I recently (a couple of weeks ago) realised my chickens have lice!! Oh the shame!
I have one cockerel and 6 hens. The cockerel was persistently preening his rear and that is how I realised. I don’t know where they came from, but I am in the UK and our flock free range all day in the garden (with wild birds around). We recently introduced a new rescue hen but had quarantined her for a few days (yes I know this probably should have been more like a couple of weeks) and had inspected her and she seemed fine.
We picked up 2 products from a local farm supplier;
Barrier Red Mite Concentrate for the birds; and Nettex Total Mite Kill for the coop.
I will attach photos of both products. I have been using them for a couple of weeks, spraying the birds with Barrier diluted solution every couple of days. I have also bathed them in turn in a diluted Barrier solution when I have seen a cluster of lice on one of them. I did a deep clean of all our chicken areas (coop, spare coop and nest boxes), and have alternated the birds between the main and spare coop every 3 or 4 days, and cleaned them out completely and gave them a spray again. Oh and I have used DE under the pine shavings bedding when the coop was clean and dry.
However, I keep finding lice on the birds! I have to be honest, I don’t think there is many compared to some things I have seen online, it is just one or two, or a small cluster per bird - but that is one or two too many!
I have read that permethrin is the thing to use, but it is the Nettex coop product that has this ingredient. I understand that Barrier is all natural ingredients. My query, is the Nettex Total Mite Kill safe to spray on the birds themselves? Or any other thoughts or suggestions?
I have one cockerel and 6 hens. The cockerel was persistently preening his rear and that is how I realised. I don’t know where they came from, but I am in the UK and our flock free range all day in the garden (with wild birds around). We recently introduced a new rescue hen but had quarantined her for a few days (yes I know this probably should have been more like a couple of weeks) and had inspected her and she seemed fine.
We picked up 2 products from a local farm supplier;
Barrier Red Mite Concentrate for the birds; and Nettex Total Mite Kill for the coop.
I will attach photos of both products. I have been using them for a couple of weeks, spraying the birds with Barrier diluted solution every couple of days. I have also bathed them in turn in a diluted Barrier solution when I have seen a cluster of lice on one of them. I did a deep clean of all our chicken areas (coop, spare coop and nest boxes), and have alternated the birds between the main and spare coop every 3 or 4 days, and cleaned them out completely and gave them a spray again. Oh and I have used DE under the pine shavings bedding when the coop was clean and dry.
However, I keep finding lice on the birds! I have to be honest, I don’t think there is many compared to some things I have seen online, it is just one or two, or a small cluster per bird - but that is one or two too many!
I have read that permethrin is the thing to use, but it is the Nettex coop product that has this ingredient. I understand that Barrier is all natural ingredients. My query, is the Nettex Total Mite Kill safe to spray on the birds themselves? Or any other thoughts or suggestions?
