Mite Control Checklist - Top 20 Things You Must Do

Start with Dr. Ben's Evictor - You'll need one gallon per 1,000 square feet.

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  • Some pesticides are merely contact killers. They don't keep protecting sprayed areas when dry. Dr. Ben's Evictor kills mites on contact AND leaves behind a fresh cedar scent that repels bugs. Residual scents help to discourage traffic and nesting in sprayed spaces!​
  • Dr. Ben's Evictor is  100% organic. You can use it to spray skin, hair, dogs, couches, beds, carpets and more.

1. Clear junk. Here's a list of things that mite warriors should discard or put in storage.

  • Throw Rugs (Rugs make it difficult to spray, vacuum and perform daily maintenance rituals connected to mite eradication.)
  • Throw Pillows (Mites can burrow deep into fabric items. It's impossible to kill them without soaking the item in pesticides.)
  • Cardboard Boxes (Mites can EASILY get in and out of cardboard boxes. Store all of your excess items in air tight plastic bins.)
  • Live Plants (Depending on what type of micro tiny invader is bothering you, it may like to eat decaying leaves or breed in the soil.)
  • Old Clothes! (Unless you plan on soaking them in PCO and storing them in PLASTIC air tight containers, get them out of your life. 
  • Wicker Laundry Baskets. (Mites can easily move in and out of the spaces. Store dirty and clean laundry in air tight plastic bins.) 
  • Old Toys. (Since toys should be sterilized on a regular basis, now is a good time to get old or unwanted items out of the mix.) 
  • Pictures. Did you know that mites can hide behind wall hangings and escape the effects of fogging? Put your favorite pieces in storage until you're absolutely certain that the mites in your home are gone. If that means storing your favorite paintings for a year or more, so be it.  ​

2. Vacuum thoroughly, spray carpets and clean hard floors with Dr. Ben's Evictor. 

Vacuuming will remove stray bugs on the surface and loosen sticky eggs hidden within carpet fibers. To clean wood or vinyl floors, saturate a dry Swiffer pad with the Evictor. You may also use a clean sponge mop or rag to spread the treatment over the floor.  

3. Spray both sides of your mattress and box springs. Spray all parts of the frame and headboard. 

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Reminder: Your headboard should sit at least six inches from the wall. It should not touch nightstands. 

4. Spray under beds and between furniture with Dr. Ben's Evictor. Allow to dry.

If your bed is too heavy to move alone, invest in a $25 pump sprayer with an extra long applicator. The picture at left links to a sprayer on amazon. One look at the video, and you'll see why it's an indispensable item that should be included in your arsenal of tools for battling chronic mite infestations.  We can't always move furniture to refresh treatments on a daily basis. Don't allow micro tiny critters to breed and flourish in places you can't reach, especially in the bedroom. Get control of the situation now. 

5. Dust under beds and furniture with diatomaceous earth. Here's why: 

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It's difficult to refresh spray treatments under beds and furniture on weekly basis. If you apply diatomaceous earth to hard-to-reach areas, it will keep protecting the area for years to come. Use DE under beds, dressers, couches and other spaces that are hard to reach. The brand pictured at left comes with a handy puffer that will allow you to blow the powder into tight spaces, such as gaps between appliances. Important: Do not spread large amounts of diatomaceous earth over open floors and high traffic areas, as this substance can be like fiberglass when it becomes airborne. It's best to keep the dust contained under beds, couches and furniture. Diatomaceous earth is considered to be quite safe when used judiciously. In other words, don't get carried away. A light dusting is all you need. 

Important! Invest in an $8 puffer to help distribute DE into tight spaces. 

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6. Enclose your mattress in a PROPER waterproof encasement labeled for dust mites.​

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Mites don't just linger on the surface of your bed. They can hide deep within the mattress where spray pesticides can't reach them.  Critters like bird and rodent mites can keep emerging from hidden areas to attack. Encasing your mattress will ensure that hidden mites can't come back to harm you. The picture at left links to one of my favorite encasement brands, but any waterproof encasement certified for bedbug and dust mite protection should do. If your current encasement doesn't feel like it's containing the problem well enough, DOUBLE ENCASE your mattress. 
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Price: $18.99
  • PVC/vinyl free waterproof TPU backing on all sides resist any leakage into the mattress
  • Smooth fabric surface doesn't feel like plastic against the skin. 
  • Promoted for bedbug and dust mite protection

7. Protect bed legs with a bedbug interceptor.
Bedbug interceptors are designed to catch bedbugs on their journey from the floor to the host. Such devices can also be used to catch crawling mites. Fill the outer chamber with diatomaceous earth. Note: Interceptors will only be effective against crawling organisms such as bird and rodent mites. Springtails are jumpers. They can catapult right past the interceptor and make direct contact with your bed frame. 

8. Move beds at least six inches from the walls, nightstands and dressers.

This will ensure that mites crawling up the wall can't easily transfer to your bed. Your bed should not touch nightstands, storage chests or bedside tables.

9. Get rid of puffy blankets and double layer comforters​! Go for synthetic blankets.

Don't use any type of blanket that features two layers of fabric stuffed with cotton, down or synthetic materials. Mites can infest between those layers and survive a trip through the washing machine.  To kill mites embedded between the layers of thick blankets, soak comforters in Borax overnight. If Borax doesn't do the trick on its own, add two cap fulls of our PCO Concentrate or Vet's Choice Concentrate. Store comforters in air tight plastic containers, and don't return them to the bed until you're 100% sure that your home is no longer infested. It's wise to choose SINGLE LAYER blankets made of synthetic materials such as rayon or polyester. Most plush blankets are made of synthetic materials. Read tags to be sure you're not purchasing organic materials like wool or cotton. ​​
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10. Spray couches and easy chairs with Dr. Ben's Evictor. 

Spray every inch, including sides, back, seats and bottom. For leather or vinyl couches, you may saturate a rag with Dr. Ben's Evictor and wipe the surface clean. If you have a fog machine, it's a good idea to flip the couch upside down and fog into the cavity. Most couches have a thin layer of fabric

​11. Enclose couches and recliners in furniture bags

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Parasites, including mites and bedbugs, will often congregate deep inside the couch crevices where wallets and keys get lost. That means many will go untouched when you spray the surface of your furniture with pesticides. In addition to spraying the surface, flip your couch upside down, tear off the protective covering and fog into the cavity of the couch. After fogging, Insert your couch into a giant furniture storage bag and keep the bag sealed. The length of time you'll need to keep it in the bag will depend on the type of mite you have, as some types of mites can live for extended periods without a blood meal. ​

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12. Spray inside cabinets and drawers, especially under sinks.

Yes, it's important to remove dishes, utensils and clothes from cabinet drawers before spraying. Yes, you should spray pantry cabinets, even if you're not dealing with notorious pantry dwellers like grain mites. If your infestation is connected to springtails, this is a beautiful place to set glue traps baited with mold. Visit our trapping page for further details. 

13. Make poison bait to put under sinks​, especially if you're dealing with springtails. 

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Directions to Make Bait:  Combine 1/4 tablespoon of boric acid powder with 1 tablespoon of white flour, 1 tablespoon of sugar and a pinch of yeast. Add just enough water to turn the mixture into dough. Pinch off little pieces of dough and place the sticky balls near the middle of a glue board made for spiders. Study your glue boards with a magnifying glass each day. If springtails actually eat the bait/attractant, they'll die. However, the glue board should prevent them from getting to the bait unless they jump straight onto it. Note that boric acid and Borax aren't the same product. It's important to use boric acid when mixing bait. Borax is the basic mineral mined from the ground. A refining process turns it into boric acid. Boric acid is more powder like and more "absorbable" through digestion. Be very careful if you have pets or small children who might eat the bait by accident. Open baiting techniques aren't advised for homes with pets and toddlers. ​

14. Soak infested laundry in a proper organic pesticide

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For more than 20 years, pet owners and veterinarians have trusted this product to wash and soak animals afflicted with mites. The formula can also be added to laundry water to help kill mites in the wash. Detergents and hot water alone don't always kill parasites in the laundry. When scabies outbreaks occur in nursing homes and other institutions where bedridden patients have no skin-to-skin contact, the laundry is usually blamed for transmission. Over a twelve year period, I have received thousands of phone calls from frustrated callers who claim that they can feel things pricks and movement coming from parasites like bird mites or springtails in laundered clothing that comes straight out of the dryer. As a general rule, infested laundry should be soaked for an hour in Boax before washing. A cap full of Vet's Choice Concentrate can be added along with the Borax. When soaking thick items such as blankets and sweaters, add two caps of Vet's Choice Concentrate. ​

15. Store laundry in proper air tight containers with sachet bags. No wicker hampers! 

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​The seal on this storage tub is weatherproof. Mites will have trouble escaping and re-infesting the environment. If you're currently using wicker laundry baskets, enclose them in sealed garbage bags and get them out to the curb IMMEDIATELY. Mites love to hide in wicker, and some species can even feed upon it.

16. Add pest controlling Sachet bags filled with cedar granules to your laundry bins.

Our cedar granules can be used in so many ways!

  • Make pest controlling sachets and put into laundry bins.  Just fill organza bags (pictured below) with the granules. Toss the sachet bags into plastic bins full of dirty laundry and keep the lid closed over the bins. 
  • Toss sachets into drawers and cabinets
  • Fill trays or bowls with granules and place the bowls into cabinets, especially cabinets under sinks. 
  • If your mite infestation began outside and spread indoors, you can surround the perimeter of your home with the granules to prevent further infestation. Granules have longer residual effects than liquids. Each time it rains, a fresh shot of pest controlling fluids will drip into the soil. Get up to two months of residual effects! ​
  • Spread granules around your yard to control fleas, ticks and mites.
  • Spread granules throughout your vegetable garden to control the pests that eat your produce. 

17. Do you need to fog the home? 

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Fogging is an aggressive agenda for serious or chronic mite infestations. The mist settles on walls, ceilings and other surfaces that traditional spray programs don’t reach. To determine if fogging is necessary, consult the following list. ​
  • Dust Mites: A fog machine is not necessary, as these mites are connected to carpets, couches and bedding. Simply spray the affected areas such as beds, couches and carpets. Dust mites do not bite! They feed upon pet dander and skin flakes that humans naturally shed. 
  • Scabies Mites: A fog machine is not necessary, as the human scabies mite doesn't travel far from the human host. Frequent spray treatment of skin, bedding and surfaces will be required. Doctor's visits will be required to monitor skin. 
  • Bird Mites: Fogging is considered very helpful for this type of infestation, as bird mites tend to spread all over the house. In addition to congregating inside couches or air ducts, they may be found climbing up walls or dispersing across ceilings. For this reason, a good fog machine may be necessary to help pest control fluids settle upon walls, coat ceilings and penetrate unseen crevices. Most bird mite clients come to me after hiring pest control operators and failing with typical spray protocols. 
  • Rodent Mites: Fogging is considered very helpful for this type of infestation because rodent mites tend to hide behind walls and emerge in large numbers when rodents die from various poisons that were used to eradicate them. Most clients come to me after hiring pest control operators and failing with typical spray protocols.
  •  ​Cheyletiella Mites: Fogging is useful for this type of infestation. Skin treatment will also be necessary, as the cheyletiella mite can burrow down into the superficial keratin layer of skin. Doctor's visits will be required to monitor skin. 
  • ​​Springtails: Fogging is considered very helpful for this type of infestation. Springtail infestations are among the most chronic and difficult to treat because these mites are often connected to mold issues behind walls. Outdoor treatment is often necessary because many clients report that their springtail problems began after dumping new landscaping materials or dealing with mold and moisture issues under the foundation. Springtails often enter homes through cracks and crevices around windows and foundations, but they may also be carried into the home via pet paws and human shoes. ​

Fog Machine Instructions

Wear a mask and goggles when using ANY type of fogging solution, including our organic product. Before fogging, spray carpets, couches and beds directly with Dr. Ben's Evictor. Clean floors with the product and spray inside drawers and cabinets. Turn off pilot lights connected to stoves and furnaces before fogging. Disable smoke detectors, as the fog may set them off. Cover television screens with a sheet or drop cloth. Remove all pets and humans from the house before fogging. Walk around with the machine and take the machine from room to room to be sure each room is treated thoroughly. Point the nozzle of the machine into cabinets and under beds.  Air out the house for 4 to 5 hours before returning humans and pets and before turning pilot lights back on. (Air out overnight before returning pet birds.) Open windows and operate fans in each room to air out the house thoroughly.  

18. Consider hiring a company to clean your air ducts!

With a heavy heart, I must deliver some horrifying news. Air ducts are a primary reason why homes remain chronically infested with mites, despite frequent cleaning and aggressive spraying. If you haven’t seen the heartbreaking stories on bird mites dot org, I’ll fill you in. Lung infestation is a very real possibility connected to bird mite, rodent mite and springtail infestations.  The average cost to hire a cleaning company runs between $350 and $400.  UV air purifiers are another wise investment. Such devices use UV lights to kill micro tiny organisms before blowing treated air back into the environment. Expect to pay $60 to $300 for the lights and $100 to $300 for professional installation. Don't delay your research into this topic. It's not uncommon for air ducts to be loaded with more than 30 years worth of dust, cobwebs and harmful debris. Worse yet, micro tiny critters like bird and rodent mites get sucked into ventilation systems, where they can be blown back out into the environment. In fact, mites can be concentrated in dust balls clinging to air vents, ceiling fans and portable cooling fans. Mite afflicted homes are often reported to have debris problems, including excessive dust, grains and specks resembling salt or pepper. ​

19. Perform this test to see if your ventilation system is infested with mites

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Glue Board Test: Use a simple paper towel rack to hold glue boards in a vertical position. (Shown below.) This improvised stand will make it much easier to place glue boards near heater vents that are close to the floor. Study your traps with a magnifying glass every 24 hours. Contact Paper Test:  Lay a large piece of contact paper over your kitchen table, sticky side up. Observe the paper for a few weeks. The contact paper will begin to collect random specks of lint and dust, but that doesn't mean much. Use a magnifying glass to study the paper. Do the tiniest specks have a shape? Bird and rodent mites look like tiny spiders. Springtails look like segmented insects with antenaee. ​

20. Get a microscope with a built-in camera and learn to identify common parasites

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It helps to know what your'e looking for. Microscopes aren't terribly expensive. Some are designed for students and others are designed for everyday science fans. A decent one will cost you around $50. A unit with a pivoting head will make it easier to study your skin. Under a microscope, bird and rodent mites look like tiny spiders. Springtails look like segmented organisms with antennae. You won't always see the tail, as they keep it tucked under the abdomen. To help identify the critters that are attacking you, consult websites such as bugguide.net and identify.us.com. An adult bird mite is about the size of the period at the end of this sentence. Babies can be smaller, making them difficult to see with the naked eye. 
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Bird Mite. Photo Source: https://identify.us.com
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Source: https://bugguide.net/node/view/1575039

SOME MORE HELPFUL THINGS YOU CAN DO!

21. Try a stand alone UV air purifier 

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Aside from a good air duct cleaning, a single room air purification system is a wise investment. The perfect air purification system should have two features. It should remove particles down to .03 microns, and it should have a HEPA filter to prevent particles from blowing back out into the environment. ​The filter pictured below has a third feature of great interest to mite infested homeowners. The UV-C light technology works to reduce airborne organisms, including dust mites, bacteria, viruses, germs and mold spores. ​

22. Look into total home air purifiers that use UV light to kill bacteria, viruses and dust mites

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If you're handy around the house, you can outfit your furnace with a total home UV air purifier. If not, expect to pay $60 to $300 for the lights and $100 to $300 for professional installation.  The effectiveness of a UV air purifier is based upon on the wattage and length of the UV bulbs. The higher the wattage, the more effective the unit will be. Discuss these issues with your installation expert before choosing an appropriate models. I've included links to the most popular models on Amazon. 

23. Get a dehumidifier

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Like all creatures, mites need moisture to thrive, and they extract it from the air. In the wild, mite populations can decrease exponentially under dry conditions. For this reason, it's a standard recommendation for mite victims to purchase dehumidifiers. In an average sized home, two inexpensive dehumidifiers placed at opposite ends of the structure will do the work of one giant deluxe model. ​

24. Get control of your skin!

Infestations below the surface of skin are most commonly connected to scabies or cheyletiella mites. However, plenty of my callers have found bird and rodent mites in their skin, and many have gone out of their way to send samples to laboratories for a formal identification. If your problems have escalated to this degree, you probably already know that mites coming out of your skin can keep re-infesting your bed and environment. Ask your doctor for a prescription of ivermectin or permethrin. If standard protocols don't work, consult our guide to mixing your own skin treatments. (Link below.) Essential oils are no joke. In an article released by the National Library of Medicine, essential oils are characterized as effective alternatives for chronic scabies mite cases where permethrin and lindane fail. (View Source.) 

More Articles Connected to Mite Eradication:

Complete List of Articles on this Site

​Home Treatment Checklist - 20 Things You Must Do if You Have Mites
What's Biting Me? Top Ten Mites that Can Irritate Humans - How to Identify Your Mite - Get a Formal Diagnosis
10 Ways to Get Mites Out of Skin - DIY Skin Recipes and Bathtime Rituals
Common Co-Infections Linked to Parasite Infestation and What to Do About Them 
​How to Talk to Your Doctor About Mites
​How to Collect Mite Samples for Identification
​Ten Ways to Deal with the Psychological Stress of a Mite Infestation
How to Get Mites Out of Ears, Eyes, Noses and Genitals 
Prescriptions for Treating Mites in the Urinary Tract
Top 12 Oral Supplements Commonly Used to Battle Parasites
​20 Ways to Trap Mites -Glue Boards Aren't Enough
How to Get Mites Out of Cars
How to Get Mites Out of Couch Crevices
How to Get Mites Out of Carpeting
How to Get Springtails and Mold Mites Out of Dishwashers
​Ten Rules to Avoid Transferring Mites when You Move to a New Home
The Importance of Choosing Clothing and Bedding Made of Synthetic Materials
​The Advantages of Treating with UV Light
How to Treat and Store Mite Infested Documents​
​How to Treat Infested Cell Phones and Computers
10 Organic Ways to Kill Lawn and Garden Pests