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Old 02-22-2017, 06:21 AM   #21
Hamsterita
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Default Re: Bugs in the substrate/wood toys?

Well, I'm in living hell.

The good news is that I'm pretty sure that Blacky is fine. Well, now he is upset but he isn't ill. I checked twice, yesterday night and tomorrow morning and I couldn't find anything in him, but I'm very worrried that he may have eggs on his fur. He didn't like the checks. He had a strange behaviour during the night. He hoarded his food in his potty, but who can blame him.

I checked the tank too and I couldn't find anything on the substrate, but I'm sure that there were all kind of critters that I just wasn't seeing. I found another bug in his potty, and I became terrified. I started to check all the hamster things that I have, and I found another kind on bug on his carrier (well, two of them to be exact, and what seemed to be a dead one) and more on a bag where I was storing the popsicle sticks that I have bought to make him things (another three or four). The funny thing is that they weren't the same species. I don't know about the one that I found in the seesaw and the one that I found on the potty, but the ones in the carrier were definitely different because they were black and longer. And the problem is that all these things were stored in different places, all near the tank, but no in the exact same place, so I started to panick. I told my dad and he told me that we were going to take care of it in the morning. but the last straw was that when I was going to bed I noticed Blacky too nervous, and the reason was that he was chasing a moth... Fu***** unbelievable.

Bottomline: my tank was a nest of all kind of pests and creepy things, and they have spread aroung the furnitures and other places near the tank.

I couldn't sleep. Last time I checked the clock it was 4 am in the morning, and I was awake at 8. I found two more moths flying around.That was it.

I cleaned all the plastic /metallic things that were in contact with Blacky, and I throw away the rest (all the wood things, the sisal string tubes, the chews and the substrate). I had two bags of susbtrate unopened. One of carefresh and another one of hemp. I noticed that some of the bits of hemp that I was using had like black spots, like mold, so I didn't want to risk using the hemp from that store again and even it was unopened I throw the 30 L bag. Maybe now that I know what to look for I found it everywhere, but I think that I found mold in the bendy bridges too. I can post videos and photos of everything later if it's going to be useful for anyone. I baked the carefresh and the sand that I had, so the only good news from this story are that now we know that we can safely bake substrate to sterilize it (I baked it 35 mins at 75 degrees, and It looked super fine to me and not too hot so I raised the temperature to 100 degrees for another 10 mins without any problems).

With everything cleaned and/or sterilized I moved Blacky to the Ovo loft temporarily and I put the cage downstair in our livingroom, and he's going to be there for a while, because my parents and I decided to fumigate my room with insecticide. I know it's not healthy, not even for me, but they were too many bugs in too many diferent places to risk having several plagues.

So now I'm really tired, scared, sick, sad, and I hope that will be enough to solve the problem.

I think that I'm going to go to the vet anyway because maybe he can prescribe something to him to avoid him host the eggs in his fur, but I'm not sure because I don't want to stress him more, and it's obvious that he didn't like the checks, and I suppose that he didn't like the cage change either.

I'm thinking that if he doesn't seem too uncomfortable there I'm going to leave him in the ovo til I have the new tank.

I'm a mess right now. My mom is super sad too, she told me like 5 times that this is the reason why she didn't want to have more pets... pffff

I don't know. I really hope All the measerures will be enough.
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Old 02-22-2017, 06:54 AM   #22
cypher
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Default Re: Bugs in the substrate/wood toys?

Sorry you're having such a hard time of it Hamsterita, it doesn't sound as though these are the mites that would infest Blacky to me, I can't be sure obviously as I don't know exactly what they are but unless he really starts scratching a lot or you see anything on him you probably don't need to treat him, he's bound to be unsettled by the changes & is probably picking up on your stress too so some different behaviour is to be expected & not necessarily directly due to the bug problem.
It does sound as though the website you're using may not be storing things properly & that could be the root of the problem but maybe if you live in a humid environment then using wooden toys or other natural materials in the cage would be better avoided?
You could use ceramic items for some things rather than all plastic which might be better for Blacky.
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Old 02-22-2017, 07:57 AM   #23
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Default Re: Bugs in the substrate/wood toys?

I took a hammy to the vet, Koala, and they did a skin scrape without the fact that there was any fur missing. She was a really good vet and she found a mite under the microscope so that was the beginning of hell over here.

All the other vets in this area won't scrape for mites unless there is fur missing. But I know that is not true, obviously.

Blacky I'm sure has bugs/eggs on him. I would recommend the vet too. See if they can do a skin scrape in more than one spot. or if you want to wait it out and see if he starts scratching like crazy then bring him in. If he isn't scratching that's good sign, or scratching yet anyways.
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Old 02-22-2017, 08:23 AM   #24
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Default Re: Bugs in the substrate/wood toys?

Aww Hamsterita so sorry to hear about your troubles Sounds like you are having a terrible time of it. I remember you saying you had bad storms recently do you think that they may have come in to the house from outdoors to shelter from the weather? I don't know much about bugs so I'm just clutching at straws really. I think Cypher is right about Blacky though, he will be sensing you're stressed out too and I'm sure he'll settle again and if you're not noticing anything different/unusual physically with him then hopefully he is ok. Switching to ceramic and/or plastic things sounds like a good idea too, less chance of anything living on it and easy to keep clean. Wish I could be more help Hamsterita, hope you manage to get to the bottom of it soon, sending you and Blacky hugs xx
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Old 02-22-2017, 10:22 AM   #25
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Default Re: Bugs in the substrate/wood toys?

I'm so sorry. While I'm glad they are not mites I very much sympathize. When we had our mite problem it wasn't truly a nightmare.

Please keep us updated. Try to remember that this too will pass and soon everything will be back to normal. You're doing a wonderful job fixing the issues.
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Old 02-22-2017, 11:18 AM   #26
Hamsterita
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Default Re: Bugs in the substrate/wood toys?

That website is dead to me. I don't know if they are the ones to blame for sure, but I don't believe in coincidences, and I prefer to pay more and be at ease, so even If it's going to be very expensive for me, I'm going to focus my orders to viovet and zooplus.

Where I live it's humid (these last few days between 75 and 93%) but it isn't more humid than the UK, so I shouldn't be having these problems for the weather. And I refuse to believe that it's a cleanness problem, I'm clean, my mom is an obsesive cleaner, my room was clean and I spotted clean his tank all days, and I've never had these kind of problems before, so it definitely was something that entered in my house inside the hamster products.

So no, I don't think the storms were relevant. I think that different products were infected with different things, and it was cold so they stayed dormant, but these last days were really hot (20 degrees outside and my mom left the heat on), and they decided to throw me the bug fest.

Definitely I'm stressed, and It's not hard to sense it at all. Blacky has being such a sweet and beautiful boy as usual. I'm really afraid that all my crazyness is going to make him get wet tail or something. That's why I haven't gone to the vet whit him, but my dad insist, and on the other hand I also want to. Maybe I'll try to contact them and look for some reassurance or advice whitout taking him there, because I'm still worried that I'm not going to be able to contain the bugs, that they can reproduce in the OVO too.

The worst part is that I have my state examns soon and this couldn't have happened in a worst time.

These are the bugs on video.
I would swear that the one in the seesaw was smaller. I don't knot if it was younger or just they are different species

And the other kind.

I think that they lost quality when I uploaded them because on my movil phone I can see them perfectly and on youtube it's all blurry

And a collage of the suspicious objects and one of the bugs
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Old 02-24-2017, 12:38 AM   #27
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Default Re: Bugs in the substrate/wood toys?

Oh Hamsterita, I'm so sorry. Try not to let it stress you too much - although easy to say I know. It gets your imagination going. They are just a few little bugs. They're not Hamster mites. And yes it sounds like they've come in something from the place you bought your things from and hatched out. It is hard when it upsets your hammy as well.

So - losing fur behind the ears - this is normal - I had that with Charlie too and I worried about it. I think it's one of the first places they start to lose fur as they grow up, behind the ears.

You've done a good job of cleaning the tank and sterilising bedding. The tank isn't the problem it was something in it that had bugs and they've just been exploring a bit. I can quite understand you wanting to knock it on the head by fumigating the room (after my moth experience!).

So you're doing all the right things. No harm will come from the few bugs and please don't worry about Blacky having eggs on him. These kind of things are interested in food and bedding, not hamsters. It's probably from the food. The moth eggs can be in anything (even flour we eat) and don't know and hatch out if conditions are right sometimes (warmth I think). And the bugs look like the grain mites. Even though they come from food they can get into bedding and other places. A bit of mould doesn't do much harm either but best to remove the offending item. I've had some bedding in the cage go a bit mouldy before where a water bottle leaked and just removed it and the rest of the cage was fine.

When Charlie's cage was absolutely crawling with moths (urgh!) I popped him right back into his cleaned out cage with new bedding and never had another one in the cage. So don't worry about them being on Blacky.

Apologies for one of my earlier posts about skin scraping at the vets - I think I saw the post earlier and thought it was a different topic about mites - these are bugs not mites. Anyway still wouldn't use anything on Blacky. You will find he is ok and he's in the Ovo unit now so it will give you time to have that reassurance that there is nothing in there.

I think natural wood items can be affected by humidity. When I had to do my cage clean after the moth incident I did decide to throw natural wood items because of the grain - you can't wash them to get any possible eggs out. Although baking them might do it, but I didn't have many (just a bendy bridge really) and decided to get rid and used smooth wood items or ceramic or plastic after that.

It does freak you out and drive you a bit mental and creepy! But try not to worry. You have removed the source of the bugs from feeding and breeding (whatever the source was) by doing the cage clean and even without the fumigating it would naturally subside now.

Blacky will get over it, even if he's a bit upset at the moment. Just tell him it's a bit of a holiday and tell him not to worry. Pretend you're not stressed Call the bugs names and tell them to go to hell! Blacky could pick up on your stress so just tell him it's all fine.

Very bad timing if you have exams coming up, but you are dealing with it.

We are surrounded by bugs and all sorts really (microscopic usually) and they're not all bad - we just don't want too many living with us! We found a huge beetle crawling on the carpet the other day and I freaked out wondering if we were going to be infested with cockroaches but it wasn't a cockroach it was just a beetle. Probably came in from outside.

Doing the cage clean and sterilising the bedding will have 99% knocked it on the head and spraying your room will sort it. The odd lone bug won't do any harm. And you've removed the source of their hiding places.

It sounds like they were only just starting to go out from the tank.

So try and stop looking for them everywhere (easy to say I know). Crack on with dealing with it. And then ignore it

So sorry you are having this. I can send you some Fitch if you like Although it wouldn't arrive quickly.

There is nothing wrong with your tank - you maybe just had one rogue item or some food or bedding that hadn't been stored well.

After my moth issue I did find out that things needed to be frozen for a week and 48 hours wasn't long enough. It was definitely from food in my case. They just then got into the bedding.

Enough creepy crawly talk. These grain mites or mould mites or whatever, won't do any harm they are just a pain and you are dealing with it.

These things can happen even without having a pet! I once had an outbreak of flying ants in a house I lived in. They were nesting in cavity insulation in the walls! And came out through cracks. It drove me mental! I'd come down every morning and the walls and windows were black and crawling with the xxxxers! I just had to open the windows every day and keep hoovering until they were gone. I have asthma so didn't want to use insect spray. They did go. And so will your bugs
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Old 02-24-2017, 02:18 AM   #28
Hamsterita
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Default Re: Bugs in the substrate/wood toys?

Thank you a lot Serendipity, I've been telling that to myself for the last two days but it's hard to convince myself, and it helps to hear it from another person.

So far, so good. No bugs in two days. I hope the insecticide worked. I think that my dad applied too much, the first night after ventilating my room all day it still reeked at insecticide, my parents didn't want me to sleep in my room. Today the smell is almost gone.

I've frozen all the food again except for a little bit for these days and I'm going to leave it in the freezer for another week. And I'm going to stablish a froze/bake protocol for new things nothing will touch my little hammy again withouth being sterilized first.

I'll keep you all posted but I think (and hope) there won't be anything else to tell.
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Old 03-02-2017, 04:14 AM   #29
Hamsterita
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Default Re: Bugs in the substrate/wood toys?

I've found this in the ovo's substrate. WTF is this? There were more, like five or six in the same area, they were all more or less rounded.



Also, I've received my order from zooplus, and the willow tunnel looks like this. Is it ok? Because to me it looks terrible
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Old 03-02-2017, 04:18 AM   #30
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Default Re: Bugs in the substrate/wood toys?

Not sure what the first bug is but the willow tube looks as though it has the web you get with the food moths or something similar on it, I would send that back, maybe email them a photo.
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