Can you rid the soil of worms?

[aztec11867]

round worms and whip worms look almost the same to me but i bought fenbendazole which will treat both. My question is do i need to treat the soil and what would i use to kill the worms in their coop?

 

[stevetone]

I have no practical experience in this, but I've read that you cannot rid the soil of roundworms--you must remove the top layer of soil. However, I've also read that DE may be helpful in eliminating them, so you could try that.

Keep in mind that anything that would kill the "bad" roundworms would also kill the other "good" nematodes in the soil.

Perhaps DE would be helpful in the coop as well, although if it was me I would evacuate everyone, strip it all out, and spray it with the most powerful agent I could find. But that's just me.

(I am not a DE promoter. I like chemicals.)

I hope others with practical experience with this will give some more useful advice. Good luck!

 

[galanie]

Just like the rest of our world, soil is an ecosystem all it's own. Healthy soil has both beneficial and detrimental organisms in it. Kill off all the bad guys and you're killing the good ones too. It'd be like spraying a potent herbicide over your whole yard to kill all the weeds. It would work fine, but what would you have left?

Even if you did kill the roundworms, etc. in the soil, wild birds and every other wild critter within 20 miles is just going to deposit them right back in there. Just worm the chickens if you need to. Don't sweat the rest of it much.

 

[dawg53]

Just like the rest of our world, soil is an ecosystem all it's own. Healthy soil has both beneficial and detrimental organisms in it. Kill off all the bad guys and you're killing the good ones too. It'd be like spraying a potent herbicide over your whole yard to kill all the weeds. It would work fine, but what would you have left?

Even if you did kill the roundworms, etc. in the soil, wild birds and every other wild critter within 20 miles is just going to deposit them right back in there. Just worm the chickens if you need to. Don't sweat the rest of it much.

x2

 

[ChickensAreSweet]

Quote:
x3

 

[aztec11867]

i cleaned their coop very well this week, and put down barn lime. I wormed them with the safeguard equine paste which was very easy, i just put a pea size drop in their beak and they ate it right up. It smells fruity so they seemed to like it. they have not had any problems so far with this medicine. I will give plain yogurt in a few days to help put back the good stuff. Thanks for all the help