These are a form of mite. They are almost invisible, they look like moving dust specks if you manage to see one. When they are not gorged wtih blood. If they are gorged, they are little red dots that are visible and squish like a full mosquito. They will not kill your animal, but it may seem like it. Your animals may have them and with regular cage cleaning and a healthy animal able to groom itself; you may not see or notice that they are infested. If the animal gets down, ill or slow or whatever; then the things multiply quickly (in a few days) and any that are hiding in the bedding and all; will converge on the easy meal. That is why it seems like a very ill or just dead animal is just crawling with them. And a just expired animal, the mites wish to get off it and find another easy meal; so they will 'surface'. To get rid of them; you need to get a flea and mite spray-- NOT a bird mite spray. The bird spray is half the strength, and takes it's time to kill them. You want something with active ingredients and strength: Pyrethrins ...0.06% Piperonyl butoxide (technical)...0.60% Total of active ingredients: 0.66% L&M makes one kind, and there are a few other brands. The Walmart Bird Mite spray is half this strength, but is better than nothing in a pinch. I purchase something called 'Defy 1-2-3' used to make dog flea and tick dip; and dilute it to the strength above and apply with small pump sprayers (old bird mite spray bottles). One bottle (8 oz) of the spray will go quite a ways. You must clean EVERYTHING...ALL your cages, equipment and everything, with soap, water, bleach. Spray it all with the spray. Doublecheck your new bedding supply...if it is an unopened bag with no holes at all it will be ok, but spray the outside of the bag first. Spray everything the cages are near or sit on....to about 6-8 feet away (2-2.5m). Spray the animals. ALL of them. Spray them on the back, the stomach, rub it into the fur, they have to be soaked but not dripping. Put some on your hands to do small pups. And the heads. Then put the sprayed animals into clean and sprayed cages. Check your feed for contamination. I have had mites get into my feed....you can freeze it for a week, and that will kill them. [hubby doesn't understand gallon baggies of hamster/gerbil feed in the freezer, but.] Spray yourself(clothing) if needed and when you finish. Spray all old bedding as you dump the cages into a garbage can with a sack in it, that you sprayed the can first and the outside of the bag after you close it. You want to kill every one of them. Just one will start the cycle over again. You must be paranoid and ruthless. Then run for the shower after you take the trash out and spray along the route you just took with the garbage bag... and dump your clothes right into the washer along the way, all of it, to your skin; and wash them with any good detergent. Head and Shoulders shampoo will kill them on you, start by washing your hair first, use lots of shampoo and use the lather as bodywash. I have a slight but persistent reaction to the spray, it makes me sick to the stomach (green at the gills) and want to stay in a flat warm soft spot for a day afterwards. Check your animals for three days following for any signs of mites. And keep an eye out for any sign of either the crawling dust specks or the small red blobs. If you see any, you have to repeat the whole thing again. ******* To check an animal: take white unscented undyed toilet tissue or white paper towelling and swaddle an animal with it, leaving the head out. After a moment or two, check the toweling or tissue for the specks or blobs. If there are any on the animal, they will jump off looking for another host to infest. ******* the bites really itch. One mite can bite you several times. In rapid order. They can hide in your lingere or along elastic or waistbands. Innie belly buttons are particular favorites for them to chomp and are unbearable to live with.... Benadryl will give you some relief for those first few days after being chomped, if you can take it. Cortisone/benadryl cream will help also. Deb Rebel -- who unfortunately has fought this war a few times. [I suggest you save this post as a 'refer to' for later....just in case] >>Rachel, >> A couple of months ago my gerbils died of the same thing. The first >>one died almost instantly and the second one died the day after. I >>worked hard on the second one for hours. I took her out of the cage, >>cleaned it, filled it with water, scrubbed it and so on. I then took >>her and doused her in water (despite what people told me), and tried >>getting all of the bugs off. They are just like ticks, except that they >>don't just stay attached, but crawl around. There were too many >>though. They were breeding and more hatched by the minutes. I went as >>far as giving her vitamins through a straw and pumping her chest gently >>to get more oxygen, but the things just wouldn't stop. By the time I >>had most of them gone, I picked her up and she took her last breath in >>my hand. They sucked the blood out of my gerbils and they lost all of >>their weight in no time and were left to skin and bones. I do not know >>what they were, but they sucked blood and were everywhere. They were >>climbing on the cage and in it. I blamed it on the CareFresh bedding >>that I used because once I started using that all of my gerbils started >>dying earleir and having problems, so i went back to the other stuff and >>the ones I have now are fine. Just make sure you clean the cage and >>watch very carefully. >> >>Lillian > >It is highly unlikely that blood sucking invertebrates would kill a >mammal. The amount of blood they would need to suck would be simply too >much. > >It is much more likely that the gerbils were infested for some time but >had been successfully grooming them out of their coat. On becoming ill, >they ceased grooming so much so the parasites accumulated so much you >became aware of them. > >A gerbil suddenly losing a lot of weight is usually sue to tooth >problems that stop it eating.
