getting rid of mites naturally?

[Michael Apple]

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.

I use pine shavings and never have trouble picking up under roosts in the morning. I use a dog poop scoop with a wire rake end. I do that daily, but when you mean cleaning, everyone has their own version on what consists of cleaning. I clean out coops every three months. That means:
1. Remove old shavings from floors and nests.
2. Shop vac to remove dust.
3. Use Oxine AH disinfectant to spray down roosts, floors, nests, walls, and ceiling. Then let dry.
4. Do a final spray of Permectrin II/Gardstar 20% E.C., or Ravap E.C. to penetrate all cracks, crevices, and floors, walls, roosts, nests. Then let dry.
5. Add new shavings and allow birds access to the coops.

I haven't seen a mite or louse since I began using this method.

 

[chooks4life]

Quote:
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.
Firstly, null and void because of the obvious fact you're replying to my reply to someone else. I wasn't asking about chemicals in California, I was replying to dawg53's statement regarding the status of chemicals in Australia.

Second, how and when does 'natural' stuff cost twice the price of pharmaceuticals? My guess is that you and I have some wildly differing ideas of what's natural. Or in this case it could be geographical.

The same goes for DE. Extremism in your statement.... when it comes to treatment of disease to which all organic methods are inept due to the resistant microorganisms, pharmaceuticals must be used.
Not sure what you mean about DE extremism, please quote the extremism you refer to. I don't really use DE, and I'm well aware the various grades are often very single purpose; you don't use pool-filter grade DE for worming or lice, for example, if you want it to work, but a lot of people don't know that.

No organic methods are inept due to resistant organisms, because those organisms only become immune to artificial and man made treatments. Hence the recommended use of garlic for humans as proven by many studies, the bacteria etc cannot become immune to it. A little research on the latest findings regarding garlic would benefit this debate if you know where to look. Hint: not on a drug-seller's website. Just go straight to the scientists and for that one.

Validate that with some statistics, if you could.
I have never lost a chick to coccidiosis, which seems bizarrely common among those who use drugs for it, and my ratio of adult deaths (among all other age groups) is far less than half of anyone else I know. They regularly lose adults to diseases I associate with chicks, and in general just seem to have immunologically damaged chickens.

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.
In their wild state birds are raised on compost. Why aren't you crusading to clean the forests? lol. Compost is sensible, if you're doing it right. Anything that doesn't work is by definition not sensible. I know what works for me; it didn't work for you, but that doesn't invalidate my statements. Don't know who those fellows are you're referring to but that's largely irrelevant as it's got nothing to do with this debate. There are many raising flocks of thousands in Australia too, including free range and organic commercial flocks. If natural methods don't work, they would have no income, never mind a business.

Do you seriously think, as per your earlier statements, that since I use natural methods I'm some kind of hippie who would pursue a methodology that destroys my animals, just to be 'cool'? I didn't call anyone an amateur, by the way. Also, lumping yourself in with people who have found some method that works for them doesn't validate your extremely inaccurate assumptions or misinformation concerning composting. Even a backyard suburban farmer could correct you there. Mud, and manure, is not compost.

No need to take humor as a personal attack. Especially when my previous post wasn't addressed to you.
It was in reply to someone else's post to me and negatively branded my stance on the subject (composting) without clearly delineating where you diverged into supposedly separate 'humorous' and generalized hippy-hating.

You should present those facts so what you're saying is believable.
I'm under no obligation to play fetch for adults who are theoretically willing and able to pursue their own education. That 'links/data required' and 'present the facts' line of attack is used by many who do not actually want to know and will refuse to see the truth when it is presented. I no longer play that game, go find your own info, or don't; it's YOUR choice. If you wanted to know you would already know, I suspect. Your attitude toward hippies probably has a lot to do with your throwing the baby out with the bathwater concerning natural methods.

You might want to rethink that statement and look in the mirror.
No, I don't think so; I don't condemn either hippies or standard mainstream farmers for their methods, whether I disagree with either of them, and I certainly don't like the implied suggestion that I'm a hippy if I don't do exactly what you do. It's non-tolerant and not a great recommendation of the state of civilized humanity. You negatively branded hippies and lumped me in with them because I follow a more natural method of poultry keeping, as well as coming out with line after line of claims concerning compost which even a simple google search would prove you weren't talking about compost at all. Your statements about compost defy the actual definition of the word.

Obviously not ok for you, lol.
Yes, actually, it is. Hence my statement that it's ok for us to disagree. This is known as a debate. Otherwise, instead of arguing my point, I'd be spouting something similar to the hippies statements, for example implying you're a redneck, as a way to somehow discredit your stance as opposed to mine. If you imply anyone using composting is a lazy and over-ambitious 'pseudo-hippy', there are some who will take offense at that and correct you on your assumptions, especially when you make it abundantly clear you don't know the difference between muck and compost.

Note: I'm not implying that you or anyone who doesn't compost are rednecks nor am I insisting composting is the only way. I accept it hasn't worked for you, but I'm not trying to completely discredit your chosen methods; compare that to your own stance. It really is ok to disagree.

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.
I'm already in that forum often enough, though not for my own flock. After I stopped 'mucking out' so often and got compost composting, I stopped having the majority of problems the average farmer has. The only problems I'm still working on are inherited ones from the random stock I keep bringing in, which I'm happy to work on rather than cull, if I've got no strong reason to destroy the animal. My long-term and established flock doesn't have problems, basically. It's always the new ones. Not counting injuries, obviously.

However, since I've been moving house so many times, and the poultry have been agisting on various properties, their health has suffered from the long break in their usual standards of care, so I do expect I'll be dealing with some different problems soon. It's all part of the job description.

The first half of my original post was a reply to dawg53, hence the fact it followed his post to me. The SECOND half of my post, under your quote of his post to me, was a reply to you. Your reply to my reply to dawg53 will take some abstract replying to... lol.

Again, best wishes. There's more than one way to achieve the same end.

 

[armorfirelady]

Wood ash. Dust bathe them in it. Several times. Will kill mites/lice. I have never had them but use it as a preventive. I do know people who have used this with chickens that were mite infested and the wood ash completely got rid of them,

you also need to remove all the littler from the coop & either burn it or bag it and get it off your property. Neem oil on roosts and in cracks where white washing cant cover also works. Several people I know said the wood ash, removing litter and whitewashing their coop has gotten rid of the mites.
If they are scaley leg mites you can use several applications of bag balm to rid them

 

[milola]

Pretty crazy conversations here. But I have to chime in. I am definitely lazy, therefore I use the deep litter method. I must say I am amazed that I can go in the coop once every couple of days and stir up all the litter and have no ammonia odor and see that the prior poops are crumbled into basically what looks like sand. Even with the water drips from the chicken nipples (more laziness) once stirred together it rapidly dries out. I absolutely would use antibiotics and or chemicals, but only as a last resort because I believe that they are way overused and have created the resistant super bugs. I have a big pan of wood ash and finally saw them dust bathing away in it today. As everything else seems to be working I am going to assume I won't have a mite/lice problem. Also I did not use medicated chick starter. I did use a pre-package pro-biotic and never saw "pasty butt". I was reading so much on here and frankly was terrified and expected to lose half my chicks before they ever got started. But instead I listened more to my 86 yr. old father and the more naturally inclined people on these boards and everything is going quite nicely.

 

[chooks4life]

Agree with milola, the overuse of antibiotics has developed 'superbugs', I believe antibiotics are best avoided rather than used as a matter of course. Not that I'd attack anyone for using them. My apologies to anyone mixed up in the snarky debate.

Also, my apologies to the thread starter, I'll un-hijack your thread now, didn't expect such an acid reflux in response to my response to your question regarding 'getting rid of mites naturally.' If you want to do things more naturally there are always people who will take it quite badly and attempt to correct you, usually with the aid of ignorant and arrogant insults. You'll need a thick skin to stay your course about it because some people out there have vicious and aggressive prejudices about it. Not that I'm saying Michael Apple does, but some people certainly do. Then there's those who may disagree but keep their thoughts to themselves, and those who know that almost no discipline of medicine or science is mutually exclusive.

I don't have a problem with hippies but am heartily sick of it being a catch-all negative term used to slander and brand anyone who tries to do things the way they've always worked. You'd think, if you listened, that life on earth only began after pharmaceutical drugs were developed, and livestock keeping has only been possible since then. Long-range history blindness. >.>;

 

[loveourbirds]

the methods you should use truly depends on the time and money you can invest. lets say you have 10 chickens with lice/mites. your options would be DE which is a crawling insect killer (more for snails and such) pyretherins from chrysanthemums, seven dust which is a different substance altogether, or my personal new favorite spinosad.

to use the DE the lice/mites must eat it directly for it to work, water washes it off very easily. you would have to re apply every couple of days for a couple weeks or more for it to actually work. as a preventative however it is priceless (in my opinion) as a preventative mix it in with bedding, a handful in 12-16 square feet of bedding about 2 inches deep.

pyretherins will kill lice and mites, but it can also cause skin irritation/feather loss. there is a similar chemical found in dog shampoo's called d-limonine (sp) it actually does a better job killing lice/mites/fleas but im not sure how safe it is on birds. it will take about 3 doses to completely kill the bugs.

seven dust - i have used this with great results, but be careful not to get it in the eyes. to much of this will also cause a fine dust in the air. and dust in the air causes respiratory infections. if you use this i do recommend a second dose in 3-5 days and a third dose in 2 weeks.

spinosad is not real common yet, it is a byproduct of beer making. it can be applied as a liquid, according to the FDA it is safe to eat. it still takes 2-3 doses but is not near as harmfull as some of the other listed chemicals. they are starting to use it more on dogs and cats.

i skipped wood ash for a reason. some woods (oak especially) when burned produce lye if its ash gets wet it could be bad for your chickens. it can produce enough heat to burn their skin and feathers or even cause death.

i also seen garlic listed. garlic typically wont get rid of an infestation, but will aid in prevention. it also has a lot of good effects on treating certain tumors and cancers. dried garlic and garlic pills typically wont work as well as raw garlic, but raw garlic can burn soft tissues in the mouth.

neem oil would probably work great, but i believe (and i could be wrong) its not supposed to be used on livestock. i have never used this. it should be fine as a coop treatment.

something else i have never used is ivomec (spelling) for cattle. ive heard it works great but again im not sure how safe it is.

on the last note, the best preventative i have found is ground up tobacco stalks in the bedding, the natural nicotine seems to get rid of (over time) and keep insects at bay.

 

[the foot]

My one year old layers were dying and I thought maybe I had a mite problem. I started using sevin dust in the coop when I change out the shavings and the chickens are back to being very healthy productive birds.

 

[loveourbirds]

7 dust does do the job. its probably the easiest to get. you can also mix it in the bedding to keep them from coming back.

 

[chooks4life]

Quote: In Australia they sell neem oil for use with every type of livestock, for insect removal/deterrence and wound healing via skin application too, and recently I cured my old cat of a life-threatening infestation of blue pigeon lice with neem oil. It's used for people too, for everything from athlete's foot to acne.

Quote:
The old insecticide grade DE they used to sell would kill insects as large as cockroaches simply through slicing them up till they bled to death. They do sell larger grade DE as horse wormer, I'd think that might be big enough particles, but don't know for sure. There's many grades of DE and they're all of different particle sizes and hardnesses, and some are filter-only.

In the other threads there's info on ivomec/ invermectin and that family of drugs, I advise against their use unless absolutely necessary because they have some nasty and fatal side effects including coma and blindness. I'd certainly never use them on poultry but I'm sure someone somewhere has. It amazes me how tough poultry can be/

As for garlic, well as usual I'd blame the strain/cultivar or processing, it's always worked excellently for me but obviously some people haven't found the correct type, or whatever is the problem there; it's entirely possible that they can't get hold of decent garlic where they are, in which case alternatives must be used.

Quote: I wish I could get hold of natural tobacco! Think of all the smokers who wouldn't be dying of emphysema if they could smoke a non chemicalized alternative. Of COURSE natural tobacco is illegal. Of course. lol.

 

[dayspringfarm]

Chooks4life, can you please let us know how you feed the garlic? Are you actually crushing raw garlic and putting in on their feed everyday? Thanks for your help.