Lice or Mites - Tried DE and they're still there... What to do?

[redhen]

DE wont work.. you need REAL meds to get rid of them.
Ivermectin pour-on... 1/2cc dropped on th ebacks of their necks (on the SKIN)... will kill the mites and worms too.

 

[Bonnie Gentry]

Quote:
I just joined this forum and have gotten some great info in the last couple of days, How safe is seven dust? surely the bird will preen off the powder. I have read a lot of post who recommend it... how much should I put on a full grown bird? how much of the pour on ivomec would I use? right now Im dealing with leg mites and saw my roo scratching too, do leg mites stay on the legs or travel the body as well? Im treating with vaseline 2 x a day now.

 

[foxinachickenhouse]

Zaneymama, I feel your pain with not wanting to use the chemicals on the birds. I had a bad infestation this winter and ultimately had to resort to the permethrin product - poultry dust. It is a synthetic form of pyrethrin which is derived from chrysanthemum flowers, not so bad. There is no egg withdrawl time for this product. It worked well. I hear not as toxic as sevin or ivomec. I dusted every saturday night for 3 weeks. Had both mites and lice. Now the girls are laying again and feathers are coming back in. Happy chickens.

When it was warmer, I used a 3 dip bath for mine and it worked for awhile. 1st dip: Dawn dish soap and borax. 2nd dip: bleach 1 cap per gallon. 3rd dip white vinegar and water. Swish bird around and get them very wet. scrub around the tail and vent area with fingers, under wings, neck area. Then I used this product, the spray on protector and I think it needs to be applied frequently. http://www.carefreeenzymes.com/id36.html

Nevertheless, the bugs came back in the winter and not wanting to drench the birds with baths and sprays, I resorted to the powder. I also cleaned the coop well (several times), sprayed pyrethrin and dust with DE and the Poultry Dust especially on the perch. At this point I gave up worrying about the organic products. The bugs are too tenacious. The nylon stocking powder puff method worked well, get underneath the tail feathers and the wings. I have also heard of hanging the stocking in the pop door so each time the birds go through they get dusted.

hope you get them under control, they can get bad fast.

 

[gumbii]

tea tree oil...?


i heard it repels them....

 

[dawg53]

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I dont recommend tea tree oil. https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=408353

 

[BlacksheepCardigans]

Neem DOES work. Works well and is documented in the research. Make a 40:1 solution of neem oil (you need to use the pure stuff) and water, shake it, apply and rub in all over the birds. You have to treat them ALL. Treat the coop as well.

I go almost nuts over the recommendations for DE; it just doesn't work well when it's used the way people are recommending using it and it's a respiratory risk as well. If you use it and don't have mites, it's because you don't have mites, not because the DE is working.

Remember that whatever solution you use (organic best practice would probably be neem on the birds and a spinosad spray in the coop, but if you're not trying to stay organic you can use a ton of things) you must treat EVERY bird and EVERY inch of the coop. Treating here and there, or treating individual birds, never works. You've got to nuke the mite population or it just keeps coming back.

 

[CMV]

Very interesting read, BlacksheepCardigans . It's almost worth the $34 to get the rest of the article. I have read about neem oil on several occasions, but I have never felt comfortable using the product because I question it's efficacy. I use the tried and true methods. I have mites too often to resort to questionable methods of bug control.

 

[Judy]

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Where is the pour on type of ivermectin located at TSC is it for cattle? how is it measured for a chicken, can I over dose the bird? Im treating my rooster for scaley leg mites now with vaseline. Would ivermectin help cure this type of mite?

In my TSC it was under lock and key, around $30 a bottle as I recall. I found a review on Amazon that says it worked well for leg mites, on chickens in whom topical treatment was not working. Look here, and then read the reviews:

http://www.amazon.com/Durvet-Ivermectin-Pour-On-250ML/dp/B000HHOEIU

The dose for Ivomec Eprinex is 0.5 cc for LF and 0.25 cc for bantams, but this is eprinomectin, not ivomectin. It is also what my TSC had. Whether these are essentially the same thing I don't know, but I do know that both are widely used on this board for worms. One form of the drug is used on people in Africa to treat river blindness.

 

[fishnet1971]

there are so many different things to use that I am begining to get confused. I am just getting over a huge load of mites and lice too. Seems that a lot of us are having infestations right now.

 

[CMV]

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Yeah, it's that magical time of the year! My birds usually get loaded with mites all spring/summer/fall from free-ranging, but they can dust bathe to keep the numbers down and they spend very little time inside their coop. This time of year they can't dust bathe because everything's frozen solid, they don't free-range because of the snow and they spend more time in the coop to stay out of the wind. A recipe for massive bug infestations.

Don't let the huge array of info dealing with pests overwhelm you. Just pick your poison and see if it works for you. If it doesn't seem to be working out for whatever reason then move on to something else. I used to use Sevin dust, but decided I didn't like it for several reasons, so I switched over to Eprinex. I love that and will probably use it forever, but if that hadn't been a success then I would have moved on to the next product. There is a ton of info out there, but I have found it necessary to weigh out that info for yourself to make the proper decisions for your own flock. Fortunately, with sites like BYC out there as a resource, poultry keeping is a lot easier. Too much information is preferable to not enough information. Even if it is overwhelming at times.