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HELP do they have MITES?

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Polypea

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Hi

I haven't been on here for quite sometime after the loss of one of my piggies, Billy, following neutering and I hope you all don't mind me suddenly coming back to ask for some help and advise? ")

I now have 7 pigs, 1 boar & 6 females all of which appear healthy & happy!
Over the last few weeks I have noticed 3 of them have started to pull their fur out on their backs in a kind of V shape, at first I thought it was a hay issue as although they have fresh hay all day everyday, there wasn't much of a variety, anyway I started to give them timothy hay aswell as meadow hay but the pulling of the fur carried on.
They are all scratching but to be honest it didn't seem any worse than the normal scratching and there are definately no sore patches on any of them.

Anyway tonight as I was sitting watching them, as you do, I noticed on the crown of Betty who is black, some tiny/small little things crawling about in her fur.
They are white-ish in colour, elongated bodies, not round.
Definately not jumping fleas that cats & dogs get but to be honest none of my piggs have ever suffered from this before and I can only assume they are mites? :{
Thing is as they all live together they probably all have them, I checked them but because of their colours it was difficult to see, 2 of them definately have them!

What do I do? Could someone please give me some advise on the following:

1) Are they definately mites?
2) How do I treat them, do I need to go to the vets?
3) What else should I be doing? I use vetbed so I will obviously have to either hot wash it or throw it away?
4) Can any of my other pets get them? (dog & cat regularly treated with Frontline)
5) Where do they come from?
6) Do they get on us humans?

Sorry this is so long winded and thanks in advance for any help/advise :)
 
I'll try and answer your questions as best as I can :)

Well, mites are invisible to the naked eye, so if they are visible it could be lice. You should go to the vet to confirm whether they have lice or mites, it's hard to diagnose over the internet. I don't think guinea pig mites get onto people, but I don't know about lice. They could have come from a new piggy.

Hope this helps!
 
Polypea said:
Hi

I haven't been on here for quite sometime after the loss of one of my piggies, Billy, following neutering and I hope you all don't mind me suddenly coming back to ask for some help and advise? ")

I now have 7 pigs, 1 boar & 6 females all of which appear healthy & happy!
Over the last few weeks I have noticed 3 of them have started to pull their fur out on their backs in a kind of V shape, at first I thought it was a hay issue as although they have fresh hay all day everyday, there wasn't much of a variety, anyway I started to give them timothy hay aswell as meadow hay but the pulling of the fur carried on.
They are all scratching but to be honest it didn't seem any worse than the normal scratching and there are definately no sore patches on any of them.

Anyway tonight as I was sitting watching them, as you do, I noticed on the crown of Betty who is black, some tiny/small little things crawling about in her fur.
They are white-ish in colour, elongated bodies, not round.
Definately not jumping fleas that cats & dogs get but to be honest none of my piggs have ever suffered from this before and I can only assume they are mites? :{
Thing is as they all live together they probably all have them, I checked them but because of their colours it was difficult to see, 2 of them definately have them!

What do I do? Could someone please give me some advise on the following:

1) Are they definately mites?
2) How do I treat them, do I need to go to the vets?
3) What else should I be doing? I use vetbed so I will obviously have to either hot wash it or throw it away?
4) Can any of my other pets get them? (dog & cat regularly treated with Frontline)
5) Where do they come from?
6) Do they get on us humans?

Sorry this is so long winded and thanks in advance for any help/advise :)
Click to expand...

To answer your questions
They aren't mites, they're lice if you can see them and are an off white colour.Some people use ivomec to treat lice, however, I always use something else for lice, but it's not licenced for use on pigs, so your vet may decide on another treatment. It needs to contain imidacloprid. If you're not used to doing anything like this you will need to get your vet to do it. Dogs and cats can get lice. I know that frontline plus kills them on the dogs and cats. I'd do them now just incase. The lice look for a host to live on and chew and suck the fluids. Did you recently get another pet? They're not like headlice, there are many types of lice and these aren't the ones that live on humans.
 
Hi hunni,
Its awful when you see these on piggies. All mine had them last summer and it was so hard to get rid of them, I thought i would catch them, i thought the house would be infested etc.

It sounds like lice to me. Mites tend to be too tiny to see and some mites live under the skin. The two types of lice mine had were running lice, little creamy-orangey coloured tiny bugs, and then static lice that tend to live on the rump and live in the middle of the hair shaft (called static as they move so slowly) both are normally from the hay.

I would get some gorgeous guineas lice n easy and follow the instructions on the bottle and then treat with ivemection which you can get from your vet. then you are treating them for both lice and mites.

Its a nightmare and i fully sympathise with you. hugs. dont panic I dont think they can live on us. This time of year seems notorious for lice in the hay!
Good luck :) x
 
O my....... I think this could be it! :(

I have noticed recently that after I have been cleaning them out that my arms really itch, I usually have a vest top on because of the heat, these things are obviously causing me irritation too! :(

Right off to vet we go then, wish it wasn't bank holiday, they won't be open until Tuesday! :(

Is there anything I can do in the meantime, if I give them a thorough clean and then put them back in without treating the mites/lice thats going to defeat the object, should I just wait until Tuesday before I do anything? :{
 
Hi

I did get a new piggie but this was a couple of months ago, although it could be it, I did quarantine her but I suppose I could of missed them, never seen them before, I was quite shocked when I noticed them today, my poor piggies!

Also I have recently changed the brand of meadow hay I buy, I wanted a larger bag as I was going on holiday but the brand I usually buy didn't come in a bigger size so I bought a different brand, could they have come from this maybe?

The only pet shop open tomorrow/today is going to be pets@home, do you know if they sell anything I can use, shampoo etc? :{

Thanks for all your help/advise :)
 
Dont worry to much it can just be from the hay.
Also lice dont annoy them as much as mites which can cause them pain when they burrow under the skin. If its just lice then they are probably just itchy and barbering themselves. Some vets will only give you ivemection and I was told that ivemection only kills mites and not lice so I would treat the lice seperatly probably with a good quality lice product. I have heard xenex treats Lice. search for lice on the forum and have a look at what other people have had success with :) x
 
for the time being you can get lice powder to treat them with - write down the active ingredient of imidacloprid that all about the animals stated, although I have treated lice on various animals with ivormectin very successfully so if you can find something with this pesticide in then it will help. If you can find the active ingredient recommended then treating them all with this would be a good idea, and then take them to the vets to confirm the lice are being treated - might seem a waste of time but I would be happier to have a prescribed product than an over the counter one, the over the counter would make do as a start though.

You must dose the other animals and they will migrate to your clothes if the infestation is sufficiant so I would wear rough clothes to do the piggies and then remove the clothes right away and wash them. Check your arms and exsposed skin too - I treated some calves for lice many years ago and had to do just that.

Lice can also live in hay and straw (that was how the calves got it - off the hay they were eating). If you can I would buy different hay and remove the old stuff. You have said you hot wash the vet bed, I would overkill and sprinkle lice powder on but shake it off before you put it back in with the piggies (I would leave the powder on for a short while).

When you go to the vet tell them what you have used to treat the lice as you may have to wait a day or so to treat them again with what the vet gives you.
 
Last edited:
Hello all,

Just an update on my piggies. Seen the vet today who had not seen these creepy crawlies before but after some deliberation believes they are running lice, which I think is true after doing my own research over the last few days!

Anyway I have been given some xeno 200 spray, I am going to treat them all tomorrow, along with another complete clean out, I did one last night as I was paranoid about the lice ") and hopefully this will be the end of the problem!

I will not be using that brand of meadow hay again! :(

Many thanks for all your help & advise :)
 
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