Uncontrollable mites.

[Goose08]

This chicken has been going through it since day 1. She was the 4th reject of the summer and had a hole pecked in through her chest opposed to her head and that’s why she lived to be 2 months as of today.

Then we noticed she had scissor beak when she was nearing 3-5 weeks of age. Not much of a big deal.

She was fine until last week when I noticed she was gaping and had a lump under her beak. Her tongue had collapsed, which is common in chickens with crossbeak. She wasn’t eating or drinking at all so I’ve been keeping her inside to monitor her, provide food easier, and to syringe feed her egg yolk and yogurt every now and again too give her more energy to eat or drink.

Then I noticed she had mites. Many of my hens have gotten these before, and I never knew the name but I provided them with dust baths, mite spray, and deep cleaning their coop which more than often worked. But for this chicken none of that worked. Today I gave her a bath and really noticed how many there were. She has a clean coop, a dust bath, I consistently spray her, but they stick.

Does anyone know what these are called, how I can treat them more effectively, and what I can do for her? Their so bad I’m considering giving up and culling her since the stress has been leaving a large impact on me, especially on my grades in school.

Thank you for any help

 

[Debbie292d]

The type of mite I'm not sure, but to kill them, you'll need some permethrin powder/garden powder.

It's recommended you clean the coop, bag it up and haul it far from your coop. Burn it if you can.

Then before you let a chicken in there, fluff this powder all over them, paying special attention to under the wings and their vent area. One method some use is to put the powder in a nylon sock, then tap that all over the chickens. Do all of your chickens as surely they've got some too.

Then put your fresh bedding back in and sprinkle all of that including nest boxes and roosts.

Then, do this all again in 10 days because the mites will have laid eggs in the coop and on the chickens. Those will hatch and if you don't redo this, the cycle will start all over again. After doing this twice, you should have eradicated every mite.

 

[chooki]

I would recommend poultry powder too - permethrin/pythethrins based, or those using Maldison as active ingredient.

Since there is a chance of mite/lice eggs laid on the shaft of feather, you need to massage the powder into the root of the feathers.

Personally I put powder on the head, back, tail, under the wings, on the chest, tummy, legs and especially all around the vent area of the chicken, then give my bird a head scratch, a bit shoulder work, some back/chest/tummy massage, a few flaps of the wings and a throughout rubbing around vent area - need to make sure that powder reach all the eggs on the root of the feathers.

 

[Wyorp Rock]

Looks like a Louse, Poultry Lice.

Permethrin based dust would be good to use. Put the dust in a sock then use it like a powder puff to dust her all over, working the dust through the feathers all the way to the skin.

Make sure to dust under the beak, the top of the head, etc. If needed, put a bit of dust on your gloved fingers and work it in in those areas.