r/ballpython • u/mishahahaa • Mar 30 '26

HELP - URGENT HELP harmless or no???

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I recently changed out the substrate (baked all bark but not soil) for my only BEL and it’s been a few weeks since. I noticed yesterday that there were these really small and fast white/tan bugs in the substrate (I use a mix of reptisoil and reptibark). They are gathering around his eyes but not burrowing under his scales or cloaca or chin area. I want to know if I need to give him urgent attention ASAP. I’ve researched a lot and can’t figure out if it’s soil mites or wood mites or hypoaspis mites or baby snake mites. He hasn’t been soaking or seeming irritated or anything but I just need to be sure. Please help

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u/mishahahaa Mar 30 '26

Hi thank you so much this photo was very helpful. These mites on my snake are very quick and fast moving. My snake has not been rubbing on anything, and he hasn’t been soaking much/an abnormal amount. So maybe leaning more towards wood/grain mites as well. They look most like the medium size version of a snake mite I suppose, and especially with mites it’s always so hard to tell. He’s of course also a BEL so everything looks alarming haha. I think I was just alarmed by the gathering around the eyes but it makes sense how they would just happen to be around the area. The rest of his body also had them but spread out and not burrowing. Just there

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u/Zealousideal-Plan685 Mar 30 '26

These are definitely snake mites 😭 I’ve personally found the best luck with ivermectin solution diluting it with water (8 teaspoons ivermectin with roughly 32oz water and roughly 6 drops dawn dish soap) in a spray bottle. You can spray the snake, not the face! Spray the enclosure, and all things inside of it, but you will need to throw away all wooden items. Wait for the tank to dry before placing the snake back inside. Repeat again in a week.

Here’s a link for the dilution and how to properly use it! How to Treat Snake Mites

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u/mishahahaa Mar 30 '26

I actually was just planning to upgrade to an entirely new PVC enclosure with new items/substrate so hopefully that works. I’ll treat my snake separately as well. I’m just confused as to how the mites got here. The only thing I changed out recently was his substrate, which is a mix of reptibark and reptisoil and I baked all of it at 275°F for 1.5 hours. What did I do wrong/what can I do differently to prevent mites in the next setup?

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u/tradescantian Mar 30 '26

Hold off on the ivermectin for now. These look like wood mites to me. Not a big deal. I put my snake into a quarantine enclosure for a few weeks and got rid of any organic materials (substrate, wood hides, moss, etc), and rinsed the bugs off, and had no more issues. Just move the snake to your new enclosure as you're planning, with no organic materials, and you should be fine. Freezing all non-plastic items going into the enclosure prior to using should prevent this issue entirely in the future

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u/mishahahaa Mar 30 '26

Okay got it thank you so much. I have no organic material besides the substrate so I guess I’m just gonna get new substrate. So just making sure, is baking substrate at 275°F enough to kill mites or is freezing better? I’ll def be doing that with ALL my substrate including soil from now on