The past TWO summers I have had a problem with these little specs of what I call pepper.They DO jump when I try to kill them. And when I am successful at killing them, the color is a reddish brown. For the most part they have been primarily in my kitchen sink, on occasion I have found them in my upstairs jetted tub and yesterday I found them in my downstairs bathroom. My pest Control company said they were spider mites and treated the sinks and tub-however they are back and with a vengeance! I trapped a couple live and some I killed with a piece of clear tape-Pest Control took it to our University entomology department, but they said it was too small to identify. I have tried bleach-ammonia-hot soapy water with lemon-NOTHING works! I have NO live plants in my home. We live on a lake in Utah-just today I was doing some yard work-pulling weeds and there they were! All over our rock beds.. I am frustrated and quite frankly can't understand what they are and what to do.. any help please?

The only way a University Entomologist would say that a sample is too small to identify would be if there were too few specimens to get a clear view of top, bottom, and sides in their microscope.

Pest control technicians have been known to lose portions of a sample, either inadvertently through taking too long to get it to the Entomologist (where the samples start to deteriorate) or negligently letting live specimens escape.

Since you seem to have found a "mother lode," gather a large sample and take it directly to the University. That way the only delays in identification are in the lab.