Mites on Baby Chicks

[BuffloverT]

I had my Silkie hen brood a set of five eggs, they all hatched. now they are 3 weeks old. I decided I wanted to try to sex them and when I did I saw little bugs around the vents. I have some poultry dust but I'm not sure I can use it on them, can I and is there any other way to help them?

 

[Mamatomany123]

Not sure about the mites but you can not sex them at 3 weeks old, especially not vent sex them. You can end up severely hurting them.

 

[douglasbirds]

Good question. We used to use diatomaceous earth to control parasitic "bugs" in the hen house. They would dust bath in it and it would Kill lice. I don't know if you can use it with chicks.

 

[BuffloverT]

It might work because the chicks love to do dirt baths, but I will make sure that it is ok for chicks.

 

[parvani]

Diatomaceous earth DOESN'T WORK. Also, it's very bad for chickens to breathe it.

Here is how to get rid of lice --

Go to Amazon. Buy

Boric acid powder (to bathe chicks)
Eprinex pour-on for cattle (to delouse and deworm the chickens)
Glass bottle for spraying olive oil (for applying the Eprinex)
Safflower oil (to dilute the Eprinex to chicken strength)
Leg rings if you have a lot of birds, so you can tell which ones were treated.
Permethrin (to kill lice and mites in the coop and run)

You will also need a clean brooder to raise the chicks for the next 3 or 4 weeks, until the adult chickens and the coop are also free of lice. Many of us just use a large plastic bin with a ceramic heat bulb suspended over it.


BORIC ACID is as non-toxic to people and chickens as table salt. It's deadly to lice and mites.

So you will give each chick a sink bath in warm water with boric acid. Let the chick feel the water as you fill the sink. You will know when the water is warm enough because the chick will stop peeping and actually enjoy the bath.

Add about a tablespoon of boric acid to each quart of water in your sink. It won't all dissolve, but that's fine. The chick may try to drink the boric acid water -- it won't hurt them if they drink a little, but I discourage them from it. I just let them drink all they want of the fresh water coming from the tap.

The lice do NOT like the boric acid bath. They will will try to run up to your chicks' heads to get away from the water when you give each chick a bath. So carefully pour some water over their heads and keep rinsing the lice off.

You will see the lice that came off the birds in the boric acid bathwater. After you think you have washed all the lice off the chick, empty and refill the sink with clean water and boric acid. Bathe the chick in it again, and see how many more lice come off. Repeat until there are NO lice in the clean water.

Don't rinse the chicks when their bath is done. The boric acid residue on their fluff and feathers will help prevent reinfestation if you missed any lice.

Wrap the chick in dry paper towels, and blow-dry them with a hair dryer. Don't get them too hot under the dryer, but don't chill them either. Once a chick realizes the scary dryer isn't going to eat them, they will stop peeping if they are warm enough.

Make sure the chick is VERY dry before you put them into a warm brooder.

Do NOT put them back with the adult chickens until all the lice are gone -- about 3 or 4 weeks, if you do it right.

You will need to bathe the chicks again in 10 days, after any louse eggs have hatched.

DELOUSING CHICKENS with EPRINEX

You probably can't bathe the adult chickens, so you will need to use Eprinex to delouse them. Eprinex is a pour-on livestock medication for killing parasites like lice, mites, bot flies, and several types of worms. It's used off-label to treat poultry for lice, mites, and some types of worms and other internal parasites.

Dosage is 1 ml per 10 kg (22 pounds) of body weight. So a 6-pound chicken needs about 1/4 ml applied directly to its skin.

1/4 ml is just a few drops. You will want to spray more than that under your chickens' wings (where there is usually a bare patch of skin) to make sure you get good coverage.

So to avoid overdosing your chickens, fill your spray bottle halfway with Eprinex, then fill to the top with safflower oil. Shake to blend thoroughly.

As when handling any pesticide, wear nitrile gloves.

Now hold each chicken upside down on your lap. Band the leg if you have a lot of chickens, and find the bare spot on the breast under each wing. Spray the skin and rub the Eprinex to spread it around.

Some birds don't have a bare spot. Just find where the feathers are thinnest and try to spray the skin. Rub it in under the feathers.

Mark the date on your calender. You will need to treat the birds twice more, a week apart, in order to kill all the lice plus the new ones that hatch.

Put all the treated birds into a holding pen so you can treat the coop.

TREATING THE COOP AND RUN
Follow the directions on the package of PERMETHRIN.

Wear eye and face protection.

Remove the feed and water dispensers.

Remove and BURN all old bedding in the coop. If you can't burn it, bag it and take it to the dump. Whatever you do, don't just throw it on the compost heap where wild birds forage for worms and insects, or your birds will be reinfested very quickly.

Spray the entire coop and run, paying special attention to cracks and crevices in the nesting boxes and anywhere your chickens spend a lot of time.

Make sure the Permethrin is completely DRY before you allow the chickens back in.

Permethrin has a residual effect that lasts for several weeks, so you do not need to treat the coop again unless your chickens get lice again several months from now.


Good luck, and please post any questions about treatment!

 

[BuffloverT]

Wow, thank you so much, I do have a few questions, since they are being raised by the hen should I move her into the brooder with them? Because the chicks are very attached and make a huge fuss the whole time they are away from their mom and she also freaks out when she does not have all the chicks with her.

Also, I have about 24 chickens but they are spread over 3 coops that are far apart, should I de-luce all of the chickens or just the coop with the chicks?

And if I do move the hen into the brooder with the chicks how do I keep her from becoming depressed? because last time she was alone with the chicks she became sick and depressed.

 

[parvani]

If you want to keep the mother hen with the chicks, then she will need a bath too, so her lice don't all move back to the chicks. And after her bath she will need Eprinex to kill any lice missed in the bath.

If the mother hen has a friend in the coop, maybe you could bathe that chicken and keep her in the brooding area too. It will need to be bigger to keep a couple of grown chickens, but then you won't need to suspend a heating lamp because mama hen will do the job.

If the three coops of chickens spend time in the same areas, they and their coops will all need to be deloused at the same time. Usually if one has lice, they all do.

Also, you probably transferred the lice to all the coops on your clothes when you took care of your birds. It happens.

But if you want to make sure, choose one small pullet or hen from each of the other coops, and give her a boric acid bath. If she has lice, you will see them in the water. Even if you only see one or two lice, all the chickens will be infested, some worse than others.

 

[BuffloverT]

Thanks, I'll do that!

 

[parvani]

Thanks, I'll do that!

It sounds like you are a very good steward of your flock.

So I want you to know that I do a LOT of research to find the least toxic solutions to the problems of mites, lice, and any other parasites I might find on my chickens.

Boric acid is so non-toxic that I don't bother wearing gloves when I bathe my babies.

Eprinex is the only parasite treatment I found that has NO requirement to withhold milk or wait before slaughtering treated cattle. So I don't worry about my hens' eggs, either, (although when I have enough eggs to sell, I probably won't sell them for eating within the week after treatment.)

I'm new to chickens, so this month I'll be running a test to see if the fertility of my eggs is significantly reduced after treatment with Eprinex. I'll report back next month.

Permethrin is relatively nontoxic once it has dried -- that is, as long as you aren't an insect! As long as your hens aren't breathing in large quantities of the spray, they will be fine.

What I'm saying is, there is no compelling reason NOT to treat all your birds and all their living areas with Eprinex and Permethrin.

Lice don't spend any part of their life cycle off the birds. They can travel from one bird to another, but they lay their eggs on feather shafts, and they need to stay warm to be able to move around. So they live on the birds and in bedding, like nest boxes, where they can stay warm and cozy.

Chicks are too small to treat with Eprinex. That's why they have to be bathed in boric acid and kept away from birds and areas that may still have some lice and louse eggs.

But if you treat ALL your birds and coops/runs, then in just a few weeks your chicks and mama hen will be able to rejoin your flock, and everyone can enjoy a louse free life.

It is recommended to delouse your flocks and coops at the end of every summer, because the birds will spend so much time in their coops in winter.

Also, lice can live on the soil all summer long because it's warm. In Summer, free-ranging flocks that forage for bugs and things in the warm soil pick up new lice as fast as you can treat them. So Fall is the best opportunity to get rid of all of them at once just before the cold weather sets in.

 

[BuffloverT]

Thank you so much!

Do I treat every chicken with the Eprinex or just the bad ones?