Mites - species and fighting them

[merops]

Hi , I have a huge problem with mites . Lets begin with the mites on my livefood - crickets .
Till the crickets are young there is no problem , but when they reach 1-2 moltings before adulthood a big part of them dies . First their jumping legs get paralized and soon they die . I think they are killed by mites , which penetrate in the head only when the crickets are big enough . Here is a pic of the cricket mites :
http://i.imgur.com/PKy0k.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/MhGXs.jpg
I'm cleaning the cages everyday with hot water and sponge and still can't stop them. What can you recommend ?

There are different species of mites on the cricket eggs :
http://i.imgur.com/kTCfw.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/Vs1XA.jpg
These are mostly scavengers and not dangerous for the crickets .

And here there are mites on my tarantulas :
http://i.imgur.com/3mkAj.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/ZDAPi.jpg
Are they dangerous for them ?

Also I'm interested on reading about mites , cos to fight them you first got to know them . I have a microscope , so I can make a drawing of the cricket mites if that would help identify them ...

 

[merops]

I made some microscope photos , excuse me for the poor quality , it was my first session with micro .

This is the big species :


and a nymph I think :


And here is the small species on 1 day old cricket:




You can see the big species by eye , they have 2 light green spots on their back and are moving quickly .
The small species is impossible to see , only a brownish spot , when they are in big quantities. They are like balloon with head , almost missing the middle part of the body .They have 4 red legs in front and the other legs are very small . Moving slowly .

Please help me identify these species , so I can know how to fight them .

 

[merops]

I lost my first post in this thread by editing and saving it with content . Don't know how happened .
Nevermind , here are the other photos made with macro lens :

http://merops.imgur.com/akar#Vs1XA

See the full resolution images - button Plus

The mites from the pix with cricket eggs and water drops are the "big" species in microscope pictures.
I'm not sure which species are the mites on the crickets ? Maybe the same species as the micro photo of 1 day old cricket ?
And about the tarantula mites ... I ddon't have any idea .
Please , help me ID them !

 

[merops]

Ok , if it's hard to ID them , please tell me how you disinfect the cages ?
And at what temperature the mites begin to die ?

 

[merops]

Please help me , I want to disinfect everything . How ?

 

[mwyomingb]

I also had a mite battle with my t.stirmi after trying all the advice on line with no sucess i eventually succeeded by moving him to a sterile container during a molt changed out all substrate in enclosure and disenfected with a bleach solution be sure to rinse very well as to leave no traces of the bleach and cafully replaced the t after his molt then added preditor mites the hyposis miles are the best to use they feed on eggs as well and sorry if spelled incorect at work and dont have proper spelling at the moment and i no longer keep crickets as i beleive thats where they came from as well only fresh each time i feed and i have had no problem since hope this may help.

---------- Post added 08-30-2011 at 10:15 AM ----------

Dont quote me on this but far as i understand if the mites are brown they pose no thrat to the t itself and may be harmless so you could look into that as well

 

[merops]

Thanks for the answer . You have used this : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bleach ? In what proportion ?
And from where you got the predator mites ?

---------- Post added 08-30-2011 at 12:14 PM ----------

I found this :

The thermal preferences in a grain mass and respiration at various temperatures in mites (Acari: Acarididae) of medical and economical importance [Acarus siro (L. 1758), Dermatophagoides farinae Hughes 1961, Lepidoglyphus destructor (Schrank 1871), and Tyrophagus putrescentiae (Schrank 1781)] were studied under laboratory conditions. Based on the distribution of mites in wheat, Triticum aestivum L., grain along a thermal gradient from 10 to 40°C, L. destructor, D. farinae, and A. siro were classified as eurythermic and T. putrescentiae as stenothermic. The lowest preferred temperature was found for D. farinae (28°C), followed by A. siro (28.5°C), L. destructor (29.5°C), and T. putrescentiae (31.5°C). The relationship between the respiration rate and the temperature was similar for all four mite species. The highest respiration was found in the range from 31 to 33°C This is ≈2°C higher than the preferred temperature of these species. The lower temperature threshold of respiration ranged from 1 to 5°C and the upper threshold ranged from 45 to 48°C Acclimatization of A. siro to temperature regimes of 5, 15, and 35°C resulted in thermal preferences between 9 and 12°C, 9 and 20°C, and 28 and 35°C, respectively. The respiration rate of acclimatized specimens increased with the temperature, reaching a maximum at 29.0°C for mites acclimatized at 5 and 15°C and a maximum at 33.7°C for those acclimatized at 30°C.


And read that if you treat them with air/water at around 50C they will die.

 

[mwyomingb]

I didnt use any spacifics from the net ive had many reptiles and such for about twenty years and just learned over time that bleach kills pests i use a high portion bleach but remeber any chemical that kills mights can kill your t also i spend a lengthy amount of time rincing and re rincing to make sure the bleach is gone if you can still smell it is still present. I got my preditor mites from planetnaturals.com but i used a diffrent kind they worked but from my reserch the hyposis miles feed on many more types of mites and their eggs and then die off once their is no more food with no harm to your t. Taking a soft paintbrush and softly brush what you can off of the t itsself helps a little hope some of this advise will help ive herd temperrarily drying the tank has worked for some people but if useing preditor mites you can kill them off as well by duing so.