How to protect your show birds from pests when out at show...

[ChicksinFL]

Today we were at the fair showing goats, during a break my youngest daughter and I went over to poultry to take a peak and test her coop card reading knowledge for showmanship next week. As we were walking around I saw where SEVERAL birds were noted to have LICE or MITES but the bird was still right there in the cage next to all the others. This was the open show and we coop in for the youth on Tuesday at the same place open will be gone by then.

I was told birds were checked upon check in for pests and were sent home if they found any .. so if that really doesn't happen how do you protect your birds before and after a show. Is there a long lasting dip that we can use when we bath birds on Monday.. our birds will be at the fair from Tuesday thru Monday. Should I dip them before they leave and when they come home?

Thanks for any helpful tips...

 

[hdowden]

i would qurentine the ones from the show, get some seven dust and sprinkle a little all over the qurentine area and then dust the birds with it from the neck down. other than that i have no clue, the same thing happened to us last year.

 

[ChicksinFL]

I was afraid of that.. I don't have any where to quarantine over half my flock so I guess I just have to hope for the best. My daughter is taking her whole show flock plus some of her sisters show flock out to the fair next week. Then we are taking the entire show flock out next month to another show.

 

[aveca]

We deal with this all of the time due to showing . as soon as we are home and settled in we dust the birds in quarentine. a generous amount all over, many years ago we had a rooster get a vary bad case of lice, we didnt notice it at the time as he didnt go out to shows , he was a breeding rooster.he has his own pen, I inspect them all several times a year, inbetween checks he became infested, we had the vet come out, none of the other birds presented any lice or mites ect... but were treated as precaution, rooster pen was already clean but was stripped, sprayed, and rebedded with light powder in the sawdust...we had to pluck little egg sacs off him and they were burned, they are attached to the feathers especailly around vent area.
The vet said he got them from the wild birds especially blu jays that came in to eat his feed, so watch out for that as well.we have not had a problem since and I inspect more often now.

Some show people take a thin plexiglass sheild to place inbetween your bird and the one next to it, helps reduce the chance of getting newcastles ect if they are not vaccinated..it is cut to standard cage size and smaller ones for smaller bird cages.especially if they have that week long fair stay. works really well at the one day shows. pests are just something that the poultry world has to deal with , but its a harder to treat some of the diseases that can come out of these shows.

 

[ChicksinFL]

We check our birds twice a month for any signs of pests even our free range birds get the once over. We change bedding in the coops weekly and dust with Sevin under and on top of the new bedding. We've not had a problem with pests yet and hope not too. We do have wild birds that come in from time to time but none that hang around due to barn cats. I also have all my runs covered so it makes it harder for there to be a free meal.

I think we'll just have to treat the whole flock when we get home since I have no where to put the birds that went out to the show away from the ones that stay home. My husband might faint if I asked him to build me a whole second 12x12 shed with 8 coops and 8 attached runs. He nearly fainted when I asked him to build me a coop and run for the LF cochins I bought.

Thanks for the tip on the plexie glass .. by any chance do you know the standard size? I will have my husband working on this before we leave on Tuesday.

 

[thea71701]

i can tell you what i use an it realy works. we show to an i got my first case an didnt no what to do at the time but a old timer told me this trick an boy how goooood it works. the flea drop stuff you put on dogs an cats. it last for 3 months but i do it everytime we go to a show or fair. i put 3 drops on big birds 2 on neck 1 at top of vent. little birds i just put 1 on neck 1 on vent. if they have mite already it kills them when they bite an just fall off. so they dont just move to the next bird. i have not had a case sence then an i been doing it for a year now ! i use frontline i know its high but just one tube will do lots of birds. i get the ones for the biggest dogs i can get. it realy does go a long way.

 

[ChicksinFL]

i can tell you what i use an it realy works. we show to an i got my first case an didnt no what to do at the time but a old timer told me this trick an boy how goooood it works. the flea drop stuff you put on dogs an cats. it last for 3 months but i do it everytime we go to a show or fair. i put 3 drops on big birds 2 on neck 1 at top of vent. little birds i just put 1 on neck 1 on vent. if they have mite already it kills them when they bite an just fall off. so they dont just move to the next bird. i have not had a case sence then an i been doing it for a year now ! i use frontline i know its high but just one tube will do lots of birds. i get the ones for the biggest dogs i can get. it realy does go a long way.

Thank you! I will have to try this, we just happen to have a large tube of front line sitting in my cabinet it's for my GP for next month but I can buy another before then. So you would do this after you bath your birds for show? It doesn't make them greasy or anything?

 

[ChicksinFL]

 

[thea71701]

i do it 1 week befor show an no it dont make them greasy dont put on feathers just the skin. it realy works great for me. i do it to all my birds even the ones i dont show. i put it on 2 week old chicks to. just so they dont get them just 1 drop over the vent. i had a big bird RIR that i saved from a realy bad man an this bird was so bad i didnt think he would live i put 10 drops on him 5 up 5 down. i thought he is going to die if i dont do something so i took the chance an im talking had hardly no feathers left an sores all over him an was skin an bones they had just eat him alive. i have never seen anything like it. i had gifted this boy to him cause i thought he would be a good person an help save the breed i want do that again till i see how they treat what they have at home any way lol here he is now!!!! dont have a pic when he was bad but he looks great now an very healthy.

 

[thea71701]

when we got him back the guy said i just dont know what happend to him i think you gave me a sick bird omg i thought i was going to blow my top. then i saw his other animals!!!!!! lets just say he dont have any more babys to miss treat. i turned him in an when the cops got there they said all most everything was dead or dieing!!!!! he can no longer have pets. an was find 2000.00. anyway sorry lol it is great stuff an works wonders. oh if you dont want to do it befor the bath than just make sure you do it 3 days after bath. oh an if you dont want to put it on the neck put it in the armpit lol you no under the wing that way you dont have to worry about the greasy look. lots of skin to put it on there.