- Jun 15, 2008
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I went to lock up the chickens to find both my broodies that have been sitting for 2 1/2 weeks up on the roosts. I looked in the nest box and saw lots of little dots on the eggs. We have a ton of gnats around now so that was my first thought but I decided to investigate further. I pulled some eggs out to better light (ignoring the itching feeling on my arms) and saw lots of little red dots with many legs.
We lost some chicks in the brooder behind the nest boxes a few days back to no apparent cause. I guess now we know. The other coop seemed fine but those chickens wander farther, dust bathe regularly right across from the coop, and the only bedding is right under the roosts and in the nest boxes. I'm guessing the higher concentration of chickens, lack of dust bathes, and full coop of bedding is contributing to the mite problem in the small coop. The coop is moving soon so I can't put in any permanent dust bathes but we'll set something up.
I need a plan to get rid of mites. Our nest boxes are plastic so will be disinfected easily enough. Does all the bedding need to come out of the coop? Would it be a good idea to use a thin layer of sand in it's place for a week? What sucks is that we just cleaned both coops and put in new bedding a couple weeks back. I haven't been able to find DE so we can't take that route unless someone has suggestions on where else to look besides feed store and health food stores. I would bet my feed store has sevin dust. Can it be used on 6week old chicks? Then probably something to spray the coop down. I might move the chicks to the pen in the other coop to help protect them and lessen the chicken load on that coop. I doubt anything in one coop isn't going to have access to the other a couple 100' away and I just moved older chicks to the other coop a week ago so there's probably no greater risk of spreading things than already exists.
Just to be certain chicken mites can't infest mammals can they? We have lots of animals including exotics here that would not be easy or cheap to treat.
I need a plan to get rid of mites. Our nest boxes are plastic so will be disinfected easily enough. Does all the bedding need to come out of the coop? Would it be a good idea to use a thin layer of sand in it's place for a week? What sucks is that we just cleaned both coops and put in new bedding a couple weeks back. I haven't been able to find DE so we can't take that route unless someone has suggestions on where else to look besides feed store and health food stores. I would bet my feed store has sevin dust. Can it be used on 6week old chicks? Then probably something to spray the coop down. I might move the chicks to the pen in the other coop to help protect them and lessen the chicken load on that coop. I doubt anything in one coop isn't going to have access to the other a couple 100' away and I just moved older chicks to the other coop a week ago so there's probably no greater risk of spreading things than already exists.
Just to be certain chicken mites can't infest mammals can they? We have lots of animals including exotics here that would not be easy or cheap to treat.
