Questions about worming layers & meaties

[Sunny Side Up]

On the ground in the chicken pens yesterday morning I found 2 poops containing long roundworms standing up & waving at me.

Yes, it's obvious I need to de-worm the entire flock, but aren't sure about the particulars. I'd like to get some imput from the rest of you.

I have about 60 or so laying hens, kept in 2 adjoining pens. They stay in their pens from nightfall to about 3 PM, then they all go out in the yard together. There are also about 20 bantam hens & roosters who roam the yard & hop in & out of the pens all day long, and roost out of reach high up in a tree. And 9 ducks, 4 geese & 3 guineas who are penned in at night but roam the yard all day long.

I have about 10 families in town who buy eggs from me, I deliver them each Fri. This is necessary to help pay for the chickens' feed.

All right, now I need to de-worm the flock. I have very very little $$$ to spend, cannot afford the Verm-X with the no withdrawal period. I'd like to give them Wazine & hope it does the trick. I was also offered some Ivomec pour-on by a generous BYCer in my area (thank you Kit!) that I think I should use after dosing with the Wazine.

I was thinking about dosing just ONE of the pens at a time, and still be able to collect & sell the eggs from the other pen not being treated. But I'm concerned about worms being spread from the infested pen to the treated pen. So I think I'll dose everyone with Wazine on one day, and tell my customers there won't be any deliveries for 2 weeks. (And look under the couch cushions for spare change to buy chicken feed) Should I keep the chickens confined to their pens the day I dose them with the Wazine?

Does that sound like a good plan? And then after the Wazine, when should I give them the Ivomec? And will there be another 2-week withdrawal period after that?

Also, do you know if ducks, geese & guineas can get the roundworms? Should I dose them too?

I also have a pen of standard-breed meat birds, around 16 weeks old, almost ready to process. I haven't seen worms in their poops, but I'd hate to butcher one only to find it full of worms when I cleaned it out.

I don't have any $$$ to spare to take their poops to a vet for a worm test. Should I give them the Wazine too, just to be on the safe side? They can wait 2 weeks to be processed, if need be.

And should I give my brooding hens some Wazine-treated water while they're setting? If they had roundworms, would it show up in their broody poops?

We've been having so much rain lately that the back part of the yard is a swamp, which certainly isn't helping anything. I need to wait until it's drier to start dosing with the Wazine, because when it's rainy the chickens don't drink as much.

Thank you for reading all this, and thank you even more for adding your imput.

 

[sammi]

if worms are showing up that you can see, then they are probably carrying a heavy load..
you don't always see worms...or the "eggs"..
so..if you're not seeing them in some droppings..doesn't mean they don't have them..

I'd go ahead and Wazine them to get rid of the initial bulk of worms.

then instead of giving them the follow up dose 10-14 days later..
I'd do the Ivomec.
some people like other broad wormers..such as Valbazon (sp?)

http://www.firststatevetsupply.com/store/

see list on right hand side..click wormers..as you click on each one..it gives info..

JMHO..
others might have different opinions.

 

[Sunny Side Up]

Do you think I could butcher the meaties 2 weeks after the Wazine? Must they have a follow-up dose of Ivomec?

And if I treat the layers with Ivomec 2 weeks after the Wazine, must I wait another 2 weeks before using/selling their eggs?

After treating with Wazine, could I still use the eggs for incubating? The local 4-H leader wants some eggs for a classroom incubator a week from now, right about when I expect to be dosing the birds.

Thank you for your imput.

 

[Sunny Side Up]

The weather is getting drier here and I'm picking up the Rx tomorrow but I still have lots of unanswered questions about all this. Could someone please help? Thank you!

 

[Glenda L Heywood]

yes you can slaughter the meat birds after 2 weeks off wormer
try and feed them some
2 tbsp of ACV in their gallon of water
immediately after getting off the wazine

and as for the setting of the eggs
yes do so
the eggs will either be fertile or non fertile
and then you set another setting of eggs the next week

yes you do need to wait out the 2 weeks after worming the birds
as far as not eating the eggs
as for setting the eggs it will be okay

If you only saw round worms you could maybe wait to use ivermectin after the eggs get hatched

generally the round worms are the worst
and they will over load the chickens systm with dead worms
and that can poison the chickens body from injesting the dead worms as proteins in their body

email with any questions