Tiny white bugs in food

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dms316

Member
Joined
Jul 26, 2011
Messages
22
I was feeding my chinchilla and I noticed the little crumbs from his food moving and at first I figured it was from the fan, but I tilted it up and the food was still moving so I watched carefully and I seen little white bugs moving around, there were a lot of them and they are extremely tiny. I got rid of his food and I'm in the process of cleaning everything off really good, I also dumped his dust out, the thing is, it is 2 in the morning and I have no way of getting to the store to buy him more food, would he be fine without it, and is there anything else I should do to make sure the bugs are gone and won't come back? Also, does anyone know what type of bug it might be?
 
I'm not sure what the bugs are, but I would definitely clean the whole cage top to bottom including any fleece you may have. He should be fine on just hay until you get to the store tomorrow.
 
I just spent two hours cleaning the cage, and I did not see any more bugs, I checked his hay, his bedding and his dust, and there was no bugs, I only seen it in his food. I scrubbed everything and gave him fresh dust and he rolled happily in it, so hopefully everything is fine. Thank you Daina91880.
 
What kind of food are you feeding? I had this happen to me once, but it was before I knew what good food was, and it was a bag of Kaytee Fiesta mix. I think the bugs liked the fruit and other goodies in the bag. I don't remember what the bugs were called, but they came from the local pet store and after I called them to tell them they had bugs all the food from that shelf was thrown out. I think they might have been weevils, but not sure that's right.
Just make sure your next batch of food is fresh and good quality.
 
I could possibly ID them, but more than likely I'd need a picture. Even without seeing them though I would put good money on the bugs being some sort of grain pest or pantry pest and most likely would be after any sort of grain, oat, flour, cereal, rice, chinchilla food, bird seed, etc. You best bet is going to be closely examining all your food, everything in a box or bag, open or unopened doesn't matter. Throw out anything that even looks slightly suspicious. Then a crack and crevice treatment in the pantry or other storage area(s) where the bugs were found is going to be necessary. I'd have to know what the bug is for sure in order to recommend a proper pesticide, but if nothing else is readily available, you can try using some Home Defense, just read the label thoroughly. That is Bifenthrin, and Bifenthrin is a broad spectrum pesticide, so it does work on most things, but depending on what the bugs actually are, it may not be the very best choice. But at least that is a starting point of something you can try to do yourself. If you do not want to throw everything away, you can try sticking things in the freezer over night, that may kill the bugs, or if its really hot there you can stick all the infested items into a dark hefty bag and place it out in the sun for 24 hours. The bag should get really hot out in the sun and the heat will kill the bugs. Hope that helps.
 
I'm pretty sure they were mites, I put his food in a big container with a lid, but I think that food was older, because it was at the bottom of the container. I bought some food today and he was jumping all over me. I check the new bag extremely good and I did not see any bugs so I'm thinking/hoping they were there because the food was old.
 
The other day I saw white little worm like bugs surrounding LingLings food that she threw out of her bowl which got soaked up by her water drippings from the water bottle.

It was gross.

I since then moved the water to another level, away from the food completely- I also switched her food to Oxbow (it was Charlie before)
 
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