getting rid of mites naturally?

[Michael Apple]

Since you live in Australia Chooks4life, I imagine that's it's tough to purchase medicines for ailing birds due to government regulations I suppose, or a costly trip to the vet. So, you have to resort to the next best effective treatments, nothing wrong with that. But I can assure you that living in the southern U.S., the humidity is horrendous and using the deep litter method is asking for trouble. The american scientist who recommended the deep litter method probably never had chickens located in the southern part of this country. As you mentioned, keeping the environment clean includes inside the coop. Post #14 explains what happens with the deep litter method. Been there, done that...I speak from experience.
Here's a link for you, please read post #3 and also the link in the same post.
https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/785679/garlic-for-worms

X2. I never understood the extremism of letting filth build up, or trying to create some type of hospital environment. Neither is appropriate. The whole "deep litter method" is merely a newly wrapped marketing of the old built-up litter that was analyzed during World War 2 during the labor shortages that affected the farm industry. They found B-12 availability in the unchanged litter built up over time. Back then B-12 was not recognized for its benefits in poultry, so it was never an addition in feed mills. B-12 didn't start getting added to poultry feeds until about 1950. Now that it is, the speculated nutritional benefit of built-up litter serves no purpose.

The anti-coccidial effect of built up litter is real but not consistent since failure to control wetness in the litter, harboring an environment for mites, lice, parasitic worms, not adequate ventilation to remove the ammonia fumes which can damage a bird's respiratory system, creates more problems than benefits. Why perpetuate an environment for disease? Laziness? Wanting to be some trendy pseudo-hippie with the audacity to think he can "save the earth" and help create more government regulation to tax people out of business or their hobby?

There are some very wise old methods for proper keeping of poultry and possess a number of Pacific Poultrycraft magazines from the 20's and The California Poultry Tribune from 1897-1899 which speak of some old methods that kept birds at peak health. The build up of manure isn't one of them.

 

[chooks4life]

Quote:
Disagree with a few of your statements, as you do mine. Fair enough. You're speaking from your experience of 'been there done that', as I'm speaking from my experience of 'been there done that'. There's only millions of environmental differences and factors that could have influenced our different outcomes, so while I respect your insistence that it failed for you, yet I maintain my statement that it works for me. Nothing wrong with that.

The humidity's horrendous here too. Not sure what you mean about government regulations etc., most people who want to use chemicals seem to have not much problem buying them. Australia's notorious for buying and using vaccines and chemicals etc that have been banned for decades in many other countries, which hinders my wholehearted embrace of all things pharmaceutical, to be honest.

I'm not resorting to 'next best effective treatments;' this is my first choice and the validity of it has been borne out by both anecdotal and personal experience and information; my survival rate compared to those who resort to what you think are the 'best' treatments speaks for itself. I'd be dosing and vaccinating and medicating like everyone else if I wanted to have the same problems and results as them.

Just because the deep litter method didn't work for you does not mean it doesn't work. I can assure you, been there done that, it works for me. As for the link to someone saying they'd used kelp/garlic/whatever from day one and it didn't work --- something was severely wrong with the types of those supplements they used. I'm careful about my sources, I don't just grab it off the shelf, believe the hype, and use it with blind faith. Garlic, kelp and other treatments of which I've spoken have not failed to fulfill the purposes I use them and advocate their usage for yet, and it's been years and hundreds of birds, including outside vaccinated and medicated sick and wormy stock I bring in. Again the results speak for themselves. I'd be using professional pharmaceutical wormers etc if I needed to. I don't, ergo, won't.

Quote: Multiple mistakes in your assumptions. Sounds like your info was derived a study of a sealed metal box of chicken poop. If you have composted, you didn't do it right, and if you haven't composted, your information is wrong, take it from someone who has done it successfully for years. Your first mistake, kinda obvious, is that you think lots of manure is the same thing as compost.

There's no 'failure to control wetness' when it's set up correctly; I don't know why I would even need to explain this really since if I was having the problems you're saying occur, I would have lost my birds, and wouldn't be saying it works. The birds are fine and we've been through multiple floods and unending months' worth of torrential downpours, in the tropics, in summer. Amid other factors that should have sent the composting into failure. But it didn't fail.

There are no ammonia fumes. Again, you are describing a failed system, or more truthfully just a manured and filthy floor. Not working deep litter composting. I'm starting to doubt you even know what it is, since your info on it is so wildly incorrect and you seem to think only hippies do it --- and it's intended for the chickens to eat?! Also it doesn't harbor worms or lice when you've done it correctly, any more than the entire farm does. Without suitable hosts, the parasites can't build up to any problematic levels. The deep litter itself kills worm eggs and lice. It's not an environment for disease, in fact it is the opposite, and again the results speak for themselves.

I'm not a hippy either, and no, I don't think the world's getting saved by chicken poop. Assumptions, again, 100% wrong. Just because I don't use chemicals etc on my birds does not mean I'm a hippy or being trendy. The scientific facts are available to anyone who wants to seek the obvious and available truth, even from the producers of the chemicals themselves. It's not the way into a survivable future for our descendants, that's just the obvious fact of it. Still not a hippy. You need to think outside the box a little. Exposing your hatred of people who identify as hippies not only fails to serve your intent in our debate, but weakens your debate, and no doubt lowers the estimation of you in the eyes of others on this site, hippy and otherwise. And no, I'm still not a hippy.
Quote: You contradicted your own statement already anyway...

It works, I'm sorry to hear you have not figured out how to get yours working. Nor how to disagree with another adult in the appropriate and respectful manner befitting an adult. It's ok if we disagree. There's no need to stoop to hysterical insults, as wildly inaccurate as they are revealing of you as a character and your worldview. Best wishes.

edited by staff

 

[Michael Apple]

Best wishes.

You too.

 

[salt and pepper]

Does garlic change the taste of the eggs?

 

[chooks4life]

Some say yes, some say no, some people are sensitive to garlic flavour or compounds, but I think if you add garlic to cage hen's diets you'd probably taste it more than if you added it to eggs from freeranging hens flushing/detoxing their systems with green feeds because less sulphur etc would be present probably. Basically, I theorize that a cage bird's liver isn't as clean as a freeranging bird's liver so stronger compounds that would otherwise be balanced or diluted would be more noticeably present. I don't taste it in the chooks' eggs or meat. But there is a freshness to a bird's meat you only get when it was eating green feed regularly. Long story short I don't think you'd taste it in their eggs.

As a small part of the 'debate' up-page seems to attest, your sources can make or break your experience with what has been a reliable aid for thousands of years. Modern cultivars are generally not to be trusted to do the same job as heirloom or primitive types though some are fine and trustworthy. If one garlic variety doesn't work, move to another, surely there's good garlic left in America too. Best wishes.

 

[salt and pepper]

Some say yes, some say no, some people are sensitive to garlic flavour or compounds, but I think if you add garlic to cage hen's diets you'd probably taste it more than if you added it to eggs from freeranging hens flushing/detoxing their systems with green feeds because less sulphur etc would be present probably. Basically, I theorize that a cage bird's liver isn't as clean as a freeranging bird's liver so stronger compounds that would otherwise be balanced or diluted would be more noticeably present. I don't taste it in the chooks' eggs or meat. But there is a freshness to a bird's meat you only get when it was eating green feed regularly. Long story short I don't think you'd taste it in their eggs.

As a small part of the 'debate' up-page seems to attest, your sources can make or break your experience with what has been a reliable aid for thousands of years. Modern cultivars are generally not to be trusted to do the same job as heirloom or primitive types though some are fine and trustworthy. If one garlic variety doesn't work, move to another, surely there's good garlic left in America too. Best wishes.

Ok, thank you! Mine have eaten chives, and I haven't noticed anything, just wondering id garlic was different. I have done a mini deep litter when I was feeling lazy, and just put another layer of bedding on top, but that's been it....

 

[danib]

I asked the same thing on another thread. I just started putting garlic powder in their food. They're only 5 weeks old, but I wanted them to get used to the taste before they go outside. They don't seem to mind, but they are on my sunporch in a grow out pen, and it stinks like garlic out there. I want to rid them of pests naturally and thought garlic would be a great natural way to do it..if it worked. They won't be free ranging, because we live near the woods, Lots of hawks live in those woods, also..and they'll meet their maker pretty quickly. But I am going to do the chicken salad bar for them and try to give them as many greens as I can. I have also been putting ACV in their water, and read on a thread where some people say that is bad, and to just give them plain water. I was planning on giving LAB a try. I just want to be as organic as I can, and give them a healthy digestive tract and keep pests off. Anyone have any suggestions/opinions on this?

 

[chooks4life]

Quote: Yeah, research thoroughly, or at least don't just take any one person's opinion for it. They may be right for their situation but there's so many factors that may make it not work for your situation. As with the woes of other's deep litter composting earlier in this thread, all it can take is one element's failure for a whole valid concept or proven method to be demonized in some people's eyes. It's good to know your sources, and whether or not the product is heat treated/irradiated and other such treatments that can destroy its active/live or working components. It's a giant topic, health, and nobody knows everything about it, it's something we'll all be learning about until the day we die.

For a healthy digestive tract, which some physicians believe to be the root of almost all health or disease, you need a few basic things kept in regular dietary use, and to avoid a few other things. (Ok, many other things. lol. Especially antibiotics and overprocessed foods).

The organism (you or your chook, works the same for both of you) needs to be at the right ph levels, which a healthy diet will do, it needs pro and pre biotics, it needs enzymes, it needs cleansing/detoxing agents, and it needs a natural diet so it can do its job properly, rather than be clogged up and sluggish from overprocessed foods. Cleansing agents can be garlic, raw foods, charcoal, the so-called 'plague herbs', etc, many things can cleanse.

Garlic generally works to repel and kill parasites, viruses, etc in a few ways; obviously for garlic to do its job you need real garlic, not anything ornamental or overprocessed or however else its potency may have been damaged. Cooking's obviously not too good. Allicin is the main antibiotic property of garlic, which is apparently created by an enzyme reaction in crushed or chopped or otherwise physically damaged garlic. Louis Pasteur noted in 1858 that bacteria died when exposed to garlic and more recently there's been a lot of studies finding it's an amazingly potent weapon against various problems, like food poisoning in humans, as it kills food borne pathogens. Diallyl disulfide is an organosulphur compound derived from garlic and other allium family plants which specifically kills many potentially fatal bacteria.

Curious you heard negatives about ACV, that's unusual, but then again I won't touch Bragg's ACV, only Melrose and a one or two other unpasteurized brands. (The Bragg's just doesn't work for me). About the hawks: I think they'd probably be fine, mine used to freerange in completely uncovered acreage as well as in the forest, with more than two chickens there's usually at least one pair of eyes at all times working as a spotter who'll cry hawk before it gets a chance. Your choice, though. No matter where they are they're not 100% safe. They will be healthier if they free range though it runs some risks, but if they never freerange they're just running a different set of risks. I find it worthwhile to let them risk their lives freeranging rather than risk their lives sitting in a cage, and the chooks are vastly happier when allowed to range, not to mention healthier. Took me some time to stop expecting losses daily though, even though I've only lost to predators a total of three chickens out of hundreds of freerangers over the years.

 

[Michael Apple]

Not sure what you mean about government regulations etc., most people who want to use chemicals seem to have not much problem buying them.

You don't live in California, that's why. Many chemicals that were once available are not any more. What is considered natural is twice the price and not effective. Yet they still sell Malathion and spray Roundup all over the county here. Most all the environmental fees from going to the landfill to buying a certain paint speak for themselves as to who profits from supposedly "being green".

Australia's notorious for buying and using vaccines and chemicals etc that have been banned for decades in many other countries, which hinders my wholehearted embrace of all things pharmaceutical, to be honest.

Well the numerous threads on the forum where people attempted an organic method for prevention or removal for worms failed. Thus, Fenbendazole, Albendazole, etc. were successfully used as treatments. The same goes for DE. Extremism in your statement. I don't know anyone who "wholeheartedly embraces" pharmaceuticals, but when it comes to treatment of disease to which all organic methods are inept due to the resistant microorganisms, pharmaceuticals must be used.

I'm not resorting to 'next best effective treatments;' this is my first choice and the validity of it has been borne out by both anecdotal and personal experience and information; my survival rate compared to those who resort to what you think are the 'best' treatments speaks for itself.

Validate that with some statistics, if you could.

Multiple mistakes in your assumptions. Sounds like your info was derived a study of a sealed metal box of chicken poop. If you have composted, you didn't do it right, and if you haven't composted, your information is wrong, take it from someone who has done it successfully for years. Your first mistake, kinda obvious, is that you think lots of manure is the same thing as compost.

No assumptions at all. Perhaps myself, those taking the lead with the Poultry Science Association, and that Fellow raising a flock of 2,600 chickens in Blodgett, Oregon are just amateurs to you, but I sincerely doubt that. Raising birds on compost is not sensible. I'll reserve my area for compost at the other end of the pasture. Let free will take you where you want.



I'm not a hippy either, and no, I don't think the world's getting saved by chicken poop. Assumptions, again, 100% wrong. Just because I don't use chemicals etc on my birds does not mean I'm a hippy or being trendy.

No need to take humor as a personal attack. Especially when my previous post wasn't addressed to you.


The scientific facts are available to anyone who wants to seek the obvious and available truth, even from the producers of the chemicals themselves.

You should present those facts so what you're saying is believable.

It works, I'm sorry to hear you have not figured out how to get yours working. Nor how to disagree with another adult in the appropriate and respectful manner befitting an adult.

You might want to rethink that statement and look in the mirror.


It's ok if we disagree.

Obviously not ok for you, lol.

There's no need to stoop to hysterical insults, as wildly inaccurate as they are revealing of you as a character and your worldview. Best wishes.

No hysteria here. Just common sense. See you in the emergencies and diseases section of the forum. I may be able to help you out sometime.

 

[salt and pepper]

What is a practical amount of time to clean your coops? If I use straw/ hay, I usually clean it once a month, if I'm using shavings, I clean it more often, the reason is with the straw, I just clean the droppings from under the roost, with shavings I can't do that.