The Scenario Unfolds:
It's another day, everything is going as it usually does, and you go out to check on your flock like your normally do, but something's off. You notice some of your birds grooming and scratching more than normal, a few are shaking their heads like they're trying to get something off their comb. You look closer, they look tired, they're combs a little lighter than normal, and you notice droppings stuck to their vent feathers. It's at this point, you know something's wrong, your mind starts going through every possible scenario, vent gleet? Coccidiosis? Did they eat something toxic? So you check for foul orders near the vent, look for bloody loose stools, check around your own or run and...nothing. Then it hits you, "check the skin and feather roots around the tail and vent, and there it is, little specks of dirt, or little "sesame seeds", running around, with with grainy clusters wadded at the base of the feathers. They have mites and/or lice!
(Chicken mites, AI generated photo created by me, with Gemini 3.)
(Poultry Lice and egg clusters, AI generated photo created by me, with Gemini 3)
About Mites and Poultry Lice, and the Harm They Cause:
All species of poultry/chicken mites, along with poultry/chicken lice are external parasites. They're outside on rodents, and wild birds, attracted by warm feathered bodies, and fallen adults, nymphs or eggs, get picked up or passed to an unsuspecting bird. Once they're on your chickens, they find the warmest dampest spot, like around the vent, consume a blood meal, and lay their eggs along the base and shaft of the feather. It's important to note, lice and mites can cause slightly "poopy butt" to become a severely dirty "poopy butt" with mixture of face and eggs. Eventually the eggs hatch into nymphs, (with mites there I lev stage prior to my oh stage), which grow through 2 more nymph stages, before reaching adulthood, and laying more eggs to continue the cycle. A few can quickly turn into many, or an infestation. Lice and mites thrive in damp, warm, humid and/or dirty conditions, but even clean flock in a clean coop can wind up with lice or mites, especially with summer rains. Since these external parasites feed on blood, they also take away vitamins and minerals in the blood. These little bugs, can cause anemia and vitamin deficiencies, such as D, E, C, A, B2, B6, B12, and other vitamin deficiencies, causing other signs and symptoms that can be misconstrued as other illnesses. Rooster Booster makes water additives such as Poultry Cell, granulated Poultry Booster, and Vitamin/Electrolyte powder to combat any possible deficiencies. "So what do we do now? How do we get rid of them?"
(Available Rooster Booster vitamin supplements. AI photo created by me, with Gemini 3)
Previous Common Treatments:
Many people have dealt with mites and/lice over the lifetime of owning chickens, and they've all tried many of the same treatments with much success. However, it comes at a cost; a cost of time, labor, headache, repetition, and of course, money. Some treatments are far more than others, some smell horrible, some take multiple treatments for the coop and the bird, and some require you catching and dipping/spraying every bird you have. If it's fairly cold outside, dipping or spraying your chickens, could have adverse effects like frostbite or hypothermia that can lead to infection, body part loss, or death. Water additives can be diluted in waterers if rains, and wind up ineffective.
Natural sprays like Manna Pro, or Rooster Boosters mite and lice sprays requires the coop to be cleaned, sprayed down, and chickens to be caught and sprayed, this can be tedious especially if you have a lot of chickens and large coop. If the weather is cold, this can be unfeasible. You may have treat for 2-4 weeks to get all lice and mites in multiple stages. This may require multiple bottles and at $17 to $20 a bottle, you're going to wind up spending, $80-$120 or more, depending on the size of your flock(s) and coop(s). There is no egg withdrawal period.
Ivermectin drench, pour-on, water additive, or injection, is another treatment, that averages about $58 and up, and carries the same challenges of repeat administration, and catching chickens, but doesn't carry the the inability to use in cold weather, with the exception of the pour on. However, This will only treat the birds and will not treat the eggs and adults in the coop. This method of treatment also isn't available in something specifically for chickens, treating with it is considered "off label" and finding/giving proper dosing for poultry only with sheep/goat ivermectin drench or as a water additive can be tricky. Too little can be an effective too much can be harmful, and it carries an 8-week egg withdrawal period.
The worst smelling treatment, hands down, is permethrin. While permethrin concentrate and the instructed amount of water can be mixed into a one or three gallon pump sprayer, and the entire coop can be sprayed, you still need to clean the entire coop first. Then you need to soak every surface, nook, cranny, and crevice with it. With permethrin, you can also mix it with the appropriate amount of water per the instructions, and use it as a dip for your chickens. Yet again the dip becomes a problem if you have an issue over winter, Or if you have a lot of chickens that you have to catch or work through.
Now for everyone's favorite treatment, that treats lice and mites in ALL stages, Elector PSP! (I know many people who have dealt with lice and mites in the past love this stuff) Elector PSP is similar to permethrin but it's considered safe for organic operations, and there is no egg withdrawal with this treatment. This particular product is also a concentrate that you mix with water, and you can spray directly on the birds, plus all over the coop after cleaning it. The directions will tell you that you can use one very thorough treatment, but many sources recommend using a second treatment one week, to a week and a half later to be safe. So again this becomes a problem in cold weather due to wet chickens, and you may have to treat a second time. Here's the downside a little 8 oz bottle of concentrate for this stuff is $160. For a lot of people that's a sticker shock especially if they have a good amount of chickens to the point where they may need to get a second bottle nobody wants to spend $320 on getting rid of lice and mites.
Premo Poultry Guard is a lesser known treatment for lice and mites, plus fleas and ticks, while being effective on ALL life cycles of these pests. Premo is all natural, eco friendly, essential oil-based, Certified Natural Products Association (NPA) and Approved Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) facilities, and made in the U.S.A. The bonus with this? It's safe for all poultry in all life stages including chicks, and it also gets rid of fleas and ticks. That means if you have quail that wind up with sticktight fleas? This works. Second bonus, zero egg withdrawal period. This is used the same way as Elector PSP You clean the coop you spray the coop the nest boxes and your birds except there's no diluting required and it comes in three different sizes, 16 oz, 32 oz, and 128 oz/1 gallon, with prices ranging from $21 to $77 on Amazon. Again if it's fsirly cold out, it might be too hard to spray the birds because risk to their wellbeing There is a downside here, even the gallon size has a hose and a simple squeeze trigger which means your hands may get tired, but I believe you can also put it in a pump sprayer. The second downside is that it's recommended to treat your birds and coop twice a week until the problem resolves, with no concise listing of how many treatments it could take despite being effective on all life cycles of listed pests and external parasites. Depending on the size bottle that you need this is a lower to moderate cost option and is safe for organic operations and people who wish to take the all-natural route.
In the end, many people choose to do an ivermectin drench per bird, or added to water instead of individual drench and use a spray in the coop.
Some people might be asking at this point, "What about diatomaceous earth?" Diatomaceous earth is a very fine powder that some people choose to sprinkle in coops in around dust baths and they swear that it works. The problem is, vets do not recommend this because it's so fine. When the chickens kick it up in dust baths or it gets moved around on the coop the dust floats through the air and the chickens breathe it in and they're small and sensitive and so is their respiratory tract. It can cause breathing problems, and respiratory failure. It is honestly not worth the risk. Using it in your garden and outside of the pen where the chickens aren't roaming and won't be scratching around, is acceptable. It works as a treatment to keep these pests away from your coop and run, especially if other animals are roaming around, that may be carrying them.
"Is that it? Is there another way? Can we prevent lice, mites and other external parasites?" The answer to that is YES!
(Photos created by me, with Gemini 3 AI generator. Common external parasite treatments.)
All-in-One Treatment and Prevention:
If You've been on this forum, in a chicken group or you've had chickens long enough, you may have heard something about sulfur for treating lice and mites. Unfortunately most of the advice says to make a dust bath with 10% sulfur powder in it, and thats it. If you search long enough, you might find something about putting a little bit in a bottle with water, and being able to spray it around the coop for treating the problem. There is so much more sulfur can do! The sulfur I am talking about is found in almost every hardware store and garden center, and it's primarily called wettable sulfur. There are two kinds and one can be mixed with water, while the other doesn't mix well. The most common brands you'll find are Bonide, Hi-Yield, and Yellow Jacket. The sulfur is available in 1 lb bottles 4 lb bags and 25 lb bags for anything larger you'll have to call an order from a supply store.
Between 2016 and 2020 there were multiple studies done, in multiple states, that have been published to those state agriculture websites, the FDA website, the National Institute of Health website, and multiple college websites. Wettable sulfur can be mixed in to a very thin watery paste also known as a slurry, once you mix this you can actually take a paint brush or a scrub brush, dip it into the slurry, paint it on, and use a scrub brush to work it into the wood. The paint brush is important because there's going to be small areas that are very hard to get into, and it's very important that you get all the areas to get rid of these pests. Once the coop is painted with the slurry inside, outside, along the door frames, and in nesting boxes, you have to let it dry and then you can add the bedding back in. You don't have to have mites or lice to do this! This is a great preventative measure, and when you notice it wearing off, you just make a other slurry, and paint more on. It is not recommended to sprinkle on top of the bedding, and I'll explain why shortly.
Adding sulfur to the dust bath, at a rate of 1 lb per 10 sq feet around the outside of the pen, or in a dust bath, or 10% mixture in a dust bath, has been proven to kill poultry mites on chickens at a rate of 95%-97% and lice at a rate of 83%-88%.
The last part and the most important part of this study is hanging bags. Muslin bags (fabric similar to cheese cloth) were filled with 30 grams of wettable sulfur in single chicken cages called "battery cages." The bags were hung in an area that the chicken frequented and would bump into or rub against. When the chicken came into contact with the bag, the sulfur powder would fall directly onto the chicken eliminating the need to dust the chicken regularly. This created an automatic dispensing system that continually kept the bird covered for both prevention and treatment. The study also tried bags that were clipped over the feeder, but most of the time it would get small amounts on the head of the chicken, while the rest of it fell through the wire cages and missed the bird. When hanging in coops with multiple chickens, It's recommended to hang the bags in areas that they frequent, such as the coop door. There are references to other studies regarding sulfur being used to control external parasites on chickens all the way back to 1927, the dust bags were only researched in the last 10 years the best of knowledge.
When dealing with multiple chickens get a piece of muslin fabric or a piece of cheesecloth fabric or other gauzy porous material. Another option is to take the dry Swiffer sweeper cloths and stretch them out to make them thinner and more porous. Cut a piece of fabric that will hold half a cup to 1 cup of wettable sulfur. If you choose to stitch the sides of your bags together, please do this first before putting the sulfur in the bag, one stitched place half a cup to 1 cup in the bag. If you choose to tie it like a purse and then suspend it from a location of your choosing, then go ahead and put the same mount of sulfur on the fabric. Now gather the corners and edges to the top of the stitches bag to make a pouch, using twine or string to cinch closed. Make sure you are leaving enough string to tie it up and have it hang at a height where chickens will regularly brush against it or bump into it. We chose to hang them in the automomatic coop doorways and above the nest boxes, along with sprinkling some on nesting past and rubbing it in. There's no reason to paint the sulfur on to all surfaces of the coop, plus dusting the chickens with the hanging bags, and then sprinkle it on the bedding. Despite sulfur being a naturally occurring organic mineral, too much can reduce air quality with in the coop.
(Different types of acceptable wettable sulfur, AI photo created by me, with Gemini 3 AI)
Does Something so Simple and Inexpensive Really Work?:
we recently picked up a 25 lb bag for the low price of $40 at an Ace hardware store. Right before a horrible snow storm a few weeks ago, I found out all of my heritage meat bird breeding pens, and our turkey pen, had chicken lice infestations. We decided to clean all the coops and spray them down with permethrin, while doing ivermectin drench in their waterers. Unfortunately with the weather and snow literally every 7 days retreating the coops with the permethrin was not possible because the chickens were refusing to leave the coops. So of course last weekend, these things were back with a vengeance! I didn't have much cheesecloth left, and we were losing daylight quickly, so I didn't have time to sew six different cheesecloth bags to fill and tie up to put in these chicken coops. So we chose dry Swiffer cloths. I grabbed and pulled and stretched them out till I could see the fibers thinning and then I turned at 90° and did the same to the other two sides to make it even. I then used one full cup of Hi-Yield wettable sulfur, put it in the center of the cloth. Then I took a spool of string-line that construction workers use, pulled the corners and sides together, and made a pouch tying the top tightly and leaving a few feet of string line to hang it. I ran the string up behind the frame for the automatic door and tied it to either nails or eye hooks, depending on which coop it was. For the turkey shelter I hung it from the roof supports directly above roosting bars.
Luckily, I didn't have to make four more for our layer coop, as somehow they have managed to stay pest free, and that's the largest coop. Most likely due to 14 inches of ice and snow we had, they have no contact with the other birds, that the others are all in separate pens that back up to each other. Due to the cold temperature I was unable to make a slurry and work it into the coops. So instead I simply took a small dry paint cup from lowes, a 2 foot long handled scrub brush and druly brush what I could. It was also too wet to clean out the coops again, as it is now mud season up here and everything is soggy and there is an actual 3 inches of mud everywhere since the melt off.
Results after 7 days: Chickens are no longer excessively grooming, wobbling or shaking their heads, or appearing lethargic. Combs and waddles are bright red, chickens are eating and drinking normally, and show zero sign of vitamin deficiency. After inspecting one chicken in the front most breeding coop that previously had the infestation, I am not seeing any live poultry lice. Given absence of previous symptoms and absence of visible lice with minimal eggs remaining due to hatch time and life cycles, it can be confirmed that this treatment has been effective. I am also left with roughly 21lbs of sulfur for future treatments, enough for 5 more treatments, that should carry through 12-15 more months.
It's another day, everything is going as it usually does, and you go out to check on your flock like your normally do, but something's off. You notice some of your birds grooming and scratching more than normal, a few are shaking their heads like they're trying to get something off their comb. You look closer, they look tired, they're combs a little lighter than normal, and you notice droppings stuck to their vent feathers. It's at this point, you know something's wrong, your mind starts going through every possible scenario, vent gleet? Coccidiosis? Did they eat something toxic? So you check for foul orders near the vent, look for bloody loose stools, check around your own or run and...nothing. Then it hits you, "check the skin and feather roots around the tail and vent, and there it is, little specks of dirt, or little "sesame seeds", running around, with with grainy clusters wadded at the base of the feathers. They have mites and/or lice!
(Chicken mites, AI generated photo created by me, with Gemini 3.)
(Poultry Lice and egg clusters, AI generated photo created by me, with Gemini 3)
About Mites and Poultry Lice, and the Harm They Cause:
All species of poultry/chicken mites, along with poultry/chicken lice are external parasites. They're outside on rodents, and wild birds, attracted by warm feathered bodies, and fallen adults, nymphs or eggs, get picked up or passed to an unsuspecting bird. Once they're on your chickens, they find the warmest dampest spot, like around the vent, consume a blood meal, and lay their eggs along the base and shaft of the feather. It's important to note, lice and mites can cause slightly "poopy butt" to become a severely dirty "poopy butt" with mixture of face and eggs. Eventually the eggs hatch into nymphs, (with mites there I lev stage prior to my oh stage), which grow through 2 more nymph stages, before reaching adulthood, and laying more eggs to continue the cycle. A few can quickly turn into many, or an infestation. Lice and mites thrive in damp, warm, humid and/or dirty conditions, but even clean flock in a clean coop can wind up with lice or mites, especially with summer rains. Since these external parasites feed on blood, they also take away vitamins and minerals in the blood. These little bugs, can cause anemia and vitamin deficiencies, such as D, E, C, A, B2, B6, B12, and other vitamin deficiencies, causing other signs and symptoms that can be misconstrued as other illnesses. Rooster Booster makes water additives such as Poultry Cell, granulated Poultry Booster, and Vitamin/Electrolyte powder to combat any possible deficiencies. "So what do we do now? How do we get rid of them?"
(Available Rooster Booster vitamin supplements. AI photo created by me, with Gemini 3)
Previous Common Treatments:
Many people have dealt with mites and/lice over the lifetime of owning chickens, and they've all tried many of the same treatments with much success. However, it comes at a cost; a cost of time, labor, headache, repetition, and of course, money. Some treatments are far more than others, some smell horrible, some take multiple treatments for the coop and the bird, and some require you catching and dipping/spraying every bird you have. If it's fairly cold outside, dipping or spraying your chickens, could have adverse effects like frostbite or hypothermia that can lead to infection, body part loss, or death. Water additives can be diluted in waterers if rains, and wind up ineffective.
Natural sprays like Manna Pro, or Rooster Boosters mite and lice sprays requires the coop to be cleaned, sprayed down, and chickens to be caught and sprayed, this can be tedious especially if you have a lot of chickens and large coop. If the weather is cold, this can be unfeasible. You may have treat for 2-4 weeks to get all lice and mites in multiple stages. This may require multiple bottles and at $17 to $20 a bottle, you're going to wind up spending, $80-$120 or more, depending on the size of your flock(s) and coop(s). There is no egg withdrawal period.
Ivermectin drench, pour-on, water additive, or injection, is another treatment, that averages about $58 and up, and carries the same challenges of repeat administration, and catching chickens, but doesn't carry the the inability to use in cold weather, with the exception of the pour on. However, This will only treat the birds and will not treat the eggs and adults in the coop. This method of treatment also isn't available in something specifically for chickens, treating with it is considered "off label" and finding/giving proper dosing for poultry only with sheep/goat ivermectin drench or as a water additive can be tricky. Too little can be an effective too much can be harmful, and it carries an 8-week egg withdrawal period.
The worst smelling treatment, hands down, is permethrin. While permethrin concentrate and the instructed amount of water can be mixed into a one or three gallon pump sprayer, and the entire coop can be sprayed, you still need to clean the entire coop first. Then you need to soak every surface, nook, cranny, and crevice with it. With permethrin, you can also mix it with the appropriate amount of water per the instructions, and use it as a dip for your chickens. Yet again the dip becomes a problem if you have an issue over winter, Or if you have a lot of chickens that you have to catch or work through.
Now for everyone's favorite treatment, that treats lice and mites in ALL stages, Elector PSP! (I know many people who have dealt with lice and mites in the past love this stuff) Elector PSP is similar to permethrin but it's considered safe for organic operations, and there is no egg withdrawal with this treatment. This particular product is also a concentrate that you mix with water, and you can spray directly on the birds, plus all over the coop after cleaning it. The directions will tell you that you can use one very thorough treatment, but many sources recommend using a second treatment one week, to a week and a half later to be safe. So again this becomes a problem in cold weather due to wet chickens, and you may have to treat a second time. Here's the downside a little 8 oz bottle of concentrate for this stuff is $160. For a lot of people that's a sticker shock especially if they have a good amount of chickens to the point where they may need to get a second bottle nobody wants to spend $320 on getting rid of lice and mites.
Premo Poultry Guard is a lesser known treatment for lice and mites, plus fleas and ticks, while being effective on ALL life cycles of these pests. Premo is all natural, eco friendly, essential oil-based, Certified Natural Products Association (NPA) and Approved Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) facilities, and made in the U.S.A. The bonus with this? It's safe for all poultry in all life stages including chicks, and it also gets rid of fleas and ticks. That means if you have quail that wind up with sticktight fleas? This works. Second bonus, zero egg withdrawal period. This is used the same way as Elector PSP You clean the coop you spray the coop the nest boxes and your birds except there's no diluting required and it comes in three different sizes, 16 oz, 32 oz, and 128 oz/1 gallon, with prices ranging from $21 to $77 on Amazon. Again if it's fsirly cold out, it might be too hard to spray the birds because risk to their wellbeing There is a downside here, even the gallon size has a hose and a simple squeeze trigger which means your hands may get tired, but I believe you can also put it in a pump sprayer. The second downside is that it's recommended to treat your birds and coop twice a week until the problem resolves, with no concise listing of how many treatments it could take despite being effective on all life cycles of listed pests and external parasites. Depending on the size bottle that you need this is a lower to moderate cost option and is safe for organic operations and people who wish to take the all-natural route.
In the end, many people choose to do an ivermectin drench per bird, or added to water instead of individual drench and use a spray in the coop.
Some people might be asking at this point, "What about diatomaceous earth?" Diatomaceous earth is a very fine powder that some people choose to sprinkle in coops in around dust baths and they swear that it works. The problem is, vets do not recommend this because it's so fine. When the chickens kick it up in dust baths or it gets moved around on the coop the dust floats through the air and the chickens breathe it in and they're small and sensitive and so is their respiratory tract. It can cause breathing problems, and respiratory failure. It is honestly not worth the risk. Using it in your garden and outside of the pen where the chickens aren't roaming and won't be scratching around, is acceptable. It works as a treatment to keep these pests away from your coop and run, especially if other animals are roaming around, that may be carrying them.
"Is that it? Is there another way? Can we prevent lice, mites and other external parasites?" The answer to that is YES!
(Photos created by me, with Gemini 3 AI generator. Common external parasite treatments.)
All-in-One Treatment and Prevention:
If You've been on this forum, in a chicken group or you've had chickens long enough, you may have heard something about sulfur for treating lice and mites. Unfortunately most of the advice says to make a dust bath with 10% sulfur powder in it, and thats it. If you search long enough, you might find something about putting a little bit in a bottle with water, and being able to spray it around the coop for treating the problem. There is so much more sulfur can do! The sulfur I am talking about is found in almost every hardware store and garden center, and it's primarily called wettable sulfur. There are two kinds and one can be mixed with water, while the other doesn't mix well. The most common brands you'll find are Bonide, Hi-Yield, and Yellow Jacket. The sulfur is available in 1 lb bottles 4 lb bags and 25 lb bags for anything larger you'll have to call an order from a supply store.
Between 2016 and 2020 there were multiple studies done, in multiple states, that have been published to those state agriculture websites, the FDA website, the National Institute of Health website, and multiple college websites. Wettable sulfur can be mixed in to a very thin watery paste also known as a slurry, once you mix this you can actually take a paint brush or a scrub brush, dip it into the slurry, paint it on, and use a scrub brush to work it into the wood. The paint brush is important because there's going to be small areas that are very hard to get into, and it's very important that you get all the areas to get rid of these pests. Once the coop is painted with the slurry inside, outside, along the door frames, and in nesting boxes, you have to let it dry and then you can add the bedding back in. You don't have to have mites or lice to do this! This is a great preventative measure, and when you notice it wearing off, you just make a other slurry, and paint more on. It is not recommended to sprinkle on top of the bedding, and I'll explain why shortly.
Adding sulfur to the dust bath, at a rate of 1 lb per 10 sq feet around the outside of the pen, or in a dust bath, or 10% mixture in a dust bath, has been proven to kill poultry mites on chickens at a rate of 95%-97% and lice at a rate of 83%-88%.
The last part and the most important part of this study is hanging bags. Muslin bags (fabric similar to cheese cloth) were filled with 30 grams of wettable sulfur in single chicken cages called "battery cages." The bags were hung in an area that the chicken frequented and would bump into or rub against. When the chicken came into contact with the bag, the sulfur powder would fall directly onto the chicken eliminating the need to dust the chicken regularly. This created an automatic dispensing system that continually kept the bird covered for both prevention and treatment. The study also tried bags that were clipped over the feeder, but most of the time it would get small amounts on the head of the chicken, while the rest of it fell through the wire cages and missed the bird. When hanging in coops with multiple chickens, It's recommended to hang the bags in areas that they frequent, such as the coop door. There are references to other studies regarding sulfur being used to control external parasites on chickens all the way back to 1927, the dust bags were only researched in the last 10 years the best of knowledge.
When dealing with multiple chickens get a piece of muslin fabric or a piece of cheesecloth fabric or other gauzy porous material. Another option is to take the dry Swiffer sweeper cloths and stretch them out to make them thinner and more porous. Cut a piece of fabric that will hold half a cup to 1 cup of wettable sulfur. If you choose to stitch the sides of your bags together, please do this first before putting the sulfur in the bag, one stitched place half a cup to 1 cup in the bag. If you choose to tie it like a purse and then suspend it from a location of your choosing, then go ahead and put the same mount of sulfur on the fabric. Now gather the corners and edges to the top of the stitches bag to make a pouch, using twine or string to cinch closed. Make sure you are leaving enough string to tie it up and have it hang at a height where chickens will regularly brush against it or bump into it. We chose to hang them in the automomatic coop doorways and above the nest boxes, along with sprinkling some on nesting past and rubbing it in. There's no reason to paint the sulfur on to all surfaces of the coop, plus dusting the chickens with the hanging bags, and then sprinkle it on the bedding. Despite sulfur being a naturally occurring organic mineral, too much can reduce air quality with in the coop.
(Different types of acceptable wettable sulfur, AI photo created by me, with Gemini 3 AI)
Does Something so Simple and Inexpensive Really Work?:
we recently picked up a 25 lb bag for the low price of $40 at an Ace hardware store. Right before a horrible snow storm a few weeks ago, I found out all of my heritage meat bird breeding pens, and our turkey pen, had chicken lice infestations. We decided to clean all the coops and spray them down with permethrin, while doing ivermectin drench in their waterers. Unfortunately with the weather and snow literally every 7 days retreating the coops with the permethrin was not possible because the chickens were refusing to leave the coops. So of course last weekend, these things were back with a vengeance! I didn't have much cheesecloth left, and we were losing daylight quickly, so I didn't have time to sew six different cheesecloth bags to fill and tie up to put in these chicken coops. So we chose dry Swiffer cloths. I grabbed and pulled and stretched them out till I could see the fibers thinning and then I turned at 90° and did the same to the other two sides to make it even. I then used one full cup of Hi-Yield wettable sulfur, put it in the center of the cloth. Then I took a spool of string-line that construction workers use, pulled the corners and sides together, and made a pouch tying the top tightly and leaving a few feet of string line to hang it. I ran the string up behind the frame for the automatic door and tied it to either nails or eye hooks, depending on which coop it was. For the turkey shelter I hung it from the roof supports directly above roosting bars.
Luckily, I didn't have to make four more for our layer coop, as somehow they have managed to stay pest free, and that's the largest coop. Most likely due to 14 inches of ice and snow we had, they have no contact with the other birds, that the others are all in separate pens that back up to each other. Due to the cold temperature I was unable to make a slurry and work it into the coops. So instead I simply took a small dry paint cup from lowes, a 2 foot long handled scrub brush and druly brush what I could. It was also too wet to clean out the coops again, as it is now mud season up here and everything is soggy and there is an actual 3 inches of mud everywhere since the melt off.
Results after 7 days: Chickens are no longer excessively grooming, wobbling or shaking their heads, or appearing lethargic. Combs and waddles are bright red, chickens are eating and drinking normally, and show zero sign of vitamin deficiency. After inspecting one chicken in the front most breeding coop that previously had the infestation, I am not seeing any live poultry lice. Given absence of previous symptoms and absence of visible lice with minimal eggs remaining due to hatch time and life cycles, it can be confirmed that this treatment has been effective. I am also left with roughly 21lbs of sulfur for future treatments, enough for 5 more treatments, that should carry through 12-15 more months.
