Lessons learned in my battle with mites

[ladyearth]

coops410silkies
what form is the spindosad ? liquid, paste, powder..??? any particular brand? I bought some on clearance year or so ago.. but its a powder big shaker form. what about price or strenth it comes in?
thanks
oh also read about using a steamer in the coop on cracks et. too

 

[casportpony]

coops410silkies
what form is the spindosad ? liquid, paste, powder..??? any particular brand? I bought some on clearance year or so ago.. but its a powder big shaker form. what about price or strenth it comes in?
thanks
oh also read about using a steamer in the coop on cracks et. too

Do not despair, Sparkling; you can use Spinosad, either as a premise spray (its labeled use) or as an oral medication you add to your chick's feed (this is an off-label application I've used in my brooder pen for fleas, with unmitigated success and no discernible side effects). It is an organic, rapidly lethal to many insects, including mites and lice of all species - and bees - with little or no effect upon vertebrates. I used Conserve, highly diluted, and others here have used Elector, as a premise spray; both are expensive and can be bought on Amazon. Google Comfortis for dogs. You CAN spray your chicks with this - or dip them - with no harmful effect from the Spinosad. (I dipped a rescue box turtle in a Spinosad solution, then sprayed its substrate, and when it was eating again, I sprayed its food with it; this approach TOTALLY rid it of mites/lice and it did not get them again.). In my experience, I've found Spinosad to be the most effective safest miticide you can use for chickens. Good luck and happy husbandry.

@ladyearth , @coop410silkies used Conserve. Coop410slilkies, what is the percentage of spinosad on your bottle, 0.5%, 11.6%, or something else?





-Kathy

 

[casportpony]

Quote: Everyone should read that thread before spending a bunch of money on spinosad.

-Kathy

 

[coop410silkies]

@ladyearth, @casportpony: I used Conserve SC, 11.6%. It is indeed pricey. Lady, I sent you a pm.

 

[chunkyonchia]

Hello SIMZ,
I know that you are in the states, but, I have recently had a big problem with mites. It is summer here in Queensland.
The temps have been up around 40c but at the moment it is a lot cooler but about to warm up again.
I was crawling with mites myself and I hate it.
I was told to put garlic into the nesting boxes, the stalks, leaves etc.
I didn't have any so I bought some fresh garlic with a bit of stem and leaf on.
I chopped, peeled, diced the cloves and put it in all the nest boxes.
Now I don't have mites. I check every day. Now when I have access to some garlic stem and leaf rubbish I am going to put it in all the boxes permanently.
I know the chooks ate some of the garlic, so that will help too.
TRY IT.

I will try this! I love the more natural and long term preventative measure!

 

[chickengeorgeto]

You could always use ivermectin pour on, or preferably eprinex on your birds. Spray the inside of your coop with liquid sevin or malathion.

Wild birds will bring mites, but Ivermectin on each bird, and either carbaryl or pyrethrin in the coop will wipe them out. Repeat infestations will occur, but I have zero tolerance for the little beasts. mary

A liquid is the best way to treat for mites and lice. A liquid spray or perhaps a 50% wet able powder sprayed on and into every last nook and cranny in your chicken house will work wonders, especially for Red Mites.

I have always been partial to painting the roosts with used motor oil to deny the mites a nice convenient place to hide, live, breed, and repopulate your place with more mites.

A cheap 1 gallon pump-up hand sprayer serves two functions.

The first is to dispense mite killing spray on to the coop and the second is to use the long hand wand to deliver a little spritz to each bird around the vent, neck, and under each wing. This can be most easily accomplished while your chickens are asleep on the roost.

Do this twice yearly. Once at the end of the molt and again at the start of the molt.

Remember that you want to manage the mite load, not control it.

In an agricultural setting the word control means that you want to Nuke ever last mite on your place. A impossibility in the real world, especially with free range chickens..

 

[chickengeorgeto]

I will try this! I love the more natural and long term preventative measure!

I thought that garlic was to repel human mites.

My bad, I mean Vampires.

 

[chunkyonchia]

​I thought that garlic was to repel human mites.

My bad, I mean Vampires.   

Hehe - the sulfur is used in a few commercial pest powders for mites.
But I mean, I've never BEEN bitten by vampires so you'd have to prove it didn't work ;-) hehe

 

[SIMZ]

OH I am SO VERY DISCOURAGED now!!!

I have had chickens for 3 years and we have never had mites. This week we just moved to a new house that already had 2 small chicken houses on the property. Today I just brought my chickens from my Mom's house and put them in the coop. The previous owners had left the house filthy, so we shoveled it out first and put fresh hay down. My daughter just found a mite crawling on her. I know this means we have just exposed our chickens to mites and by tomorrow morning they are going to be covered! I am SO UPSET!!!! What do I do now?

Tomorrow when the sun comes up I can scrub the house with pinesol. But what do I do for my birds?

I'm so sad for them. My poor birdies are going to be itchy with bugs now, disgusting, vile, bugs that cause infections and other ailments. I hate bugs!

I didn't want to have to put poisons on my birds. Is there no hope now? Am I going to have to poison my birds to kill the bugs? CAN they be killed? Reading this thread does not give me any hope. So sad now.

Sparkling in Idaho.

It's going to be fine! Mites really aren't the end of the world and most chickens are healthy and don't become "covered" by them.

Unless your chickens live in a completely contained, inside environment, they are going to be exposed to mites. Permithrin works really well and takes care of it...or at least keeps them controlled.

Best of luck with your chickens!

 

[Sparkling]

Thank you for the encouragement.

Today is day four of the ambush against the evil insects. I haven't actually seen any on my birds, I hope I've intervened in time. The house was absolutely horrid. We bought a power washer and ended up having to SOAK the floor in water, and use a flat front shovel as well as the power washer to get the inch layer of yuck off the floor. Not sure the previous owners ever had cleaned it out. It's clean now though!!! Scrubbed, power washed, cleaned with murphy's oil soap, and then a friend of mine suggested we paint the inside, so today we used the spray painter and painted the whole inside of the house, ceiling, walls, floors, roosts, nest boxes, everything, and as much of the little house as I had paint for - got the floor and roosts painted before I ran out.. Used a full gallon of paint. Left it to dry all afternoon, and then we put fresh bedding down on the floor. It's much much much better now. Hopefully painting the inside will break the cycle. Any mites left in the wood after the soaking won't be able to escape the paint.

And put DE in their dust bath area also.

Really trying to avoid using the Permethrin because the chickens yard is connected to the orchard and I really really really don't want to harm the bees.