parasite?

[jrsterling]

I've got one girl who originally had a sticky butt. Now either by her or something she is losing feathers on her behind. There are also white clusters of something on the feathers she has. Is this a parasite? Any ideas?

 

[Mehjr10]

Sound like lice egg clusters.. you need to get some poultry dust or sevin dust.. Dust the bird and coop to treat, You can also clip off the egg cluster. Treat those to kill. You can also use liquid permethrin 10 spray mixed up to treat the coop.. For a Natural treatment you can use a Spinosad product by montery.. This can be used on the birds and the coop..

Have you wormed the bird?

 

[jrsterling]

No I have not. They were wormed when I got them. Will rubbing alcohol kill these eggs?

 

[Mehjr10]

You can probably trim them and put them in a bottle with some to kill them. But you still need to treat to kill the egg layers.


You should worm them, I do mine twice a year. I use Valbezan at a dose of .5ml per 4-5 lb bird given orally, with a follow up in 10 days.

Safeguard is also a good one also.

I would not recommend Wazine as it only kill one type of worm.

 

[jrsterling]

Update. I went out and coated their area with sevin dust. I picked up the girl and inspected. The white cluster were very hard and pick many off. Once I did Lota of small light brown bugs went everywhere. I coated the area with sevin dust. Any ideas as to what this is?

 

[heartsizedfarm]

Lice. They are the little light brown bugs you are seeing. The white crusty balls you are seeing at the base of the feathers, those are egg sacs. The eggs aren't affected by the dusting powder, so you have to dust again in a week to kill those lice that have hatched out.

Lice infestation and dusting can be hard on a hen. She may look sickly and slumped. Feed her some special treats like grapes or mealworms to help her cope.

 

[jrsterling]

OK will do. Would it be wise to pick off the eggs? I'm scared to remove too many of the feathers.

 

[heartsizedfarm]

Well I had this once and I pulled out a lot of the feathers that had egg sacs attached. Just plucked them out and threw them away in a plastic bag. Don't leave them in the coop because they'll hatch anyway! My hen squawked a bit and didn't much like it so I didn't get them all. Then I repeated the plucking and dusting the following week.

And if they have access to a nice dust bath area with wood ash and diatemaceous earth in it they can clean up themselves pretty well.

There's another thread in this forum called "revolution yay" which is about using dog and cat anti parasite medication on chickens. Have a look at it!

 

[dawg53]

I've read that coconut oil will remove lice eggs from feather shafts, might be worth a try.

 

[heartsizedfarm]

I've read that coconut oil will remove lice eggs from feather shafts, might be worth a try. 

That's an interesting natural remedy. I look forward to trying that out. Might be preventative as well as curative?