ECLARK - mites

[Shelby]

I bought two BP morphs from Ed Clark (a lemon pastel and a cinny pastel) I'd paid them off awhile ago, and had been waiting for proper weather to have them shipped.

I recieved them this morning, and they were packed well enough, the heat pack was warm and all, though both snakes were in the same snake bag. I've recieved shipments with multiple snakes before and they've always been packed separately in the box.

Anyways, I discovered mites on the snakes, especially on the cinny. As we all know, mites are a great way to spread diseases among collections. Luckily I always keep provent-a-mite on hand so I was able to treat the tubs the snakes are in, but even so, the risk of one or more having escaped the provent-a-mite (ie falling off the snake bag etc before I sprayed the PAM) is real, and I sincerely hope they don't spread to the rest of my collection.

Ed claimed he did not know of the mite infestation, which very well may be true, but I believe you should keep close eye on your animals.. mites are not difficult to spot.

So.. those are my experiences.

[frankykeno]

That must be very frustrating April to have to deal with. We've been very blessed thus far to never have a mite in our collection and I'm glad you've immediately dealt with what's happened. That last thing you need is your whole collection getting infested with these awful bugs. Hope they all stay clear and you got all the mites.

I've had multiple snakes come in from Robin and each was packed properly in seperate snake bags within the shipping box.

[SPJ]

2 snakes in the same bag and MITES on morphs!!!!!

[CrazyDog]

I thought i was the only one!

[Freakie_frog]

I thought i was the only one!

Say it aint so? Is this a trend. I've only gotten the one from EC.

[CeraDigital]

That sucks April!


In my experiences with Ed, he is a good guy. My snake's (a Cinny and Yellowbelly) came in, well packed and in excellent health. No mites, no injuries, no scars. The snakes were shipped together, but I was notified of this. Both before and after, Ed was very helpful in answering my questions and everything. Sucks they came in with mites. I don't think Ed knew about the mites. You might want to contact him and talk to him about it.

[rabernet]

April,

I'm very sorry that you had to experience this, you would hope that using PAM in every collection, especially someone selling as many high dollar morphs as Ed does would be common practice. I hope you're quarantining these new ones, and I'd treat all your established animals as well as a precaution.

Joanna,

Thank you for the compliments!

CrazyDog,

Are you saying you also had mites on snakes you purchased from Ed?

Ed,

Have you offered April any compensation for this?

[slartibartfast]

Yeesh! That's pretty serious indeed.

Did you contact him about the problem prior to starting this thread?

I got two girls from him last fall, who are just thriving beautifully and no mites present. Just waiting on good weather to ship my pinstripe, although as pretty as the weather is this week, he might be here soon. :-)

[rabernet]

That sucks April!


In my experiences with Ed, he is a good guy. My snake's (a Cinny and Yellowbelly) came in, well packed and in excellent health. No mites, no injuries, no scars. The snakes were shipped together, but I was notified of this. Both before and after, Ed was very helpful in answering my questions and everything. Sucks they came in with mites. I don't think Ed knew about the mites. You might want to contact him and talk to him about it.

Andrew, just curious, and it may not even be related, but did you get your mites after you got your shipment from Ed?

I've used oth Equate and PAM. I've had incredible results with both. I had a mite infestation a little while ago in my Blood Python rack and one of my Ball Python racks, so I moved these racks to the quarantine room, and used equate instead of PAM. To say the least after one treatment with Equate, I haven't seen mites again

[xdeus]

The snakes were shipped together, but I was notified of this.

Hmm... I'm not sure why Ed ships snakes together. A new snake bag costs less than a dollar. Seems like a cheap price to reduce stress or possible cannibalism, especially for thousand dollar morphs.