Lice? Mites? Molting?!

[SJsChickies]

I’m at a complete loss. About 7 weeks ago I finally realized that the chicken that was picking at the base of her tail and made herself bald, had some sort of bugs. Looked like mites or lice. Treated the whole flock with permethrin while I waited on the Elector PSP. Gutted and cleaned the coop and boxes and sprayed it all with permethrin. When the Elector got here a week later, I treated the whole flock and coop again. Everything seemed to be fine after that. Fast forward to last week, I noticed picking AGAIN! So I repeated the elector treatment with the flock, cleaned and treated the whole coop again and put down new bedding. Now today it looks like they’re picking still I just don’t know what to do anymore. This is what two of the girls look like (the other 2 wouldn’t let me get a pic, and the youngest doesn’t seem to be picking at all) and the one that picked herself bald is STILL bald What can I do?! It’s driving me crazy and I feel so bad for them. Just in case it’s needed, the 4 that are picking are 7/7.5 months old and the one that doesn’t SEEM to be picking is 18 weeks old. They are on Kalmbach 17% layer and I recently added a 20% layer with it for more protein. I clean out the poop from their coop every single morning. Help please!

 

[AshVau22]

Do you have a rooster?

 

[SJsChickies]

Do you have a rooster?

No rooster.

 

[AshVau22]

It really looks like feather damage from being mounted. Could possibly by dominate female. After treatment have you seen any more signs of mites or lice? The vent area is normally best place to check. How long do you keep the saddles on for? Do they have a dusting area?

 

[SJsChickies]

It really looks like feather damage from being mounted. Could possibly by dominate female. After treatment have you seen any more signs of mites or lice? The vent area is normally best place to check. How long do you keep the saddles on for? Do they have a dusting area?

I haven’t seen any signs of lice or mites anymore other than the damaged feathers. I just held the striped one for a while with her feathers moved to watch for bugs and nothing came. I don’t see anything that looks like eggs, just dirt particles. Yes they have a dusting area that has sand, soil, first Saturday lime and Preen Queen all mixed up. I’m going to try to get a pic of one of the other girls that’s a little worse than these two. I have a saddle on the one who’s got a bald spot cause every time a feather started to grow back she’d pick it out lol. It’s been on for about a week and a half.

 

[AshVau22]

And are you100% sure this is self inflicted or could you possibly have a feather pecker? Usually the one with all her feathers is the culprit if everyone looks pecked but 1. Just a thought.

 

[SJsChickies]

And are you100% sure this is self inflicted or could you possibly have a feather pecker? Usually the one with all her feathers is the culprit if everyone looks pecked but 1. Just a thought.

I was thinking that but the one that doesn’t have any messed up feathers is the lowest in the pecking order and gets chased around a lot. Do you think she would be one to pick?

 

[AshVau22]

Does she roost near the ones losing feathers?

 

[AshVau22]

How often and how long do you sit and watch them?

 

[AshVau22]

Anything is possible, your treatment of lice or mite should have been effective. Also keep in mind they wont regrow those feathers till they molt around 18 months old.