Urgent Care :: LITTLE MITES!!! young R.E.S

[ScrewZoo]

I looked in my tank this morning when i cut my lights on and theres little live things everywhere! like all over walls top of water everythin i immediately took them out and washed them and put em n a different smaller holding cage untill i clean but i hearf the eggs are still gonna be in there... any help??? plz.. i care for little screw and squirtle... they are a couple months old and are 3 inches long very healthy eat anything wide variety of food, live, dead, pellets veggies.. spent about 400$ on em. plz help.

[mat012]

First let me say I am not sure what it might be. There are fresh water mites but they rarely infest indoor aquariums. Keep in mind I really have no clue what you are dealing with (a picture maybe although you are not going to get a good close up of mites I bet?) - but if they are mites, you could start by cleaning everything with very hot to boiling water. Most mites - at least those that infest house plants etc. - cant survive at high temps (over 200*). Be careful rinsing any glass items including your tank with hot water as it could crack. Warm the tank with warm to hot water before you rinse. You would have to boil the media in your filter as well.

I am sure you know this - but dont try to put the turt in hot water.

Hopefully someone much more knowledgeable has a better plan - maybe a UV sterilizer would work too. Heres a nice description of these

http://www.marineandreef.com/Aquarium_U ... n_s/14.htm

Here is another site I found that might help a bit

http://www.veterinarypartner.com/Conten ... 4&EVetID=0

There are so many different types of mites though that if it is the problem it would be hard to know exactly what to do without figuring out what type you have. A vet or someone at a local extension office might be able to help as well.

[roseK]

i used to have little redish mites that fed off the algea on my zoomed dock. and everytime they got wet they would fall in the water and just hop around on top of it

i think i posted pics long ago on here. maybe its the same as urs. they ended up disappearing and harmless to my turt.

is this what u have?

[marisa]

Welcome. What kind of basking area are you using? Do these things jump? If so, they possibly could be springtails, which aren't harmful to your turtles.

[ScrewZoo]

nope dont jump plz help thheir like microscopic worms... real small squirmy things.... white ones i got rid of em for a while but their back again.. bout 2 weeks later

[SpotsMama]

Are they in the water or on the surface of the water or on other surfaces like the basking platform and walls of the tank?

[ScrewZoo]

they were on the surface and the walls not out of the water at all.. i got rid of em again and changed my turtlles eating habits, mealworms, pellots and a different brand of crickets. hopefully they dont come back.

[ScrewZoo]

theres a few back in the tank again.... their disgusting... i did a water change but their still their i dont wanna do a big thourough cleaning right now ill c if they spread quickly or not.... hopefully not... yall probably got em too but cant c em i just look real closely..