We just spotted fly strike on one of our older hens. Isolated her and began treatment immediately. Washed her with warm saline water (epsom salt) and sprayed with betadine diluted in water. Then tried four times washing/flushing with the warm water solutions, as is recommended in a lot of sources. Hardly anything came out, and there was a huge amount of maggots and an even larger amount of eggs that hadn't hatched yet. Then my wife realized, the maggots thrive in warm moist conditions, so she decided to try flushing with cold water. Instant results, more than 95% of the maggots and eggs washed out immediately. They were rushing to get out and escape the cold. We flushed her again, pretty much all we could see were gone. Sprayed with the betadine solution (note that betadine dries out sore areas so they heal faster) and put her in the hospital cage. I checked an hour later, there were just a few little worms moving, maybe four or five. Wiped them very gently with a q-tip soaked in betadine (you don't want to pull or scrape hard, it will tear the skin) and rinsed with cold water, and didn't see any more signs of them. We'll check again every hour or two...
I haven't seen cold suggested anywhere as a treatment, but wow... the results were almost instantaneous.
Since we caught it before most of the eggs had hatched, we are very hopeful; although the ones that had hatched had already been eating the skin, and there was a good bit of bleeding.
I haven't seen cold suggested anywhere as a treatment, but wow... the results were almost instantaneous.
Since we caught it before most of the eggs had hatched, we are very hopeful; although the ones that had hatched had already been eating the skin, and there was a good bit of bleeding.