes food prey and your Ts. this is why many people dont want to use it, but it only harms what it touches.

if you are careful and deliberate theres no chance of it getting on your pets, but its your own comfort level that matters. to use D.E i sprinkle it on the shelves and sit all containers in the powder. this kills them as they leave, and stops spread across enclosures.
if your infestation is severe youll notice them pile up, an orangey pink color in the powder. remove this powder and replace so the mites cant use the dead to walk across it. :I

good luck friend!

I'll try the hard way first, wipe down every enclosure on the outside with hot water, vacuum and rinse the wardrobe. Already threw out my mealworm colony and cleaned the box with water. We'll see if that helps. I use springtails in my damp enclosures already, so i don't mind a bit of mites for cleanup, but if my whole wardrobe is crawling with them, nope, eff that. If that doesn't help, I'll go on the offensive with poisons and stuff like that.

Would it hurt if i vacuum the outside of enclosures on low power? Some mites are clumping together.

 

[egyptiancrow]

I'll try the hard way first, wipe down every enclosure on the outside with hot water, vacuum and rinse the wardrobe. Already threw out my mealworm colony and cleaned the box with water. We'll see if that helps. I use springtails in my damp enclosures already, so i don't mind a bit of mites for cleanup, but if my whole wardrobe is crawling with them, nope, eff that. If that doesn't help, I'll go on the offensive with poisons and stuff like that.

d.e is not a poison. its totally safe to pets and humans, it just kills inverts on contact.

i am not the person to ask if you can vaccuum your enclosures.... i dont know lol

 

[Saksida2000]

d.e is not a poison. its totally safe to pets and humans, it just kills inverts on contact.

i am not the person to ask if you can vaccuum your enclosures.... i dont know lol

Yeah, that's what I meant, just didn't find the correct expression. Thanks for your help.

 

[cold blood]

Would it hurt if i vacuum the outside of enclosures on low power? Some mites are clumping together.

I think wiping it down would be more effective.

d.e is not a poison. its totally safe to pets and humans, it just kills inverts on contact.

i am not the person to ask if you can vaccuum your enclosures.... i dont know lol

You would need to use food grade diatomatious earth.

I should have mentioned this, sprinkling some around the outside of the enclosures, like on the tables they sit on, can be pretty effective and that is also something I did to further reduce numbers of mites.

 

[Saksida2000]

@cold blood @egyptiancrow a bit of an update. I put all of the spider down from the wardrobe, wiped all the enclosures with hot water, wiped down the wardrobe and blowdried it. I have been repeating this for the last few days and the results are fenomenal. Wardrobe is now clean, maybe there are some mites here and there, but definitely not overrun like before. The enclosures are also a million miles better, there are a lot less mites and they take a lot longer to crawl out onto the lids. Before, the lids were overrun in 2 hours, now there are 1/5 of mites in the whole day. My problem is pretty much solved now, and will probably put the spiders back on to the wardrobe today or tomorrow.
Thank you both for your help and your time.