Dottie & Mabel have mites - grrr!

[Guinea pigs <3]

I always check through their fur thoroughly and I'd noticed recently that they both seemed to have dandruff, which they never had before. They've never liked me parting their hair so it is difficult to establish if they are itchy or not. Anyhow, they've been to the vets (just in case) and it seems they have mites! GRRRR! Through further investigation Dottie actually has a little bald patch on her back :0 so they are now having 6 drops of xeno every two weeks (over 6 weeks) lets hope it kills the !

Now, do mites live in vet bed? I always give it all a good clean out every week (vet bed more often) but do I need to do anything differently? It seems like it never stops!

 

[sharonS]

Mites can be little to treat, has your vet suggested the drops? Mine at the moment are on a course of ivermectin injections, appparently this is supposed to be the best course of action, will kill all mites ear,burrowing, and fur mites too, which the xeno may not. I think that the mites will prefer to live on the host, so I don't think they would choose to live on the vetbed, but practice goodhouse keeping and wash maybe at a higher temp than you would normally, and disinfect the cage too, I don't think you can do much more. If it was fungal, you may have had to replace the vetbed as the spores can live on surfaces.

 

[Guinea pigs <3]

Mites can be little to treat, has your vet suggested the drops? Mine at the moment are on a course of ivermectin injections, appparently this is supposed to be the best course of action, will kill all mites ear,burrowing, and fur mites too, which the xeno may not. I think that the mites will prefer to live on the host, so I don't think they would choose to live on the vetbed, but practice goodhouse keeping and wash maybe at a higher temp than you would normally, and disinfect the cage too, I don't think you can do much more. If it was fungal, you may have had to replace the vetbed as the spores can live on surfaces.

Many thanks for your response. It's always good to get advice from people with experience! They have the drops now so i'm going to give this a go and see how we go from there...if not i will go back and ask for the injection or a skin scraping to properly determine what it is. Last time Dottie had an injection of Baytril she screamed, it was HORRID but apparently normal for piggies! I don't think it's fungal as there are no clumps of fur coming out with any dead skin attached but we will see! Hopefully i've caught it early (the bald patch is only a few millimeters wide) Will wash vet bed at 60 degrees on the next wash. Thank you!