Hen - Occasional eye bubbles, stopped laying, change in comb

[casportpony]

Hi enola, those pictures show a different infestation, they are stuck tight fleas and are in discussion on this sight. Those pictures are on google. They are not what I am talking about. The eye liner on eye lids is as I said. There is such a collection of tick fleas on the eye lid that the chook looks like she has eye liner on. These stuck tight fleas are visible with the naked eye, but you need a magnifier to see the ones that I am talking about. I wish I had taken pictures of chooks with the tick flea, then everyone would be able to see it. Those fleas are also brown to red. TF's are black and very flat.

What type of magnifier will work? 2x, 5x, 10x? Or what about 3.25 reading glasses?

-Kathy

 

[Snow bunny]

Hi casportpony. If you got those pictures off google, you would be wise to have put the cursor over them. They may have come up on Google, the same as it did for me, but other than those pictures, it was all about cats fleas, dog fleas, other blogs and nothing about tick fleas. These are not tick fleas. They are totally different. If you are trying to make me look absolutely stupid then carry on doing what you are doing. I know what I know and that is that. If you cant accept me helping someone with a problem, then don't read my posts, it is as simple as that. To add to this, if a chook has a possible throat trauma, you do not put anything down her throat.

 

[Snow bunny]

Not sure what I use, but reading glasses wont work, I think you will just have to try from the smallest up. That is what I would do.

 

[casportpony]

Hi casportpony. If you got those pictures off google, you would be wise to have put the cursor over them. They may have come up on Google, the same as it did for me, but other than those pictures, it was all about cats fleas, dog fleas, other blogs and nothing about tick fleas. These are not tick fleas. They are totally different. If you are trying to make me look absolutely stupid then carry on doing what you are doing. I know what I know and that is that. If you cant accept me helping someone with a problem, then don't read my posts, it is as simple as that. To add to this, if a chook has a possible throat trauma, you do not put anything down her throat.

I'm not trying to make you look stupid, I just want to learn more about this bug.

• Argas persicus, the fowl tick, the poultry tick; important for poultry; worldwide in warm climates.

 

[casportpony]

• Argas persicus, the fowl tick, the poultry tick; important for poultry; worldwide in warm climates.
• 

 

[enola]

Ugly!

 

[Snow bunny]

Hi Casportpony, if you want to learn, I will help you. Honestly, all that I know about the tick flea has been posted. it is all on enola's posts. But I will explain to you. There is virtually no information of this tick flea on the internet. I cannot post our government information on here as you wont be able to open it. I can tell you that is originated in the top of Queensland, but has spread due to travel and export. The tick flea is black, flat and very small, that is why it looks like a blotch or a scab, as you put it. This is the first sign of the problem. These tick fleas feast on the hen, the eggs go into the sand (that is what we live on) and multiply. They attach themselves to the chook and multiply on the chook. So when you see the bloctch, you start treatment. The chook will not lay, sometimes it affects their balance and it eventually causes paralysis. BUT, it is treatable. There is no panic about it, if chooks get it, they get it. But once the chook gets it you can almost guarantee the coop mates will have got them. That is why you treat chook and coop. If you have concrete as the floor, you have it light. If you have sand or soil as the floor, you have more work. If this is not treated or seen until later, the chook will hunch up and look very sad and depressed. I have seen where a chook cannot eat as the beak was paralysed. It could stab at the food but could pick it up. Now, I have treated chooks at this stage, and you can still bring them back. While I am treating them, I put vitamins in their water and onto their food, plus I give cider apple vinegar in the water. The cider apple is to treat inside to build up a vinegar taste to the tick flea. All you can do is suffocate the tick fleas, then they wipe off. If you try to scratch them off you can hurt the chook. If you want to pick them off you will be doing that for a very long time and they will still be multiplying. So, watch for the blotch, as we say here, and have vaseline and chook flea powder on hand. Honestly casportpony, you may never see tick flea, but when you see the blotch put a thick layer of vaseline on and the treatment will have started. We have no chook vet here, and normal vets wont touch chooks, so we have to do things ourselves. It works for us. I don't know the life cycle as I have never wanted to get that familiar with it. It is a pest and can be prevented. I am currently looking into kitten flea treatment to keep chooks safe from this tick flea. If I find that it is safe enough to use it, I will post it so that everyone knows OK. Please don't panic about this. I put urgent on my post as you need to act quickly, specially if there are coop mates involved. OK

 

[casportpony]

@AlexChat, do you have access to a scope? Looking at it under a scope sounds like a fun experiment!

-Kathy

 

[enola]

That is a good idea!

 

[casportpony]

You give me a file or link and I'll open it, lol. Heck, if you think it's something I can't open, save it to PDF, take a screen shot, use snipping tool or take a picture of the screen with your camera.

I do want to learn, but I really would like to see a document on this bug.

-Kathy