Sorry for posting on the wrong board friends :-(

[Verlin]

Hi friends,

I do apologize for posting here instead of the Emergency board, but I always find far more interaction here because many like me just does not have the time to read every forum. I did just post this same post on BYC exboard, but want all the help I can get, so I post here too.

I think I will also post this on the General Forum in the new BackYardChickens.com board & hope I don't upset anyone because I sure don't want to do that. I still get confused as to which one I should be posting on. But then, I truly am a medical, mental disaster area.

Even my doctor was pulling his hair yesterday as to where to go with all my escalating issues. I left his office after Carol & myself talked with him for about half an hour, with no new answers. O well...probably more chickens is the main answer don't you think?!?!?

I mentioned this problem we are having in another thread not long ago, but never pursued it further because we though we had this problem on the run. Sorry to say, but NOT.

One of our year old Mottled Cochin Bantam roosters from last years group had a very bad infestation of Northern Fowl Mites. We had given him to another person late last fall, but their cat got hold of him & he was injured pretty bad. They brought him back to us & we spent 2 weeks nursing him back to full health. We believe that he contacted the mite problem while away from here; we have not had any bad problem with mites before, so this is our suspicions as to where they originated from. We dusted all our chicks about the same time & believe we missed him because of his injuries.

About four weeks ago I noticed Louie being very pale looking & listless acting, so I brought him inside & we looked him over & found the very bad infestation. We bathed him in dog flea shampoo, dried him good, gave him a few shots of Adam's Flea & Tick spray with Skillstop, dusted him very throughly with a dust that has Permethin as the active ingredient & kept him in that night. We also gave him a dose of Rooster Booster, which put color back in his crown & wattles very fast, it's high in Iron.

We also inspected all the other guys & found some mites, but no infestation. We sprayed & dusted all of them anyway & put Permethrin in all their coops & yards.

The next morning we gave Louie another bath with the flea shampoo & another round of spray & dust. When he dried good we dusted him again, gave him more Rooster Booster & put him back out.

We did another round of spray & dusting to all the chicks at 5 days. At that time we noticed a bit of infestation on two of the hens, so brought them in & went through the whole bath, spray & dusting routine. We again did another dusting for all of them after another 5 days.

We ended the whole thing after one more 5 day dusting & thought we had the mite issue whipped, but still not.

We finally had the time to completely clean out all the coops & yards last Friday. We scrubbed the coop areas, including all the perches, with Oxine, 1/2c to a gallon of water. Anything we could not scrub, we sprayed with the mixture & we left their coops bare, no bedding at all, just the wood floors. After they dried we dusted with the Mite dust & D.E. including their perches.

We also cleaned out their enclosed yards which had straw on the ground for them through the winter & dusted them with D.E. & Mite dust. We also raked out the 25 foot long uncovered part of their runs.

While doing this I noticed Louie was once again getting listless & his ear lobes were swollen up. I caught him & we inspected him throughly & found a mite infestation around his neck, ears & even his eye lids.

We did the whole bath, spray dusting again three days ago & today was the follow up dusting so I caught him before he was off his perch this morning. His ear lobes are still swollen up & his eye lid on the right side was matted shut this morning. I was able to get the eye open & completely dusted him again very heavily, even his poor little eye areas.

Is there anything specific I can do for poor Louie to get this cleared up from his eyes??

I do believe that cleaning out the coops & runs will help get this under control, but there must be something else we can do to put an end to this very big problem.

Any ideas friends, I'm getting very desperate & my energy level is so low that this is really making a physical & mental basket case out of me so I truly appreciate any help I can get.

Well that's it. I am sorry for this being long...again & of course in the wrong forum. Thanks for tolerating me, I know I am a real pain in the butt at times.

God bless each of you, my friends at BYC. Have a great day.

 

[bayouchica]

Hello Verlin, I always enjoy reading your posts & you're not a pain, okay?
I'm no expert but maybe you can get some teramycin eye ointment, your sweet roo may have an eye infection. I'm just grasping at straws I don't know what else to tell ya.
They may have it at a vet's office or feed store.Or here's a link to Jeffer's Livestock
http://www.jefferslivestock.com/ssc...B0C29PSQF6SGHFLXXEC48RRD&pf_id=229&cmkw=N2-J1

Again it's always so nice to see you around & I hope some else can give you some more advice..

Take care of yourself, Miriam

 

[prariechiken]

I don't think you are supposed to be getting dust "in" the eye areas. I always try and keep all dusts, sprays, dips, etc. away from the head of the birds. I just figure I myself wouldn't want an insecticide or pesticide poured in my face. If you got the dog dip, (don't know how this mix works on chickens myself), in his ears, might be infected as well. I'd be sure and spray down their coops with a good bug killer while they are not inside it. Those little bugs crawl off of birds and hide in cracks and crevices in the pens themselves. Just be careful not to over-medicate to cure this problem. Too much pesticides/insecticides will cure your bug problem by killing your chickens. I knew a guy that mis-mixed some malathion dip and darn near killed his whole flock. Be sure and protect yourself with the proper protective devices as well. Good luck...

 

[blue90292]

OMGoodness, you poor thing! that's alot of work. i'm so sorry.

my suggestion is to keep louie quarantined. and that's alot of pesticide going on him. it can't be good for him. keep him separated and AWAY from that area where the mites were/are. get some new (not what you have around the house) shavings or straw sprinkled with DE for him to be comfy in. every couple of days clean out that crate he's in and clorox it and burn the shavings/straw. i would do that for about a couple of weeks until he gets his strength back and you have the situation with his infestation under control. this way you can get rid of some of the variables that you're having to deal with.

too much pesticide is not going to be a good thing. after a while those mites will become immune and then you'll be in bigger trouble.

crossing my fingers for you that things get better.

 

[TheBigWRanch]

I agree, that sounds like way to many pesticides. My uncle used to many on his dog once, and the vet said he had given him brain damage. I've never heard of someone using dog flea shampoo before, but maybe it works, I'm not sure. I would get human grade D. E. if you want to dust him daily. I used a livestock lice powder on my goat once. It said to do it every 10 days till the lice were gone, so we did. Then the goat lost all of her hair, so we took her to the vet and he said we massively over did it. He said to use it once, and then again in 3 weeks, no more than that. The swelling in it's ears might be a reaction to the pesticides, and the eye problem is probably from getting pesticides in it. Rinse them very well with water.

 

[Llysse]

Maybe you can try raw (not boiled) linseed oil on the coop? Sometimes an oil like that will smother the mites and eggs on surfaces. Raw linseed oil takes a long time to dry, so it works for a long time. This wouldn't be a linseed oil finish, just plain old linseed oil. You can ever get food grade linseed oil if you have the bucks. It's pressed from flax and a lot of people use it as a nutritional supplement.

You'd still have to find a way to get rid of them on your chickens, though, but the oil might help in the coop.

 

[allen wranch]

You can also get a product called Ectoban. It is powdered permethrin you mix with water and spray down the coop. The spray gets into cracks and places the mites hide.

I hang Die-No-Mite pest strips at the entrance to all my nest boxes and chicken doors. It is like a flea collar and also contains permethrin. Every time the birds go in and out they rub against it and it delivers a LOW dose of the permethrin. I have not seen a mite since I started using them. Jeffers Livestock has the strips and they are not expensive at all.

 

[Verlin]

Hi friends,

JJ put me on a new track today, but I am really worn out now since I haven't stopped all day, trying to get my special little roo healthy again.

I had also posted on the ezboard BYC. That one was moved to the Emergency forum, bad thing to post a medical issue on the General Discussion forum you know!

This is the link, there is some very interesting posts done by the best researchist in all BYC land, Diana, or dlhunicorn, she is absolutely great, but then so is JJ, I really appreciate all your one on one time today JJ.

http://p072.ezboard.com/fbackyardchickensfrm4.showMessage?topicID=4691.topic

Well I have the new improved holding cage all set so when Carol gets home we can bath our little Louie & get all that insecticide off him & see how the special natural products & the Vet RX does for him.

Wes reminded me that Orange Guard will work for mites if sprayed in the coops, soaking everything. I do believe I have half a gallon on hand too.

That would make my day just a bit better for sure.
http://www.orangeguard.com/

God bless all of you friends, thank you so much for all the great help. I can always count on you guys to give me a hand.

Verlin

 

[Llysse]

The Orange Guard sounds great! I wonder how long it repels the mites--I didn't see that info on their site's FAQ. Just to be clear, though, I wasn't suggesting mixing linseed and kerosene, which works, I guess, but seems kinda icky and stinky. (I don't think I'd like to sleep in a bedroom that had been soaked in it!). Just the linseed, which smells, uh... like... uh... linseed oil.

Not as pleasant as citrus, I'm sure.