Feeling defeated by mites.. What do I do?

I've been treating my flock of 5 for almost a month now for mites. Cleaning their bedding every other day, spraying down their coop with dawn dish soap, dusting them and their run.. I dust them, the next day they look good then 2 days later I see mites running around on them again.

I have three silkies and 1 of them is looking horrible.. She seems to be getting them the worse. Has scabs on her face, eggs, and I even see the little critters scampering about. I'm feeling defeated and so so bad for my birds? What can I do? I'm desperate!

Spread DE everywhere everyday for as long as needed.

chickens r life said:

Spread DE everywhere everyday for as long as needed.

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Ok. I've been doing it once a week but didn't want to over do it and have it hurt my birds. I'm dusting them with seven poultry and garden dust every 7 days. Is that enough? Anything else I can do?

Instead of spraying the coop with Dawn try using a good insecticide. I use Insectrin by Prozap, it has residual effect so it really helps knock down the population and it's easy to get the spray deep into all the nooks and crannies where mites hide. Mites can be very hard to get rid of so you do just have to keep treating the coop and the birds until you've broken that hatch cycle. They hide all over the place so a good spray in and around the coop is your best bet as well as continuing to treat the birds.

cafarmgirl said:

Instead of spraying the coop with Dawn try using a good insecticide.  I use Insectrin by Prozap, it has residual effect so it really helps knock down the population and it's easy to get the spray deep into all the nooks and crannies where mites hide.  Mites can be very hard to get rid of so you do just have to keep treating the coop and the birds until you've broken that hatch cycle.  They hide all over the place so a good spray in and around the coop is your best bet as well as continuing to treat the birds.

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Ok I'll try that! Thanks!

Seven poultry is the stuff that can harm them.... DE is natural so I doubt it can harm them. Just try to keep it from floating in the air too much so it doesn't harm their lungs any.

Carbaryl (Sevin) is no longer approved for poultry, but permethrin dust is okay to use and works well. I clean out the coop and use permethrin dust under the new shavings, and then treat the birds too. Wear at least an N95 dust mask when using any product, and when cleaning out the coop!!! DE, poultry dust products, and duff from the coop, are all VERY bad to breathe, so be careful and safe. I think that DE isn't worth using; it's bad to breathe, and not very effective in the face of an infestation. Mary

AshleyBickle said:

I've been treating my flock of 5 for almost a month now for mites. Cleaning their bedding every other day, spraying down their coop with dawn dish soap, dusting them and their run.. I dust them, the next day they look good then 2 days later I see mites running around on them again.

I have three silkies and 1 of them is looking horrible.. She seems to be getting them the worse. Has scabs on her face, eggs, and I even see the little critters scampering about. I'm feeling defeated and so so bad for my birds? What can I do? I'm desperate!

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I understand. Years of the mites. I just wanted to burn down the coop. to get rid of them.
I washed them bathed dusted used all the stuff recommended to no avail.
but I bought

Atroban 11% EC Insecticidal Spray Concentrate Merck

l cut down all of the forsythia bushes next to their coop, so the sparrows would not use their coop area for nesting.
THEN I bought a sparrow live trap and relocated the ones I caught.
THEN moved the entire coop to the other side of the yard.
all of this worked. Those mites killed two of my girls.Sucked the blood right of them. And I was constantly taking scabs off of them and bathing them.