> Stamets claims (and it's true) that many 
> types of mycelia produce oxalate crystals. 
> Did it have to do with that?

I will quote the paper that led me down the rabbit hole, but in brief, this was said to be an "organic" attack on the mite, not a chemical or mechanical one.

"Entomopathogenic fungi usually infect their hosts through specialized spores, such as conidia, that attach to and germinate on the integument, and then form an appressorium, which penetrates the cuticle. The penetrating fungus multiplies within
the hemocoel and soft tissues of the host, and death occurs usually within 3–10 days after infection by water loss, nutrient deprivation, gross mechanical damage, and the action of toxins (Roy et al. 2006)."

But we have a specific time-honored term for a scenario where nothing works after one guy leaves the lab... "N-Rays"!
So, if the bacteria failed to kill mites, then the description of the mechanism by which the mite were supposed to be killed would also be, umm... doubtful.  

No one showed me "twenty seven eight-by-ten color glossy photographs with circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each one explaining what each one was" of dead mites killed by Metarhizium anisopliae, so I never saw me no "Appressorium", which still sounds to me like a double-glazed porch at the family ancestral estate where cider is squeezed from apples, located near the Ornagrie, the Conservatory, and the Pergola.

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