Organic method for treating chicken lice?

[loversday002]

I got one hen think she Red Star or Sexlink that pecks all her front neck feathers out and then her chest.
Wasn't too bad for a while. She is fearful and gets chased a lot but mostly stays out of the way. Figured if she got used the place she would be fine. She hangs mostly with a Gold Wyandotte she came with.
Got better for a while now worse than ever.
She has a big red bulge of skin looks like a golf ball on her chest.

I have been given them Cayenne and Ginger in their food.

So today I got out the essential oils of Lemon Eucalytptus, Citronella, Tea Tree, clove and Pennyroyal which is fine as long as pregnant women don't eat it.
I mixed the oils with a homeopathic stress lotion and some pure aloe concentrate Mannose and a little calendula and coconut oil.

It was real thick liquid so I squeezed it out of a dropper and smeared on her skin. The aloe and calendula will help heal the skin and the rest should scare off any mites or lice if there are any. Could be she just does this feather pulling thing as nerves. But it tastes so bad every time she would try to peck at this stuff on her chest she would have to rub her beak in the dirt.
I am hoping the lotion will stay on a day or more and it will keep her from pecking herself.

But I also noticed one other older Buff Orpington who lays eggs with wrinkles in the shells, went broody for a few weeks until I took her and put her in a private pen with a roost and no nest box for 3 days. Cured the broodiness and she lays an egg every couple days or so now. She is probably old, her eggs are beyond Jumbo. But I noticed the side of her neck all plucked out so I put some of this lotion on her neck and near her vent where it looked like some feathers had been broken off and some plucked.

So maybe I do have some critters on the one that spread to this one when it went broody. I will keep the oils going daily for a while and see what happens.

They all love to go to several dirt baths where they free range on several acres. I thought my spearmint and peppermint that grows in one part of the pasture, an old garden would keep the bugs away. But they roam too much I guess or the bug found them.

I cover the runs and coop and the hens with DE regularly. As well as our goats who share the range with them. And a little PDZ zeolites to absorb nitrogen and ammonia odor on the ground.

lol i was just wondering... how old is your Buff Orpingtin that lays the wrinkled eggs? :3 i have a Bard Rock that does the same thing but she is 8 years old... i was thinking it was because she was old

 

[Earthologie]

QUESTION:

If one kills all the adult lice in a coop & on the chickens (wether using organic methods or man-made synthetic chemicals), and then repeats their actions to kill the young lice before they are able to hatch out more eggs,

wouldn't that be enough to stop them completely?

I once brought home two chickens that had lice. I looked and didn't see any crawling on them. But when I got them home, they were jumping all over me after I put them into their quarentine area.

I treated with DE twice, and never saw lice again.

Someone wrote in this thread that if a person only uses organic methods, they will always have an infestation. I don't feel this is true if one times the applications correctly and really , really cleans.

 

[Beekissed]

Whoever stated that is obviously not using all natural methods properly.

 

[Hulia]

I have used Neem Oil in a warm bath (as it needs warm water to dissolve) and I have also sprayed coop, replaced bedding and also sprayed areas where the chickens take their dirt baths. Like any organic remedies, or otherwise it seems, you do need to reapply/rebath, but neem works well with all pests in the garden also.We spray our veges with it as you can still eat them the following day, and I use it for aphids and a few bacterial problems on roses. It works on plant pests by eventually breaking the breeding cycle, so I am curious to see if it does the same for lice. I am due to redo chickens tomorrow for lice, and hope to get on top of the problem this summer. I have previously used it on a goat with lice and it worked perfectly. You do have to watch eyes in particular, as it can cause problems, so be careful should you choose to give it a go. I wait for a really warm, fine day to bathe them too, just to make sure they don't get too cold. I have also heard that lice are species specific, but I don't think the same can be said for fleas.

 

[CaliBlueChicken]

I didn't know that about neem oil, yet another use to add to the list. Thanks for sharing!

 

[aggiemae]

Personally I think DE is a waste of time but soap and water bathing, followed by neem oil to eliminate the infestation then providing wood ash for dust bathing and using sand on the coop floor seems to work.

 

[dianacirce]

Regular Dawn? Or any variety of Dawn? I just posted that I discovered lice on my girls and I have been treating with DE and gave a salt water batch today and got a lot of dead lice, but I do see a lot of eggs on the feathers near her vent

 

[Cluky]

I have a question on this washing thing. how many total chickens do you have? Typically they say if one has them to treat all of them, which I think SEVIN dusting would be manageable. But a wash, although sounds better, would be touch for someone like me who has 8 chickens

 

[Beekissed]

I wouldn't wash a chicken..it removes all their natural protective oils on skin and feathering. Best to use what they use for cleansing and parasite control and use a dust of some kind. Sevin is not organic, nor is it anything I'd put on my chickens but there are other things out there with which to dust..sulfur powder, sweet lime, wood ashes, etc.

 

[dianacirce]

I have 4, getting ready to get 6 more, and I used a combination of food grade DE and an all natural product called Poultry Protector that I found at Tractor Supply Co. It took me about a week, but I don't see any bugs, they aren't preening themselves and itching at themselves any longer. I also got 2 eggs today, and I haven't been getting any for the last 5 days. I am going to keep up with the DE every few days, as well as making sure there is some in their dust bath area, and keep sprinkling it on their bedding. And now, once a week, I will spray their coop and run with the Poultry Protector. I've also put DE where I see the wild birds hanging out and dust bathing, that is probably a waste of time, but it makes me feel better. On top of that, we have also added a roof to the run, at least that way there is less likelihood that wild birds can leave droppings in their run for them to come in contact with.