going crazy over the mites

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Fri Jun 03, 2005 9:15 pm

ok, so about a week ago or so one of my indos came out of molt, but he had mites. so i bathed him in IO, and did a few baths a day for like 3 days in a row. did the whole tank clean thing, and even bathed his tank mate in IO even though i couldn't see any on him. so i thought the mites were gone, i hadn't seen any, and everything seemed fine. then i looked in the tank two days ago and saw mites on the just molted one again. ::sigh:: so i started bathing him again. there still aren't any on his tank mate.
so here's the bigger issue with all this. Indy, the mite infested crab, really doesn't like even being picked up let alone bathed every day. i have to wear leather gloves, because he tries his darndest to get me every time i pick him up now, and his pincher is big and causes severe wounds that take weeks to heal (i would know he gave me one when we first got him). he seems to be getting really stressed out, and i don't think i should bathe him anymore. he runs and hides in his cave everytime i come in the room now, before he only would hide when i lifted up the top. i think the bathing is stressing him out more than the mites are. he's eating a lot, and i've noticed him go from the salt water to fresh a lot, bathing himself. so i've taken this to be him trying to get rid of the mites himself. i feel awful because he was finally starting to make progress and be more gentle until all this mite stuff started, i think we're back to square one with aggression towards people. every now and then i mist the tank with IO, but i really feel like i shouldn't bathe him anymore. is there anything else i can do to get rid of these things without stressing him out so much? i'm not sure what to do at this point. sorry this is so long, thanks a bunch!

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Sat Jun 04, 2005 12:13 am

ok, i think i'll try that. maybe i'll give him another couple of days to chill first, since i can't do a whole tank cleaning tomorrow. thanks a bunch! i hope this works, i'll let you know. thanks again!

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Sat Jun 04, 2005 8:15 am

I hate to stress my crabs by bathing them, too. Especially the Indos.

There's another method to try, it's pricey, but it works:

http://www.crabstreetjournal.com/module ... =0&thold=0

That's the article I wrote about what I did when I found mites.

Good luck!

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Sat Jun 04, 2005 8:52 am

Did you send samples of these mites to the Entomologist Kerie? I have been trying to round up pictures for mites and bugs we experience in the tank...if we know what they are, it is plausible to combat them...while an obviously efficient method of erradication, that is more humane for the crabs, it also poses practical application problems! That was a good article...

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Sat Jun 04, 2005 9:29 am

I have! Dr. Williams did warn me he couldn't get to the samples for a while, but it's been an awfully long time.

The problem with bothering a scientist is that we don't pay his research grants. Sigh. I can't get a straight answer out of Greenaway about parasites and junk in dead fish, nor about free glutamates from Dr. Gilchrist either.

I'll give him a little more time then maybe do a gentle nudge via email.

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Sat Jun 04, 2005 9:47 am

Julia_Crab wrote:The problem with bothering a scientist is that we don't pay his research grants. Sigh. I can't get a straight answer out of Greenaway about parasites and junk in dead fish, nor about free glutamates from Dr. Gilchrist either.

Well, besides that, there's just tons of stuff that isn't known with any certainty. People on the outside sometimes think that everything is known, but that is far from the case. I don't know what you asked them, but it may not even be known.

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Sun Jun 05, 2005 10:18 am

i had read about these before in a post, it linked to this site: http://crabdr.tripod.com/cdr/index.blog ... id=1006451
it sounds like a lab that figures out how to naturally combat problems or something, i couldn't really figure it out

it sounded really interesting, but expensive. the thing i wonder about is do these mites hurt the crabs at all, and do you get rid of them after they've done their job and how?
another question- some of the mites, on Indy, are red, but most i've seen are smaller and whitish, like moving sand particles. are these mites too? are they just immature forms of the red ones? they're so small they really do look like sand, but they're running all around. another thing i thought was weird, the mites are only on Indy. they're not on the other crab in the tank, not on any toys, not on the sand. is this normal?

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Tue Jun 07, 2005 11:33 am

i'm going to be starting the de-miting today or tomorrow, but what i really wanted to know was if anyone knew about this: some of the mites are the usual red ones that everyone's talking about, but a lot are tiny whitish specks that look like sand, but they're crawling on him everywhere. are these mites too? and can i get rid of them with IO? i wanted to make sure before i started treating him, but i'm having trouble finding anything that sounds like what he's got. thanks!

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Tue Jun 07, 2005 11:41 am

Those are the mites I have. They don't seem to bother healthy crabs much, but when I have a sick or weak crab they multiply exponentially, and I've found thousands on dead crabs. I have three that seem to carry the infestation without being bothered, since virtually none of my other crabs have any unless they're sick. Those three are now separated. I have had no luck getting rid of the infestation totally, but it seems like keeping everyone clean and healthy reduces it. The mites also seem to be attracted to anything spoiled in the tank, so I have to be extra vigilant about hidden food.

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Tue Jun 07, 2005 11:53 am

nicaha wrote:i'm going to be starting the de-miting today or tomorrow, but what i really wanted to know was if anyone knew about this: some of the mites are the usual red ones that everyone's talking about, but a lot are tiny whitish specks that look like sand, but they're crawling on him everywhere. are these mites too? and can i get rid of them with IO? i wanted to make sure before i started treating him, but i'm having trouble finding anything that sounds like what he's got. thanks!

What you describe could be possibly the nits (baby mites), but with out seeing them, it is only a guess...I think you can treat them as you would the adults...

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Tue Jun 07, 2005 3:14 pm

ok, that's kinda what i figured they were, but i just wanted to make sure before i went ahead and treated them as mites. thanks a bunch!!

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Tue Jun 07, 2005 11:02 pm

One thing u might wanna do is to feed your hermies 3 times a week overnight and remove the hermie food for the rest of the time. Mites eat commercial hermie food and anything that contains meat. Maybe u need to remove any exo pieces as well.

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Thu Jun 09, 2005 1:06 am

mine don't really eat their food mostly at night, they all eat at different times, plus they eat more often than once every other day. i have crabs that even if they were just eating the old food, they'll at least try the new food as soon as i put it in the tank. that and i don't feed commercial food at all anymore, i feel there's too many chemicals and too high a risk to bother with it. sand gets exchanged out for clean sand in small doses, or when i do a full clean when it gets too wet; and gets sifted when i bake it, so there really isn't leftover exo pieces in it either. thanks for the suggestions though, i'm just not sure that any of those reasons are why this guy got mites. none of the other tanks have any, and his tank mate doesn't seem to have any (although he is also getting isoed and bathed), and there isn't any i can find any where else in the tank.