Dusting northern poultry mites

[AGRowles]

I'm using "Dust-on" with active ingredient permethrin but I have one hen who is broody and is covered in mites. Should we make a water mixture and do a bath? Anyone have experience with this stuff and what you recommend doing? I have 22 fee range birds in a 8x16' coop. Thanks!

 

[oldhenlikesdogs]

Just dust her straight and you may want to change the nest bedding and dust underneath. Best to get rid of the mites before the eggs hatch. I have had to dust chicks in the past before I learned setting hens need to be checked for mites and can become overwhelmed with them.

 

[AGRowles]

Is that all I need to do plus maybe a follow up at 7 and 14 days? I checked 3 other random chickens and none of them had mites I could find yet, but one broody chicken and 2 nest boxes were covered all over the lid and roosting bar. My question is, should I proactively treat my other normal dust bathing chickens? And do I need to clean and dust the entire coop as well?

 

[oldhenlikesdogs]

I generally only see broody and very sick chickens get overwhelmed by mites. Since mites live in the coop I would do a bedding change and dust the bottom of the nestboxes as well as any wooden cracks like where roosts are mounted. I would than dust the birds with the most mites in another week. That generally will take care of the majority of them. As long as the rest of your birds have a dust bath area, that will keep mites under control. Broody hens don't dust bath enough so they can get into some trouble because of it.

 

[AGRowles]

Thanks for the help! So are these mites something you live with and ecology keeps them in check, or are they something that needs to be eradicated through vigourous cleaning and treatment?

 

[oldhenlikesdogs]

You will never completely eradicated mites. Wild birds will bring them in. It just takes two for the population to get going again, so I do management of them as needed.

I never expect my birds to be external parasite free. Some years I do nothing and other years I need to dust some birds, but for the most part a good dust bath area will keep them under control, and I don't need to get involved.

The two times to be more vigilant is with broody birds, and during winter if your ground freezes hard which can make it hard for them to find a good dry area that isn't frozen and covered in snow.

 

[AGRowles]

You've been a huge help, thank you!