I think mites are killing my little ones.

racer 6

Arachnosquire
Old Timer
Joined
Jun 13, 2009
Messages
56
My H. hottentotta popped 23 slings about a month ago. The moment they dropped off, i separated them. I used modified pillboxes as containment, each compartment floored with a bit of coco peat. It was all going well until they died out one by one, leaving only 4. I actually saw one dying, and i noticed an absolutely microscopic kind of moving white speck-slash-piece of dust on that baby's back..saw the same thing on the other dead ones.

Am i suffering some sort of infestation here? Do such parasites eat the living hell out of scorpions? they might be in danger of getting wiped out, even my other scorps.. :(
 

Nomadinexile

Arachnoking
Old Timer
Joined
Apr 8, 2009
Messages
2,674
Yes, sometimes are friends are killed by mites.

First off, there are lots of good long thorough threads on here if you search the scorpion forums. I would recommend doing so and reading them.

There are a couple of things you can do.

1. Do not use same tools without bleaching them while moving from cage to cage. Bleach, rinse completely, then dry thoroughly before moving to next cage.

2. Depending on how much money you have, and how many scorpions you have, you can order Hypoaspis miles predatory mites, which will seek and destroy the bad ones quite often. (I don't know an exact success/failure rate) These will cost around $65, and take a week or two to receive, so if you can and want to, order them asap.

3. You should absolutely positively change out all of your containers, using a bleach solution to clean, rinse, dry, then put in NEW clean substrate. Rehouse each specimen. While rehousing them, you can try and scrub off any mites you see attached using a childs toothbrush.

There are other solutions given in the other threads you can search for. These are the ones I know off the top of my head.

Good luck, and be patient. This will be a pain, but it will be worth it in the end.
 

spaza

Arachnopeon
Joined
Aug 10, 2010
Messages
14
hey i have this scorpion book it sais there is a desies that the scorpion will get white spots and it will die off if they get 1 or 2 you can get rid of it if they get 5 or more they will die i hope u find out what the problem is
 

Michiel

Arachnoking
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May 22, 2006
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hey i have this scorpion book it sais there is a desies that the scorpion will get white spots and it will die off if they get 1 or 2 you can get rid of it if they get 5 or more they will die i hope u find out what the problem is

they way you reproduce what you read is not very clear to say it nicely, unless it is a crappy book :) I think you meant disease instead of desies, LOL I was wondering what you meant.

Can you be a bit more specific, because I doubt the book says" there is a disease and when a scorpion get white spots if they get one or two etc etc etc"
 

AzJohn

Arachnoking
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Joined
Dec 25, 2007
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2,181
It's hard to say with mites. A lot mites are carion eaters and only feed on dead or dieing things. I see this a lot. My tanks will be mite free until somthing dies, then I'll see a few feeding on the dead thing. It could look like the mites killed the scorpion. Of coarse you want to avoid any bad infestations. The easiest way to do this is to keep everything nice and clean. Make sure there are no left overs in the tank, or get isopods to clean everything up. If it's real bad a substrate change might be in order.

I'd let your Hottentotta babies dry out. I water mine once a week and the rest of the time they are on dry substrate(50/50 sand peat). That might solve a lot of the mite problem.

John
 

Miss Bianca

Arachnoprince
Old Timer
Joined
May 14, 2008
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1,145
It's hard to say with mites. A lot mites are carion eaters and only feed on dead or dieing things. I see this a lot. My tanks will be mite free until somthing dies, then I'll see a few feeding on the dead thing. It could look like the mites killed the scorpion.
I second this. Also, we can't know if the mites were the reason of death because other facts are missing as far as how they've been kept.

I'd go with cleaning everything, disinfecting, and re-homing (clean + dry).
It would rule out these little buggers that appear when things are less than squeaky.
 

spaza

Arachnopeon
Joined
Aug 10, 2010
Messages
14
srry for my spelling erros if u want more info on the book its called scorpions in captivity by mark newton i got it when my fliders war pregnent and she started eating here babies after i read a bit more info so i was just giving advice

i think after they leave mum they should be able to eat small to medium crickets my baby is about 4 months old and can eat a medium cricket i wouldent recomend i mostly feed it worms but dont go bigger than medium
 
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