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Mites fleas? or mites? maybe both!

Kitkat99

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Aug 21, 2016
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so Im in the process of moving house and cleaned my guinea pigs cage a couple days days later than I normally would have. when I was cleaning it I was removing some hay and poo from the heavy areas and noticed jumping black insects, that look like fleas. I cleaned everything and hoovered but still see the odd one jumping about. I checked my guinea pigs over a two are fine but one as some flakey skin and a scab on her back. Two of my pigs are white and I didn't see anything black in their fur but I combed it through with a fine comb and found
white flakey bits that I'm not sure are skin or something else.

They had what I thought was mites previously which I treated with a guinea pig spot on from the pet shop, and it seemed to clear up but I heard that stuff can make the mites become resistant or something? I will be taking them to the vets for proper treatment but with moving and everything I won't be able to afford it until I get paid in a couple weeks. I'm also worried about carrying the fleas to the new house.

Is there anything I can do in the mean time? I was planning on washing all their fleece on a hot wash before moving, maybe even washing it at another family members house to avoid it get contaminated again. Should I bath the pigs? Im not sure if this would help. Is it worth given them the pet shop stuff or is that a bad idea? As I said really do not want the fleas coming with us, especially because after we move we will be getting a cat too so I can just imagine them both reinfecting each other.

Any advice would be appreciated.
 

LittleSqueakers

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Sounds like it's probably fleas, as mites don't jump and fleas are celebrated jumpers. If your pigs aren't showing any symptoms of being very irritated by the fleas yet, you might be able to treat them without going to the vet. You can by a topical pour-on solution of ivermectin for cattle on Amazon for around $20. The bottle will be more than enough to treat all your pigs. I can't find the link right now, but I'll look for it later and post it if nobody else does.

You can just thoroughly wash all their fleece as would normally, or you can add a little non-chlorine bleach to the load if you want to be safe. Fleas don't generally survive for long without a living host, so once all the pigs are treated, the flea population should begin to die off.
 

Soecara

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Ivermectin is Ivermectin, regardless of what it is marketed for. What matters is the concentration when it comes to dosing. If you look at the one marketed for birds it should say something like X% or Xmg per mL, if you can let us know that we can tell you how to dose it. I would expect the one marketed for birds to be one of the weaker concentrations.
 
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