Ivermectin Overdose - Afraid I’ve killed my hen :(

[Chickflick29]

I have a serama hen named Buttercup, probably around 1.5-2 lbs, who came down with scaly leg mites - it’s a bad case and has been giving her trouble for a while, so we decided to try ivermectin pour-on after lots of research. I am using the pour-on for cattle and had planned to use a very low dosage. Unfortunately, somehow my carefully recorded .05ml/kg got muddied into .5 ml/kg.. even though I had planned and planned, instead of remembering to add the extra 0 after the decimal and aim a bit under it (should have been 1, maybe 2 drops from the needle-less syringe by my calculation), my stupid self carefully measured out just under .5ml instead of .035ml as intended and administered it to the back of her neck.

I realized 4-5 minutes later and flushed her neck with water multiple times. It has been about 30 minutes, I saw applying dawn dish soap can also help stop absorption so I have just applied a small amount and rinsed her again for good measure. To get an idea for how “overdosed” she was, I re-filled the syringe to the same .5ml spot I’d gauged previously and counted about 6-7 drops as I emptied it.

I’m terrified I’ve killed of my dearly beloved little ladies, and it’s tearing me up to think I’ve done way more harm than good. Does anyone know if the amount administered will kill her? I’m hoping we caught it quickly enough, and perhaps a few drops got shaken off right after it was given, but I’m not hopeful after doing so much reading into how easily it can harm chickens.

 

[BigBlueHen53]

How is she acting?

 

[Chickflick29]

How is she acting?

She was acting normally, she’s roosted for the night so it’s hard to tell now.

The label warns not to administer to livestock when there is rain forecasted within 6 hours, so I’m hoping that means we scrubbed her quickly enough to get most of it off before it soaked in.

 

[BigBlueHen53]

Sounds good, keep us posted.

 

[Chickflick29]

Update: she seems fine this morning and is acting completely normal, she was ready for breakfast and bossing my standard hens around like usual! Fingers still crossed, but I think we may have washed it off early enough!

 

[BigBlueHen53]

Good news! Thanks for the update. May she continue to do well.