MITES! I'm so *sick* of mites on my banty cochin!!

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JennsPeeps

JennsPeeps

Rhymes with 'henn'
11 Years
Jun 14, 2008
6,583
45
261
South Puget Sound
My banty cochin, Tribble, is constantly infested with mites. Today I picked her up and saw that the feathers of her rump were COVERED with mites. They looked like dirt on her, there were sooo many.

My big girls don't have mites (or not many, anyway), just Tribble.

It's disgusting. I treat her with Sevin Dust once a month or so. I'm so sick of it. She's a sweet little bird but her feathered feet and small stature have been causing a constant battle with mites. We decided not to get silkies for this reason, in case they have the same issues. Our clean-footed/tall birds haven't had nearly the issue that the feather-footed bantam has. It stinks!

he.gif
I'm SO sick of it!!
 
Hi, stop Using the seven. Dip the the legs in old motor oil. They get under the leg scales and lay eggs. The mits you see will only live for a short time. you have to kill the eggs and the seven will just make your birds sick. After you dip the leggs, get some baby oil in a spray bottle and mist around the egg hole and under the wings, If you want put a little menthol in the baby oil. This will drive the mits out in the open and the other birds will pick them off for her. You need to fog your coop and Put some veggie oil, any type, and a little dish saop and warm water in a pump sprayer and mist the ground in the run. It will smoother any live one's in the dirt or grass. You may have to do it a couple of times.
We had a the same problem and an old farmer told us to dip the whole bird in the motor oil, We just couldn't do it so we came up with this plan. It worked for us, Hope it works for you...
 
Sorry to hear about your girl! When one animal suffers from pests like this and the others do not, it makes me think she might have other systemic issues going on that make her more vulnerable.

Has she had any other problems the others have not? Does she eat enough? What is her place in the pecking order?

And ~ do you use DE in your coop/run? This might help a bit. Do you have a vitamin/probiotic supplement available occasionally for the chickens? I wonder if this might give her a boost too.

Good luck, and please keep us posted.
 
I had the same problem. I used eprenex pour on (ivermectin. .2cc between th shoulder blades. They will be back if you have a wooden coup. Clean everything and seal the wood with latex paint or varnish. Remove the chickens when doing so. Good Luck.
 
I'm going to try some frontline to see if that helps. I've been using Sevin off & on for a while. No DE for a while. These are feather mites, not scaly leg mites, so her body needs to be treated, though her wee little puny legs are feathered, too.

Tribble is our banty cochin with a twisted beak. It's not terribly bad but she can't preen as much as the others. Being so short in the muddy climate of the Pacific Northwest, she's always got a muddy abdomen and wet legs. I think that's a primary contributing factor to her mite infestation.

Thanks for all the suggestions! I'll keep you posted on her progress. We're getting chicks at the end of this month and would really like for her infestation to be 100% gone by then so that she can raise them (if she'll take them).
 
In the Spring, I put garlic powder in the waterers. I use about 1 teaspoon per gallon of water. This seems to really keep the bugs off of the chickens. I haven't had but a couple of birds with mites in the past couple of years. It hasn't affected the taste of the eggs because I am not using alot of garlic. But I guess just that little bit gets in their skin and the bugs don't like it.
 

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