Quick update - the fly traps worked on a few of the fruit flies, but I’ve found that Apple Cider Vinegar + Dish Soap in an open top glass/container, works really well 😊
@@youzelin1199 actually was my friends idea online some guy said to line the bins with Vaseline and wipe them away twice daily and when I was frustrated with that she recommended lady bugs I had no idea! It worked well too after 2 days and the Vaseline line felt more manageable
This is a complete nightmare. You are way more calm than I’d be. I’d pack a suitcase, walk out of my house, and toss the mites the keys. It’s their house now.
I had issues with grain mites after getting mealworms from petsmart. Infested literally everything in a night and couldn’t get rid of them until I got rid of my feeders. Since then, I avoid any type of grain based substrate for my meal worms and super worms
Yeah thankfully its been just over 2 weeks since the outbreak and I haven't seen anymore. So I think removing the feeders, getting new ones and keeping the crickets in a cold place has really help minimise the chances of any eggs and mites surviving.
Crested geckos are great, very easy pets. They do fine on crested gecko diet (such as Pangea). You can feed them live insects but you don't have to. Plus some of them will not eat insects regardless.
@@Gexkoofficial I was just commenting on a type of gecko that doesn't have to be fed insects. Sorry didn't know you already had a gecko. I personally have a lepoard gecko and 4 crested geckos. (I keep the mealworms for my lepoard gecko in the refrigerator.)
I had a breakout of the grain mites twice- and it’s worse when you keep your feeder bugs under your bed 😀👍. Microwaving oats before using them prevents the mite eggs from hatching !!
I've had 3 infestations but managed to save my colony every time. It must be a nightmare having a colony under your bed and getting mites. I currently have my beetles on my desk under my bed just in case any mites are still in the area they were previously and they get infested again.
Yep you have to attack the surfaces every day for a week at least, they are a true nightmare. Now regarding the fruit flies, you have to replace every few days. With the fruit beetle colony they will happily eat fresh fruit so don’t worry about decayed fruit
Yeah the room was getting a deep clean everyday, thankfully I havent seen anymore since and it's just been over 2 weeks. Ah okay. I've been freezing fruit and cutting it up when I need it, but of course it gets quite mushy, but I've now set up a number of different fruit fly traps around the room and I'm seeing less and less. :)
Lovely to see you back :) I’m in the UK too and had a reptile room grain mite outbreak a couple weeks back from my dubia roach colony! I emptied it, cleaned the container, replaced all the bedding and food and luckily haven’t had a problem since. It seems that if they don’t have a food source they die off. Hope you don’t have a problem again! :)
I feel so sorry for you! We had grain mites in October which came from my mealworm oats, I ended up putting all the animals in temp mite-free enclosures, left the mealworms in a tub outside for a week (after changing substrate) and they were fine and hoovering every 2 hours, they love door frames! So I recommend hovering the frames to suck them out of the crevasses. We also deep cleaned the entire room and squished any rouge ones. We found chemicals to be pretty ineffective but nevertheless we got rid of them all in just over a week and haven’t had a problem since! Good luck, they’ll go eventually!!
Yep, it wasn't what we were expecting to do a couple days before Christmas. We had planned to get the house nice and clean ready for xmas, but this turned into a deep clean. Yes thank you the geckos are doing well, I haven''t seen a single mite on or near them thankfully :)
oh no 😬 I was kind of worried about them getting into the guinea pig food, but thankfully we were super careful with anything coming out or going near the reptile room, so i think we've managed to avoid it.
those can also be wood mites. They hitch a ride with the aspen bedding. You will see them gathered around the water bowls in your reptile enclosures. They LOVE water.
With the fruit flies we use misquote traps. They light up with purple light. Once a fly flies in, they get sucked in a fan and get stuck to the sticky pad inside. It worked so well. We got it from Amazon i think
Aye they are grain mites, I had them as well. I washed everything and wrapped all the legs of the reptile shelves in tape. I had to cull all my feeder colonys
Same thing happened to me last year. I’ve only kept reptiles for about 3 years and had NEVER BEEN WARNED! I will NEVER use oats ever again! At first we had an exterminator come over and he didn’t even know what grain mites were. Since I have birds I couldn’t use bleach in my room, but the mites were in my leopard gecko enclosure, my cornsnake tank, the mealworm bin, and they drank from my fish tank! I had to strip my room and clean all of my pet enclosures except for my bioactive crested gecko tank, the mites never went in it for some reason. I wiped my room down for days and In under a week they were gone. Another reason that having a lot of pets sucks and isn’t for everyone
Absolute nightmare! Yeah I think a while back I stopped using oats because of potential mould build up and oats can be high in phytic acid which isn't great for your geckos - I didn't really know much about grain mites. I only handed maybe a handful or less of oats for my morio worms, and boom, they're everywhere. Crazy.
It took me forever to get rid of fruit flies i don't even know what they were thriving off of because I tried to kill them multiple times and had nothing they could eat
Idk why but when my gecko enclosure was directly next to the mite infestation it wasn't really affected. Maybe one or two mites on the enclosure glass. However my lighting fixture was a whole different story... it was covered in them and I was disguised to touch that thing. I had to wipe it down every day
I highly suggest the funnel contraption!! When I was young we had fruit fly infestations constantly, thousands at a time because I wasn’t kept in a good living environment. Anyway, we always had them all over the house and they really work! I think they might work a little better than fly tape because the scent attracts them, they assume it’s food instead of just a place they can land. They actually make similar traps in the states in shapes of apples so it’s not so ugly. If you ever get an extreme infestation, they like to land on the ceiling. Weird tip, suck them up with a vacuum nozzle, make sure you cover the nozzle right after though with your hand or else you might have a few escapees!
I had these! I soaked all the mealworm containers and all other surfaces in vinegar, rinsed off the worms (lol) and now I put my oats in the freezer for a long time before putting it with my insects.
I recently had an issue with both of these little nuisances. There was a bag of rotten potatoes in the pantry, and a massive swarm of fruit flies attacked the food for my meal worms, crickets, superworms and dubia roaches (mainly apple, carrot and I believe cucumber). I caught nearly 90 of those flies within 4 days of setting apple cider vinegar traps. Then, I had a mite infestation (obviously they were just the nuisance kind and not the blood sucking kind. Otherwise I wouldn't have any insects). I changed out all of the bedding, limited food and had the containers stay dry. Within a week, all of the mites were gone. So yeah. I'm nuisance bug free and both of my geckos couldn't care less as to why I had freaked out
Thank you! This is a very real worry for me so thanks for showing what to do if they do happen…. *shiver* it’s a risk that I am willing to deal with but yeah. I am so feeling with you and the stresslevels must have gone through the roofs! Hope all of you are okay after this tho ( I am unsure when this video was made as I didn’t check before typing, but I love your videos and how you are showing all sides of reptile owning! Lovely and great work even if I do have some psycosomatic itching going on atm at the mere thought of having other mites than dust mites 🤣
I'm currently dealing with a fungus gnat infestation, and I have grain mites as well though not as badly as you did (knock on wood it doesn't get worse)
@Alyssa Coon Ugh they're so annoying! When I'm trying to sleep they'll try to fly into my nose and ears! Idk where they came from originally, cuz I sanitized the crap outta everything for my bioactive, but now they're in all the house plants too so that's super 🙃
We've had multiple fruit fly occassions at home. Throw away any leftover fruits/veggies from all tanks and feeders every day (they lay their eggs there). The bottle trick with vinegar inside works wonders btw, I never used the sticky tapes! I put a few drops of dishsoap in there too so they drown instantly instead of floating on the vinegar + I put things like pieces of banana peels as extra to lure them. Good luck!!
Thank you so much for this video. I had an infestation a few months back and had no idea what they were! I keep my feeder insects on bug grub as a substrate so I'm guessing this has acted like the oats and provided an ideal habitat for the mites. I'm going to immediately change substrate now to prevent them coming back! For anyone wondering how I got rid of my mites, I moved house (not due to having mites, I'm not a drama queen) and sterilised everything before the move in boiling water and reptile safe disinfectant.
@@SIRO_GLYDER they don't usually have them. The thing is if they did the companies would probably get fired for unhygienic food.. you need to make sure they stay dry and your colonies have good ventilation so they don't infest. If you do have an infestation then that is a good method.
Rebecca, make sure that you use wheat bran for worm substrate, as it has more nutritional benefit and it’s easier to microwave or bake to kill mite eggs. :)
I feel for you so much. I woke up the other day and found a load of them on my desk and tv and how my drawers. I feel physically sick. The only new thing I added recently was a cheap magazine. Then noticed they were on some ribbon I’d used to pull back my curtains. So I assume they can go into fabric too; which really creeps me out. Any ideas of how I can rid them would be greatly appreciated. Do you have to get rid of everything or do they go? I cleaned the desk but they somehow came back.
@LeopardGecko Grain mites aren’t harmful to anything other than my sanity lol, I’ve thrown out more old insect feeder breeding racks than I care to talk about. First thing to know about mites is they hate citrus and more importantly citric acid. Put some citrus fruits in with the crickets and that should get rid of the mites in their container and give the crickets a good snack. For the wall get some citrus oil and some rubbing alcohol/white vinegar And spray it on a rag and wipe them up. For the enclosures you can take a lemon wedge and wipe it on the edges of the tank doors and edges of the tanks to keep the mites away. You can also mix some pet safe tank cleaner and mix with a small amount of lemon juice for the mites in any enclosures. For fruit flies get a empty water bottle and mix some fruit scented dish soap with warm water and vinegar and shake to make a foam on top. The mix will smell like spoiled fruit to the flies and they will die once they get stuck on the foam. For use with predatory mites. They work well... almost too well if they get in one of your bio setups they will eat all the springtails and baby isopods. So if you use them just be careful.
I mean I remove old food every other day, I've never had a problem like this in the 14 years of owning geckos, I think it was reintroducing oats and accidentally creating the ideal conditions for the eggs to hatch and a population to explode.
I had some mites before it was horrible. I got them from my meal worm container that I had for years. It was from the heat going into my meal container from a lamp.
Hey, I’ve noticed mites inside my gecko terrarium and on the outside and I’m freaking out about it (nowhere near the amount you had on this video) but I think they are spider mites or something similar and I’m wondering is there anything you’d recommend I can do? (it’s a custom terrarium so I can’t just rip it all out)
Food grade diatomaceous earth in a sock banged about everywhere,and grain products thrown out. Literally go round the house and all cupboards banging your sock about almost like an exorcism! Leaves a fine layer of earth over everything.
wow i literally got rid of every breeding setup yesterday because of mites! Its the second time it has happen and I just give up... its not worth the trouble, might as well just buy feeders when I need them.
I get them all the time when I feed my mealworms or get new ones from the pet store. (I keep them in oatmeal). The best way to get rid of them is to lower humidity and heat. Cool dry places kill them super quick and moving any food sources away to cold dry areas helps.
I had an infestation of them in the summer. They got into every single thing and I had to clean all of my feeder cages. The main problem I had is that it infested and they were breeding in my 18L water container I had. Once I got rid of that and vacuumed every day, my problem was gone in a week
Got the same problem yesterday, luckily I was able to recognise them because I'd watched this video before. I very tediously removed all feeder insects from their homes and put them in new containers, being extra careful that no mites got in (except the fruit flies, I just took a few to stage a new colony and got rid of the rest) and washed out their containers with hot water. Luckily they mostly stayed contained to just that area, with just a couple stragglers, so I sprayed it all down with hot water and then tea tree oil to kill them and the eggs. Also ordered some ladybugs in case things get out of control, and brought in my dehumidifier. Winter is nearing fast too so I'm keeping my heater off for cold temperatures. Wish me luck.
They're fairly easy to kill just annoying so I wouldn't worry too much and if one day you end up with an infestation and are unable to identify the type of mite quarantine any pets and clean the room with white vinegar and vacuum the floors and you'll probably be just fine
I had a mite infestation from flour i think, they were everywhere in the pantry, and then decided to infest my bedroom! They were a nightmare, but after wiping the surfaces they were on they just left, I still find a mite or two in boxes and that
Hey great video I’m having the same problem I think ,y Mario worms I bought have come with the mites 😔 did you manage to get them away ? I was looking at trying the app cider vinegar trick,as you did in the video on top of cleaning is the finger worth doing did they help? Thank you for the advice 😊
Mites live in dog food, cat food,etc flour, sugar, in any grain,oatmeal, bird seed, in cereal, and in bio active tanks, you just have to be diligent at cleaning
We get fruit flies every fall. I use apple cider vinegar and dishsoap in a jar with paper or platic wrap over the top with little holes in it. They go in and cant get out. Catches masses of flies!
I had an infestation of mites in my mealworm colony a few days ago but i found it beforeit spread to my room. They are very annoying. Im sorry this happened to you. Controlling it is a nightmare, i know how you feel... now im more scared of them happening as i have a hamster plus my crested gecko.
I'm dealing with fruit flies at the moment, feels like it's never ending! That's the problem with having 2 crested geckos, plus 4 guinea pigs, a hamster, and my leopard gecko's bugs all eating fruit and veg! 😅
You should get a small glass that you fill halfway with vinegar and cover it with cling film. Then make some small-ish holes in the cling film. The fruit flys will fly in but never find there way out. Works well for me!
I had grain mites recently too. I have gotten rid of them almost entirely by removing oats from my feeder bugs, cleaning their bins, and wiping down surfaces. But mine didn't seem as extensive as yours at least not outside of the feeder containers.
Hi Rebecca, I got those mites (or similar) ugh!. They spread into all my feeder insect boxes by the time I realised they were there. I got them with a supply of mail ordered feeder insects, I think they actually were in my box of Dendrobea worms. I was horrified, they even crawled onto me. I had to throw all my feeder insects and their substrate etc out, very costly and use really strong F10 solution (F10 was the only thing that got rid of the mites). The mites were in any soil or substrate so that all had to go. The only good thing was my feeders and supplies were kept about 6ft away from my vivs and terrariums. Seeing this video has reminded my I need to move my insects away from my vivariums again (they are temporarily on top of them). So A HUGE THANK YOU for making this video you have reminded me I should move them I had forgotten about that horror.
Omg this just happened to me! It literally broke my brain. I could barely talk or hold a thought. I had to throw out so much stuff…. Diatomaceous earth helped! Vinegar did nothing! Also got a heavy duty dehumidifier and it is working like a charm.
Oh my gosh girl!! I have the same dang problem and I have NO idea where these damn bugs came from! I have used white vinager and it seems like it helped a bit but they are all over my mice and my hamster and I have NO idea what to do anymore!! I hope this helped for you and you are able to get rid of them. Please keep us updated bc I may have to buy this stuff!!
I have these mites in my crssted gecko tank what shou,d I do with my crestie and how do I get rid of them my mom has been spraying it with neem oil and soapy water and then I watched your video and now we are spraying white vinegar and water of them.
Peppermint oil clove oil will help get rid of grain mites on a cloth . I only have New Caledonian geckos .Also eucalyptus oil not sure if it’s ok for Leopard geckos though . Tried it as had the same problem.
I had this happen to me. They came from my beardies mealworms. I basically took a wet wipe and wiped the mites up (luckily they didn’t get in the tank) and then threw away the container. Then wiped everything nearby down and luckily I haven’t seen any recently.
I have them ALL over my reptile rack since I have fruit fly cultures… How do I remove the mites without killing off my flys because I need them for darts!
I still sont really understand how to get the mites away bc i got them on my aquarium. I anyway wanted no aquarium anymore but how do i get them to be gone?
You mentioning fungus gnats made me google what those are and now I know the flies I have are fungus gnats. They infested my cornsnake tank and I suspect they came from a new plant I introduced into the tank. So annoying!
We had this in our garage once from chicken feed, was so gross. If I freeze the substrate I plan on using for mealworms or dubia food, will that kill the eggs? Heat seems like it would spoil food quicker.
This happened to me almost a year ago now, with grain mites. It was a NIGHTMARE! I literally had to throw my entire kitchen table and chairs away, cause I’d wipe it down and within an hour, the table would be covered again. I then cleaned the entire table, top to bottom, thinking that would help. I did this several times. An hour later, the same thing happened. It was then I’d realized they’d set up in every little crevice on the table. 🤦🏻♀️ So we threw the whole thing out. The mites came from crickets I purchased. I’ve also had a fruit fly infestation. Those aren’t fun either, but I’ll gladly take those over the mites any day! The Apple Cider Vinegar, Water and Dawn mixture works very well!
Quick update - the fly traps worked on a few of the fruit flies, but I’ve found that Apple Cider Vinegar + Dish Soap in an open top glass/container, works really well 😊
I guess Im kind of randomly asking but do anyone know a good website to watch newly released movies online ?
@Torin Adrian i would suggest Flixzone. You can find it by googling =)
@Torin Adrian i use flixzone. Just search on google for it :)
@Joaquin Cannon yea, been using flixzone for since march myself =)
@Joaquin Cannon Thanks, I went there and it seems like a nice service =) Appreciate it!!
So sorry this happened to you. Was able to get rid of my wheat mites with lady bugs!
big brain
Wait you let them in your house?
Idm them actually but like still.
@@youzelin1199 actually was my friends idea online some guy said to line the bins with Vaseline and wipe them away twice daily and when I was frustrated with that she recommended lady bugs I had no idea! It worked well too after 2 days and the Vaseline line felt more manageable
Thanks :) I did think about ladybirds, great form of pest control though once the mites are gone they may run out of things to eat lol
This is a complete nightmare. You are way more calm than I’d be. I’d pack a suitcase, walk out of my house, and toss the mites the keys. It’s their house now.
I had issues with grain mites after getting mealworms from petsmart. Infested literally everything in a night and couldn’t get rid of them until I got rid of my feeders. Since then, I avoid any type of grain based substrate for my meal worms and super worms
Curious to know what you use instead
@@krys1059 u can microwave oatmeal that kills the eggs just let the oatmeal cool
@@krys1059 I just use coconut fiber bedding for worms and beetles and add in veggies. For my crickets I just use paper towels at the moment
Yeah thankfully its been just over 2 weeks since the outbreak and I haven't seen anymore. So I think removing the feeders, getting new ones and keeping the crickets in a cold place has really help minimise the chances of any eggs and mites surviving.
@@leopardgeckotalk is it good that my baby leopard gecko let me pick it up within the first week and a half
this makes me wish that geckos were herbivores
There are some vegetarian geckos!
Crested geckos are great, very easy pets. They do fine on crested gecko diet (such as Pangea). You can feed them live insects but you don't have to. Plus some of them will not eat insects regardless.
@@markadams5009 thanks mark but i think you've got the wrong thread, i have a gecko mate
@@Gexkoofficial I was just commenting on a type of gecko that doesn't have to be fed insects. Sorry didn't know you already had a gecko. I personally have a lepoard gecko and 4 crested geckos. (I keep the mealworms for my lepoard gecko in the refrigerator.)
@@mrsb1212 leopard gecko lmao
Oh god , ive never had these , but now im genuinely terrified for your geckos.
Oh they're fine :) Thankfully these aren't the kind of mites that are interested in harming humans or animals, they just want the grain lol
I had a breakout of the grain mites twice- and it’s worse when you keep your feeder bugs under your bed 😀👍. Microwaving oats before using them prevents the mite eggs from hatching !!
I've had 3 infestations but managed to save my colony every time. It must be a nightmare having a colony under your bed and getting mites. I currently have my beetles on my desk under my bed just in case any mites are still in the area they were previously and they get infested again.
ahhh scary! I think I'm just going to avoid oats at all costs now haha stick to what I usually use lol
Since it’s cold where I am right now I’ve left the oats outside from morning to night and that also seems to have done the trick.
Yep you have to attack the surfaces every day for a week at least, they are a true nightmare. Now regarding the fruit flies, you have to replace every few days. With the fruit beetle colony they will happily eat fresh fruit so don’t worry about decayed fruit
Yeah the room was getting a deep clean everyday, thankfully I havent seen anymore since and it's just been over 2 weeks. Ah okay. I've been freezing fruit and cutting it up when I need it, but of course it gets quite mushy, but I've now set up a number of different fruit fly traps around the room and I'm seeing less and less. :)
@@leopardgeckotalk great To hear :-).
Say they go onto fabric like curtains what do you do then? Throw them out or wash them or use a hoover on them? 🤷♀️
Lovely to see you back :) I’m in the UK too and had a reptile room grain mite outbreak a couple weeks back from my dubia roach colony! I emptied it, cleaned the container, replaced all the bedding and food and luckily haven’t had a problem since. It seems that if they don’t have a food source they die off. Hope you don’t have a problem again! :)
I had those! I got ladybugs and they were gone in hours :)
I feel so sorry for you! We had grain mites in October which came from my mealworm oats, I ended up putting all the animals in temp mite-free enclosures, left the mealworms in a tub outside for a week (after changing substrate) and they were fine and hoovering every 2 hours, they love door frames! So I recommend hovering the frames to suck them out of the crevasses. We also deep cleaned the entire room and squished any rouge ones. We found chemicals to be pretty ineffective but nevertheless we got rid of them all in just over a week and haven’t had a problem since! Good luck, they’ll go eventually!!
Just got round to watching this and this is exactly like what my room looked like when I had them😭
What did you do to get rid of them?
the problem I've had every time I tried oats was mold growing
good luck on eradicating those pests!
Yeah - damp food+oats+poor ventilation = mould growth. I had the same and quickly removed it all :( such a pain.
How to get Rid of these, What insecticides to use
Please help
Aawww. I couldn't go through the trouble to get rid of those mites. I hope the geckos are ok!
Yep, it wasn't what we were expecting to do a couple days before Christmas. We had planned to get the house nice and clean ready for xmas, but this turned into a deep clean. Yes thank you the geckos are doing well, I haven''t seen a single mite on or near them thankfully :)
I had an infestation of grain mites recently. They came in with my gerbils food
oh no 😬 I was kind of worried about them getting into the guinea pig food, but thankfully we were super careful with anything coming out or going near the reptile room, so i think we've managed to avoid it.
Am I in school? Yes. Do I care? No. Will you learn more from this video than school? YES!
Great video:)
lol same
@@massimotrento3498 lol
@@CadenKunich BN+SS
If ya know what I mean
@@massimotrento3498 OMG yes lol
those can also be wood mites. They hitch a ride with the aspen bedding. You will see them gathered around the water bowls in your reptile enclosures. They LOVE water.
With the fruit flies we use misquote traps. They light up with purple light. Once a fly flies in, they get sucked in a fan and get stuck to the sticky pad inside. It worked so well. We got it from Amazon i think
Aye they are grain mites, I had them as well. I washed everything and wrapped all the legs of the reptile shelves in tape. I had to cull all my feeder colonys
Yeah absolutely nightmare. .😰
@@leopardgeckotalk yeah it was a pain, it was shocking how many of them just appeared overnight. The tape trick helped, sticky side out.
Same thing happened to me last year. I’ve only kept reptiles for about 3 years and had NEVER BEEN WARNED! I will NEVER use oats ever again! At first we had an exterminator come over and he didn’t even know what grain mites were. Since I have birds I couldn’t use bleach in my room, but the mites were in my leopard gecko enclosure, my cornsnake tank, the mealworm bin, and they drank from my fish tank! I had to strip my room and clean all of my pet enclosures except for my bioactive crested gecko tank, the mites never went in it for some reason. I wiped my room down for days and In under a week they were gone. Another reason that having a lot of pets sucks and isn’t for everyone
Absolute nightmare! Yeah I think a while back I stopped using oats because of potential mould build up and oats can be high in phytic acid which isn't great for your geckos - I didn't really know much about grain mites. I only handed maybe a handful or less of oats for my morio worms, and boom, they're everywhere. Crazy.
My house was also infested with fruit flies but they left for the most part
It took me forever to get rid of fruit flies i don't even know what they were thriving off of because I tried to kill them multiple times and had nothing they could eat
Oh no. Well glad they left :) Its difficult because I have to keep providing decaying fruit for the beetles, so the flies love that.
@@leopardgeckotalk yeah they were annoying because they would bite and were always around our fruits. Btw I got merch
That jar fruit trap works great
In the beginning of the video:
Crested gecko owners: ha ha ha!
4:25
Crested gecko owners: oh:(
Idk why but when my gecko enclosure was directly next to the mite infestation it wasn't really affected. Maybe one or two mites on the enclosure glass. However my lighting fixture was a whole different story... it was covered in them and I was disguised to touch that thing. I had to wipe it down every day
thankfully I haven't seen any mites near them :)
I highly suggest the funnel contraption!! When I was young we had fruit fly infestations constantly, thousands at a time because I wasn’t kept in a good living environment. Anyway, we always had them all over the house and they really work! I think they might work a little better than fly tape because the scent attracts them, they assume it’s food instead of just a place they can land. They actually make similar traps in the states in shapes of apples so it’s not so ugly. If you ever get an extreme infestation, they like to land on the ceiling. Weird tip, suck them up with a vacuum nozzle, make sure you cover the nozzle right after though with your hand or else you might have a few escapees!
I had these! I soaked all the mealworm containers and all other surfaces in vinegar, rinsed off the worms (lol) and now I put my oats in the freezer for a long time before putting it with my insects.
If you still want to use the fly trap kit you could try to cut pieces of the normal sticky strips and stick them to the other ones that didn't work.
I recently had an issue with both of these little nuisances. There was a bag of rotten potatoes in the pantry, and a massive swarm of fruit flies attacked the food for my meal worms, crickets, superworms and dubia roaches (mainly apple, carrot and I believe cucumber). I caught nearly 90 of those flies within 4 days of setting apple cider vinegar traps. Then, I had a mite infestation (obviously they were just the nuisance kind and not the blood sucking kind. Otherwise I wouldn't have any insects). I changed out all of the bedding, limited food and had the containers stay dry. Within a week, all of the mites were gone. So yeah. I'm nuisance bug free and both of my geckos couldn't care less as to why I had freaked out
Thank you! This is a very real worry for me so thanks for showing what to do if they do happen…. *shiver* it’s a risk that I am willing to deal with but yeah. I am so feeling with you and the stresslevels must have gone through the roofs! Hope all of you are okay after this tho ( I am unsure when this video was made as I didn’t check before typing, but I love your videos and how you are showing all sides of reptile owning! Lovely and great work even if I do have some psycosomatic itching going on atm at the mere thought of having other mites than dust mites 🤣
Omg I’m glad I watched this. I just looked through my meal worm colony and they’re in there every where!
You help so much with my new leopard geckos u gave me so many tips
I'm currently dealing with a fungus gnat infestation, and I have grain mites as well though not as badly as you did (knock on wood it doesn't get worse)
oh no! Luckily fungus gnats seems to happily fly into fly traps/sticky strips, fruit flies seem a little smarter lol
@@leopardgeckotalk Good to know! I haven't had any luck finding sticky traps this time of year but I'll keep looking! Fruit flies are *so annoying*
@Alyssa Coon Ugh they're so annoying! When I'm trying to sleep they'll try to fly into my nose and ears! Idk where they came from originally, cuz I sanitized the crap outta everything for my bioactive, but now they're in all the house plants too so that's super 🙃
apple cider vinegar in a cup with a drop of dawn dish soap and then the paper cone works MAGIC
We've had multiple fruit fly occassions at home. Throw away any leftover fruits/veggies from all tanks and feeders every day (they lay their eggs there). The bottle trick with vinegar inside works wonders btw, I never used the sticky tapes! I put a few drops of dishsoap in there too so they drown instantly instead of floating on the vinegar + I put things like pieces of banana peels as extra to lure them. Good luck!!
Thank you so much for this video. I had an infestation a few months back and had no idea what they were! I keep my feeder insects on bug grub as a substrate so I'm guessing this has acted like the oats and provided an ideal habitat for the mites. I'm going to immediately change substrate now to prevent them coming back!
For anyone wondering how I got rid of my mites, I moved house (not due to having mites, I'm not a drama queen) and sterilised everything before the move in boiling water and reptile safe disinfectant.
My leopard gecko has not been pooping after a couple days after I’ve fed her what does that mean
What kind of substrate do you use
You might need to get a bug zapper or death spray
Next time you use oats, freeze them when you get them. Same with flour
@@livheijmans2843 it kills all the bugs carried on oats and flour, like weavills and those mites
@@SIRO_GLYDER they don't usually have them. The thing is if they did the companies would probably get fired for unhygienic food.. you need to make sure they stay dry and your colonies have good ventilation so they don't infest. If you do have an infestation then that is a good method.
Rebecca, make sure that you use wheat bran for worm substrate, as it has more nutritional benefit and it’s easier to microwave or bake to kill mite eggs. :)
I feel for you so much. I woke up the other day and found a load of them on my desk and tv and how my drawers. I feel physically sick. The only new thing I added recently was a cheap magazine. Then noticed they were on some ribbon I’d used to pull back my curtains. So I assume they can go into fabric too; which really creeps me out.
Any ideas of how I can rid them would be greatly appreciated. Do you have to get rid of everything or do they go? I cleaned the desk but they somehow came back.
@LeopardGecko
Grain mites aren’t harmful to anything other than my sanity lol, I’ve thrown out more old insect feeder breeding racks than I care to talk about.
First thing to know about mites is they hate citrus and more importantly citric acid.
Put some citrus fruits in with the crickets and that should get rid of the mites in their container and give the crickets a good snack.
For the wall get some citrus oil and some rubbing alcohol/white vinegar And spray it on a rag and wipe them up.
For the enclosures you can take a lemon wedge and wipe it on the edges of the tank doors and edges of the tanks to keep the mites away. You can also mix some pet safe tank cleaner and mix with a small amount of lemon juice for the mites in any enclosures.
For fruit flies get a empty water bottle and mix some fruit scented dish soap with warm water and vinegar and shake to make a foam on top.
The mix will smell like spoiled fruit to the flies and they will die once they get stuck on the foam.
For use with predatory mites. They work well... almost too well if they get in one of your bio setups they will eat all the springtails and baby isopods. So if you use them just be careful.
This is when you realize gecko's food must not be neglicted at any point. I am not saying that you just didn't cared it's just you didn't had luck
I mean I remove old food every other day, I've never had a problem like this in the 14 years of owning geckos, I think it was reintroducing oats and accidentally creating the ideal conditions for the eggs to hatch and a population to explode.
I had some mites before it was horrible. I got them from my meal worm container that I had for years. It was from the heat going into my meal container from a lamp.
yooooooo that must have been so upsetting to find.... YUCK! Thanks for sharing & being open & real, I've had grain mites in my Leo's tank before.
Hey, I’ve noticed mites inside my gecko terrarium and on the outside and I’m freaking out about it (nowhere near the amount you had on this video) but I think they are spider mites or something similar and I’m wondering is there anything you’d recommend I can do? (it’s a custom terrarium so I can’t just rip it all out)
Food grade diatomaceous earth in a sock banged about everywhere,and grain products thrown out. Literally go round the house and all cupboards banging your sock about almost like an exorcism! Leaves a fine layer of earth over everything.
wow i literally got rid of every breeding setup yesterday because of mites! Its the second time it has happen and I just give up... its not worth the trouble, might as well just buy feeders when I need them.
I get them all the time when I feed my mealworms or get new ones from the pet store. (I keep them in oatmeal). The best way to get rid of them is to lower humidity and heat. Cool dry places kill them super quick and moving any food sources away to cold dry areas helps.
Oats contain phytic acid which binds calcium, so they’re not the best substrate. Dry soil is better
Aw poor you - think looks horrible! I've bookmarked the video for future use in case I need it - lots of helpful tips, thank you :)
I have heard that lady bugs help and they eat them
Yes but you can't just let lady bugs into your house😂
Also these are grain mites so idk
I had an infestation of them in the summer. They got into every single thing and I had to clean all of my feeder cages. The main problem I had is that it infested and they were breeding in my 18L water container I had. Once I got rid of that and vacuumed every day, my problem was gone in a week
Got the same problem yesterday, luckily I was able to recognise them because I'd watched this video before. I very tediously removed all feeder insects from their homes and put them in new containers, being extra careful that no mites got in (except the fruit flies, I just took a few to stage a new colony and got rid of the rest) and washed out their containers with hot water. Luckily they mostly stayed contained to just that area, with just a couple stragglers, so I sprayed it all down with hot water and then tea tree oil to kill them and the eggs. Also ordered some ladybugs in case things get out of control, and brought in my dehumidifier. Winter is nearing fast too so I'm keeping my heater off for cold temperatures. Wish me luck.
We caught fruit flies in jars by putting fruit in the jar and putting cling wrap on top and poking very small holes in it with a needle.
Literally just went around my house panicking afraid I might have mites too 😅 I’m already a paranoid and very anxious person so that’s great 🥲
They're fairly easy to kill just annoying so I wouldn't worry too much and if one day you end up with an infestation and are unable to identify the type of mite quarantine any pets and clean the room with white vinegar and vacuum the floors and you'll probably be just fine
@@beanythompson1460 thank you so much! You have no idea how reassuring that is ☺️
I only use oats... atleast I used to. Fixing that right now
Oh no what a nightmare to end a nightmare year :( I'm sorry, hope you guys can get it under control quickly 🙏🤞 Wishing you luck!!
First I love you channel
I had grain mites once, I rinsed the beetles and worms off gently and replaced the bin and substrate
I used to get this all the time with my mealworm breeding colonies so it’s probably from them, they looked identical to what you have
I had a mite infestation from flour i think, they were everywhere in the pantry, and then decided to infest my bedroom! They were a nightmare, but after wiping the surfaces they were on they just left, I still find a mite or two in boxes and that
What chemicals did you use that worked for you?
Hey great video I’m having the same problem I think ,y Mario worms I bought have come with the mites 😔 did you manage to get them away ? I was looking at trying the app cider vinegar trick,as you did in the video on top of cleaning is the finger worth doing did they help? Thank you for the advice 😊
mold mites i got same issues they love electrical stuff too
I got those sticky pads and they worked SUPER well with our fly I festation
Mites live in dog food, cat food,etc flour, sugar, in any grain,oatmeal, bird seed, in cereal, and in bio active tanks, you just have to be diligent at cleaning
Yikes on bikes 😬
We get fruit flies every fall. I use apple cider vinegar and dishsoap in a jar with paper or platic wrap over the top with little holes in it. They go in and cant get out. Catches masses of flies!
I had an infestation of mites in my mealworm colony a few days ago but i found it beforeit spread to my room. They are very annoying. Im sorry this happened to you. Controlling it is a nightmare, i know how you feel... now im more scared of them happening as i have a hamster plus my crested gecko.
I'm dealing with fruit flies at the moment, feels like it's never ending! That's the problem with having 2 crested geckos, plus 4 guinea pigs, a hamster, and my leopard gecko's bugs all eating fruit and veg! 😅
You should get a small glass that you fill halfway with vinegar and cover it with cling film. Then make some small-ish holes in the cling film. The fruit flys will fly in but never find there way out. Works well for me!
I lLOVE YOUR VIDS YOU HELP ME SOOO MUCH!!!!🤪
Ack, mites! That sucks! I wish you luck with getting rid of them!
I had grain mites recently too. I have gotten rid of them almost entirely by removing oats from my feeder bugs, cleaning their bins, and wiping down surfaces. But mine didn't seem as extensive as yours at least not outside of the feeder containers.
Yeah I think getting rid of the feeders helped a lot. :)
Did the vinegar water work for removing them all?
I like to use 91% isopropyl with lemon juice.
Putting bay leaves around helps apparently. They repel bugs.
funnily enough I think I have a few bay leaves lol
Oh no, sorry this happened to you! Also do you know if when gut loading feeder insects with vegetable scraps do the scraps need to be organic or not?
they don't. Just make sure to wash/peel things.
@@SohiHien Ok, thanks for the info!
I had and have still the same infestation problem.
Can the mits kill superworm?!
Did the mites ever bite you? I think my Leo might have mites but they’ve only been biting me. I haven’t seen any symptoms on him.
Hi Rebecca, I got those mites (or similar) ugh!. They spread into all my feeder insect boxes by the time I realised they were there. I got them with a supply of mail ordered feeder insects, I think they actually were in my box of Dendrobea worms. I was horrified, they even crawled onto me. I had to throw all my feeder insects and their substrate etc out, very costly and use really strong F10 solution (F10 was the only thing that got rid of the mites). The mites were in any soil or substrate so that all had to go. The only good thing was my feeders and supplies were kept about 6ft away from my vivs and terrariums. Seeing this video has reminded my I need to move my insects away from my vivariums again (they are temporarily on top of them). So A HUGE THANK YOU for making this video you have reminded me I should move them I had forgotten about that horror.
If this happens often maybe try getting butterwort plants. They do act like flypaper.
Now I’m scared. Is it likely to happen?
It is from the crickets !!! Happen to me 3 time last yr. Petco crickets
Me slowly turning to stare at my mealworms box with oats...
I recommend changing their substrate to dry soil.
I'm so sorry you have to deal with this
Omg this just happened to me! It literally broke my brain. I could barely talk or hold a thought. I had to throw out so much stuff….
Diatomaceous earth helped! Vinegar did nothing! Also got a heavy duty dehumidifier and it is working like a charm.
Also they stayed in a radius for me too!
here beforee 100 views :00 love your videos!
Oh my gosh girl!! I have the same dang problem and I have NO idea where these damn bugs came from! I have used white vinager and it seems like it helped a bit but they are all over my mice and my hamster and I have NO idea what to do anymore!! I hope this helped for you and you are able to get rid of them. Please keep us updated bc I may have to buy this stuff!!
Ones I had this problem I just used a vacuum and refused humidity
Also they can be used to make cheese
I have these mites in my crssted gecko tank what shou,d I do with my crestie and how do I get rid of them my mom has been spraying it with neem oil and soapy water and then I watched your video and now we are spraying white vinegar and water of them.
Peppermint oil clove oil will help get rid of grain mites on a cloth . I only have New Caledonian geckos .Also eucalyptus oil not sure if it’s ok for Leopard geckos though . Tried it as had the same problem.
I had this happen to me. They came from my beardies mealworms. I basically took a wet wipe and wiped the mites up (luckily they didn’t get in the tank) and then threw away the container. Then wiped everything nearby down and luckily I haven’t seen any recently.
I have them ALL over my reptile rack since I have fruit fly cultures… How do I remove the mites without killing off my flys because I need them for darts!
I still sont really understand how to get the mites away bc i got them on my aquarium. I anyway wanted no aquarium anymore but how do i get them to be gone?
You mentioning fungus gnats made me google what those are and now I know the flies I have are fungus gnats. They infested my cornsnake tank and I suspect they came from a new plant I introduced into the tank. So annoying!
You always upload while I’m at school 🤔I’m still gonna watch it tho
Auh naughty🙃
Yep, I upload at the same time each week lol
We had this in our garage once from chicken feed, was so gross. If I freeze the substrate I plan on using for mealworms or dubia food, will that kill the eggs? Heat seems like it would spoil food quicker.
This happened to me almost a year ago now, with grain mites. It was a NIGHTMARE! I literally had to throw my entire kitchen table and chairs away, cause I’d wipe it down and within an hour, the table would be covered again. I then cleaned the entire table, top to bottom, thinking that would help. I did this several times. An hour later, the same thing happened. It was then I’d realized they’d set up in every little crevice on the table. 🤦🏻♀️
So we threw the whole thing out. The mites came from crickets I purchased.
I’ve also had a fruit fly infestation. Those aren’t fun either, but I’ll gladly take those over the mites any day!
The Apple Cider Vinegar, Water and Dawn mixture works very well!
Sorry about the mites, but I wanted to know where you got the large rocks in your gecko’s tank?
Yeah- fruit flies have been infesting my place too same as my college. Ifk if its a entiely uk problem?? But uts annoying.
Did you solve the mold mites? I have duiba roaches and they are getting in my bins.
Omg 😱 first I saw mine on TV remote control n I checked again they’re everywhere..pls tell me did you get rid all of them
What do you use for your morio worms? I use oats and so far have had no problems, but if I do I'd like to have a backup plan. Thank you.