Dealing with bird mites; my home, my hens, my itchyness!

[WhipOrganics]

Tag23- we have over 100 chickens at the moment and since our incident 2 years ago we have not had any on us or in the home. Of course we shower with sulphur soap after each feeding/chore. All those treatments should be great at keeping them in check. Remember that mites are part of nature, they digest waste and without we would have other diseases and problems. Don't over do it in your coop. A modest amount in a dusting bin is what we keep filled at all times and a lite application throughout the coop (mainly clean wood ash). DE is an added bonus and neem oil might also help, but we don't use it. Again if you interact with your chickens like they are pets, the mites will transfer to you. Same goes for fleas on dogs and cats. Since we want organic chickens for eggs and meat we don't treat them with ivermectin or other pesticides. One last comment, if you see a chicken who is loosing feathers and has the nits, it means they need an ash bath and they are not dusting themselves. We do that a lot where the chickens need a direct application to help them combat the pest. Go for it, but maintain the shower protocol and bag your clothes, rubber boots every time, all should be fine. One last comment, Australian mites appear to be much more aggressive so depending on your area take care. I read about the gal in this post with what sounds like a a classic serious mite infection. Get medical attention and discuss ivermectin to rid them from you. It is really horrible when humans become the host for these parasites. Good luck.

 

[WhipOrganics]

Mmmm - you can treat your hens with an ash bath. Ash contains sulphur and hence it works well to knock down the mites. It's not a cure though and you should bath every hen repeatedly once per week for the next month to help them get it under control. Also make sure they have a dust bin. As for you, sounds like you might have scabies, the human form of mites. Get medical attention to rid yourself of these highly contagious and horrible parasites. Ivermectin will likely be the cure and your doctor can prescribe it. Discuss as he can easily diagnosis the tracks as scabies and has a multitude of options to treat it. God speed.

 

[MMMM]

best to paint with semigloss the entire wood coop...and fill in all cracks with chalk first...use linoleum on floors...so can clean. Don't use tree branches..where mites can hide. use smooth 2x4's or wood poles. Read more and see what prevention people did. Don't use hay or the like as mites like it. Use pine shavings..and change often. Paint your wood laying boxes and chalk cracks before painting...and clean out often. or use plastic laying boxes of some kind.

Wood ash in the coop after you rake it weekly at the min. Put wood ash where the hens dust themselves. Use sulfur soap on your self when done doing chickens duties...and through all clothes in hot water wash first..then shower and scrub self.



Use hardware cloth wire...not chicken wire for coop. Feed organic feed only...no GMO. You don't want to eat that stuff. Poison.

Keep coop clean...dont bring in mites into your home on you and your clothes

good luck.

 

[TaG23]

Tag23- we have over 100 chickens at the moment and since our incident 2 years ago we have not had any on us or in the home. Of course we shower with sulphur soap after each feeding/chore. All those treatments should be great at keeping them in check. Remember that mites are part of nature, they digest waste and without we would have other diseases and problems. Don't over do it in your coop. A modest amount in a dusting bin is what we keep filled at all times and a lite application throughout the coop (mainly clean wood ash). DE is an added bonus and neem oil might also help, but we don't use it. Again if you interact with your chickens like they are pets, the mites will transfer to you. Same goes for fleas on dogs and cats. Since we want organic chickens for eggs and meat we don't treat them with ivermectin or other pesticides. One last comment, if you see a chicken who is loosing feathers and has the nits, it means they need an ash bath and they are not dusting themselves. We do that a lot where the chickens need a direct application to help them combat the pest. Go for it, but maintain the shower protocol and bag your clothes, rubber boots every time, all should be fine. One last comment, Australian mites appear to be much more aggressive so depending on your area take care. I read about the gal in this post with what sounds like a a classic serious mite infection. Get medical attention and discuss ivermectin to rid them from you. It is really horrible when humans become the host for these parasites. Good luck.

Thank you for the advice. I will mix wood ash into their dust bath bin...or should this be straight wood ash? I am worried about my long-haired daughters as they are looking forward to the chickens as pets and may not be as vigilant as bagging their clothes and showering after each contact. They were miserable with the lice so hopefully they will listen, especially after I read some of these posts to them.

 

[TaG23]

best to paint with semigloss the entire wood coop...and fill in all cracks with chalk first...use linoleum on floors...so can clean. Don't use tree branches..where mites can hide. use smooth 2x4's or wood poles. Read more and see what prevention people did. Don't use hay or the like as mites like it. Use pine shavings..and change often. Paint your wood laying boxes and chalk cracks before painting...and clean out often. or use plastic laying boxes of some kind.

Wood ash in the coop after you rake it weekly at the min. Put wood ash where the hens dust themselves. Use sulfur soap on your self when done doing chickens duties...and through all clothes in hot water wash first..then shower and scrub self.



Use hardware cloth wire...not chicken wire for coop. Feed organic feed only...no GMO. You don't want to eat that stuff. Poison.

Keep coop clean...dont bring in mites into your home on you and your clothes

good luck. 

MMMM: All good advice, especially caulking the corners and seams. Neither my husband or I thought of that. We organic garden using heirloom seeds/plants so would only feed the chickens with organic mix. I will get more tea tree shampoo but what is sulphur soap? I don't think I have seen it in the US. Would pine tar soap work?

 

[WhipOrganics]

MMMM: All good advice, especially caulking the corners and seams. Neither my husband or I thought of that. We organic garden using heirloom seeds/plants so would only feed the chickens with organic mix. I will get more tea tree shampoo but what is sulphur soap? I don't think I have seen it in the US. Would pine tar soap work?

See my post in this thread with a link to sulphur soap.

 

[WhipOrganics]

Thank you for the advice. I will mix wood ash into their dust bath bin...or should this be straight wood ash? I am worried about my long-haired daughters as they are looking forward to the chickens as pets and may not be as vigilant as bagging their clothes and showering after each contact. They were miserable with the lice so hopefully they will listen, especially after I read some of these posts to them.

Don't take this lightly. If your kids won't adhere to your protocol than keep them out. This unfortunately can be a horrible condition if contracted. Our kids help with chores and they wash up just like us, but they are younger. Good luck

 

[MMMM]

Sulphur kills mites. Wood ash has sulphur which is why it works against mites. only use ash from clean non chemical woods.

Sulphur Also kills scabies....which is a mite. I bought two bars with 10% Sulphur and 3% Salicylic Acid. After looking at all the ingredients of many types....and read posts from others..I decided on this one. There's another without Salicylic acid...which is also 10% sulphur. I figured hit em with both. My elderly mom gets a fungal on her skin and so I will give one bar to her since Salicylic acid kills fungus.

this one is just sulphur

http://www.amazon.com/Pack-Premium-...194_img_2?ie=UTF8&refRID=0GN9PJCJSWTYAY2QVH2J

this ones has both
http://www.amazon.com/Pack-Premium-...WSTZ3+L&dpSrc=sims&preST=_AC_UL160_SR160,160_

 

[TaG23]

Don't take this lightly. If your kids won't adhere to your protocol than keep them out. This unfortunately can be a horrible condition if contracted. Our kids help with chores and they wash up just like us, but they are younger. Good luck

Looks like we have some serious talks ahead. Thank you.

 

[TaG23]

Sulphur kills mites. Wood ash has sulphur which is why it works against mites. only use ash from clean non chemical woods.

Sulphur Also kills scabies....which is a mite. I bought two bars with 10% Sulphur and 3% [COLOR=111111]Salicylic Acid. After looking at all the ingredients of many types....and read posts from others..I decided on this one. There's another without Salicylic acid...which is also 10% sulphur. I figured hit em with both. My elderly mom gets a fungal on her skin and so I will give one bar to her since Salicylic acid kills fungus.[/COLOR]

[COLOR=111111]this one is just sulphur[/COLOR]

http://www.amazon.com/Pack-Premium-Sulfur-Soap-Cleansing/dp/B00DSOI73W/ref=pd_bxgy_194_img_2?ie=UTF8&refRID=0GN9PJCJSWTYAY2QVH2J

this ones has both
http://www.amazon.com/Pack-Premium-Sulfur-Soap-Cleansing/dp/B00DSOI73W/ref=pd_sim_194_3?ie=UTF8&refRID=0R7WK4PBVY94NZ36P5W9&dpID=413JWSTZ3%2BL&dpSrc=sims&preST=_AC_UL160_SR160%2C160_

Thank you for the Amazon links. I bought the sulfur and salicylic acid soap. We will try that one first. Thanks again.