Growth/lump/rock like thing INSIDE one side of wattle

[Kiki]

You may want to research this a little more but here is something that you can use to treat your yard.



http://npic.orst.edu/factsheets/imidagen.html

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19003778


https://www.mdedge.com/cutis/articl...es/whats-eating-you-sticktight-flea-revisited
Sticktight Fleas - Echidnophaga Gallinacea Bites - Flea Bites on Humans

 

[Eggcessive]

Thank you Dawg53 for chiming in on this thread. Always helpful advice.

 

[dawg53]

Stick tight fleas are not like other types of fleas that carry transmittable diseases; like rats infested with fleas transmitting bubonic plague in the Dark Ages of Europe. That's why they called it the Dark Ages IF my history memory is correct. (A big IF lol.)
I suppose these types of fleas are a Florida thing. I havnt heard of anyone else from a different state dealing with them. Please correct me if I'm wrong. If so, I'd bet it's a southern state.
That said, this link that Eggcessive provided is from the University of Florida in Gainesville, Florida...the capital of the stick tight fleas themselves. I'd think they'd know a thing or two about them down there, and up here in Jacksonville. I've plucked a couple myself. Please read "Health Effects" in the link below. I'm not dead and my birds are all healthy lol.
http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/mg236

 

[thegreenacrehomestead]

Eggcessive got it right. Those are stick tight fleas and permethrin or any other chemical or dust has no effect on them, neither does ivermectin. You have to suffocate them much like scaly leg mites, then pluck them off one by one with tweezers, almost like ticks with the heads buried in the skin. The only difference is that their heads dont break off like it does sometimes with a tick.
Treating the soil with chemicals really doesnt help because of the rain, not even malathion, liquid sevin nor liquid permethrin. The only way is for them to go away is for it to stop raining and dry up and/or cooler temps. Or if it were dry enough, you could burn an exclusion zone outside the pen perimeter 6' out from the base of the pen, if your birds are penned all the time. Speaking of burning; burn all bedding. Spray the inside of the coop with a bleachwater mixture to include roosts and nest boxes. Let it dry and repeat one more time, it should help control them. It wont work on soil.

As far as the wattle goes, I'd open it up and get that infection out of there. Then flush it with betadine and pack it with neosporin. Just to be safe, open his mouth and see if there are any lesions present.
I forgot to add that stick tight fleas dont transmit diseases unlike other types of fleas.

We opened the infection and dug as much out as we could - I'll be keeping an eye on it and applying a medication tonight. I'll return to try and get the rest also. I wanted to do it in one sitting but the roo started to really get pissed and it became dangerous to try and scrape things out of the spot.

As for the stick tight fleas, it'll be almost impossible us to completely get rid of them because I don't know WHERE they are coming from as everyone around me has farm animals. This roo and his ladies are in a new, untreated coop. I just started treatment on it.

In my main hen house, we got the stick tight fleas and I significantly DECREASED their numbers by spraying the ground every day with sevin yard spray (while they were out of the hen house) and Vet's Best Flea and Tick Yard Spray. I can walk into my main coop now with crocs on, no problem. My chickens have dust bathed their fleas off. I also lay down a healthy amount of DE when in their house. I am 100% sure the Vet's Best kills the stick tight fleas because, before using it, I got a couple live fleas and drop them in a jar with the spray. They were dead within seconds. I also use this spray in my house on my dog beds and it's safe and essential oil based. I still spray when the ladies and gents are in their run, though, just to be safe

 

[Kiki]

http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/mg236

Quoted from the above webpage:
"If fleas are too numerous to remove individually, a flea product registered for on-animal use should be applied according to label instructions."

Permethrin kills fleas.

 

[dawg53]

I found this link that might help you treat your lawn with Dawn dish detergent.
https://www.hunker.com/13406499/lawn-treatments-for-fleas-using-dawn-dish-detergent
Check this link out and the chart at the bottom comparing the bedbug, red chicken mite, and stick tight flea:
http://www.poultrydvm.com/condition/fleas

 

[dawg53]

Quoted from the above webpage:
"If fleas are too numerous to remove individually, a flea product registered for on-animal use should be applied according to label instructions."

Permethrin kills fleas.

They may be killed on the chickens, even by smothering them with vaseline. They still have to be plucked out with tweezers. They dont drop off like fleas on a dog when they're given a bath. Entrenched dead fleas in skin can become infected, gotta be plucked out, like a tick.

 

[Eggcessive]

Here is another article from Australia which gives a lot of details about how the fleas and larvae survive, and recommend cement floors over chicken houses and roosts:
https://www.agric.wa.gov.au/livestock-parasites/stickfast-fleas-control-and-eradication

 

[Eggcessive]

SWAT original horse fly repellant ointment could work as well, and is natural and made from pyrethrins, plus has an ointment base that would smother the fleas.

 

[dawg53]

Here is another article from Australia which gives a lot of details about how the fleas and larvae survive, and recommend cement floors over chicken houses and roosts:
https://www.agric.wa.gov.au/livestock-parasites/stickfast-fleas-control-and-eradication

It's a good idea, cement floor. I'd hate to clean the poop though, especially cecal poop...yuckers. They probably take a hose to it, that would be easy. But as much as chickens poop, that's alot of hosing.