Could the mites they come back?

[lauren52]

Hello. The background information: I am located on Long Island in New York and last April/May I had a bird mite infestation. Turns out there were starlings nested under the shingles in the corner of our roof above my room, and seemingly overnight my entire bedroom was covered in mites. I noticed one the day prior, not really thinking anything of it, and then the next morning was a living nightmare. It took three exterminators just to figure out what they were, and finally once they were identified, the nest was found, removed, sprayed, sanitized, patched up, and the window and the corner of my room closest to the nest was sprayed. It took me almost month to get back into my room before I was sure they were all dead (I would pick them up with clear packaging tape, hold up to the light, and would see if their legs moved). I was never told exactly which type of bird mite they were. I never saw any red ones, they all seemed dark brown with a white splotch. I never suffered any noticeable bites or itchy spots, and my dog (a collie who lives in my room with me) also seemed perfectly fine.

I still have a lot of my things tied in plastic bags (pillows and some stuffed animals and other fabric/cotton/stuffed items). I’m wondering if you could tell me if it’s at all possible they could come back? I’m terrified that they laid eggs or something, maybe in my stuffed animals or in my paintbrushes (the brushes have been soaked in steaming hot water) or in a crevice in the molding or something. Is this something I should be bracing myself for, and if so, is there anyway to prevent/prepare? In my research I haven’t been able to find out if they lay eggs away from birds or when they don’t have a reliable food source, and I’ve found contradicting info on whether or not they can survive the winter and how long they can live without a bird food source. I recently realized that I had left a few pieces of rolled tape on the wall from a poster and found a bunch of seemingly dead mites, but other than that I’ve been going through some bags with hard items (meaning not soft/fabric/cotton/stuffed etc) and have found nothing.

The infestation – while apparently physically harmless – caused a great deal of mental and emotional trauma and just the idea of bird mite eggs hatching or stragglers waking up for the spring deeply stresses me. Any help or resources you could point me towards would be immensely appreciated. Thank you for your time!

[CNDNGirl]

Hi there –

I think them coming back is a possibility, so it’s important to be as diligent as possible when going through your stuff. I’ve done a lot of research into academic articles related with the red poultry mite, and it seems as though you don’t have that (maybe the northern fowl mite), but still some of this info may help.

First of all, it’s important to know that once mites have had a blood feed, they can live for up to 9 months on that feed (again, this is for the red mite). From a study:

“As a nest parasite it only comes to the host to feed, but it must do that repeatedly; the two nymphal life-stages both feed, and the adult female has to feed for every batch of eggs.

Chicken mites are well adapted to host absence and can survive long periods of starvation (up to 9 months) if they are protected from desiccation.”

So if there were mites that fed off you or your dog and then just lay dormant, it is possible they could still be alive.

As a precaution, I would wash everything that comes out of those bags. Wash on hot water and put Borax into the washer along with your regular soap. Then do a long dry cycle in case the washing doesn’t kill anything. For things that can’t be washed, bag them and put them in the freezer for a few days just to be sure. And definitely I would keep up and do a deep clean with heavy vacuuming, washing (I use Pinesol or Lysol) of walls and floors, and keeping up with laundry.

I hope some of this helps! Good luck.

– J

• This reply was modified 4 years, 10 months ago by CNDNGirl.

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