These Are Dust
Mites And
What They Do! Click On One Of The Sqaure Blocks
And Watch The Movie! {Then Wait 15 Seconds!}
| House dustmites are almost transparent and tiny (about 0.3mm long), so you can't see them without a microscope. There could be two million of them living in your mattress! They are not insects but arachnids (they're in the same family as ticks and spiders). |  |
| You find mites in just about every home, living in the dust that builds up in carpets, bedding, fabrics and furniture. Their main food is bits of human skin. Every day each of us sheds about a gram of skin. The average family produces about 1.5kg a year - the equivalent of one and a half bags of sugar. House dustmites dine on your old discarded skin. They also enjoy fungi, bacteria and yeasts that grow on it. | |
| The problem for asthmatics is the droppings that dustmites produce. The droppings are really small, about 10 microns in size. They float in the air whenever the dust is disturbed, so it's easy for you to breathe them in. | |
