Help?!!!
So in Salt Lake there was a small coop w/one lonely little silkie hen, who has been treated as a pet, sits on your lap to be brushed, etc. I couldn't resist and I could use a small coop for my upcoming chick order. ANYHOW's... precious little silkie is INFESTED w/mites! They weren't visible, even looked because the owner said he'd seen one a couple wks ago and gave her a bath. Also gave her a bath last night and didn't see any. We picked up her this afternoon, I looked and didn't see any.
So "Betsy" rides to Summit County on my daughter's lap in the back of the car. After we get home and Betsy is in a dog kennel we had fixed for her (coop hasn't bn picked up yet thank heavens). We put our tiny bantam in there for company but w/in 5 minutes it was obvious they weren't going to be friends so Izzy went back to the outside coop. Now DD's itching and tadah - little red mites start making their grand appearance. They are for sure not fleas.
I have never experienced this in owning well over 100 chickens. I had son googling what to do, daughter in shower trying everything from a vinegar wash, to epsom salts, then shampoo. I had sprayed a dog flea & tick spray (has pymethrin sp?) on the silkie (now in the bathrm sink). Asked my son to read the tiny print on what to do next.... "Do NOT spray directly on animals". Just great.
So she immediately gets a bath, flea & tick shampoo, then vinegar mix, epsom salts, rinse, repeat. By now we've run out of hot water and daughter and bird are shivering. Betsy let me hold her upside down, spread her legs, stretch her wings, scrub her vent. She had at least 100 of thse little buggers and just when I thought I got them, more would appear.
Finished the bath, used a white towel to dry to find and pick off at least another 50. I think I got close to getting rid of most. The dog kennel is now outside, I put fireplace ashes in with the chickens in the garage (which Betsy's cage was next to), and Betsy is in an incubator with hay and ash. She's dried out but hv a low wattage lamp for heat just in case. She was breathing funny but that seems to hv stopped. No interest in eating, she preened just a little and is now asleep. btw, her prior owners took her in the house every night and so she's used to sleeping in a small dog kennel for bedtime.
I never did pick up the DE (stupid). Any suggestions and advice would be greatly appreciated. I've googled and have read chickens mites can not spread to humans and other animals, but also read the opposite. These could also be mites from mice & rats since they lived right next to Cottonwood creek. No neighbors w/chickens and she was the only chicken. They are not microscopic bugs, tad bigger than a flea, red, flatter not fat, crawl no jumping.
I also wonder if the elevation or cold up here kill them and that's why I've never had them? We hv mice in the barn run around the chickens and still havn't ever had this.
Help! Any advice would be so very much appreciated. We all have the crawlies and husband isn't real thrilled w/the wife. Are my dogs and chickens in the garage in danger of getting them too (and maybe the outside ones for the brief encounter with Izzy)? I am in for a nightmare on chicken street?
Thank you for any help!
julie
Edited to add -- I am reading the mite thread here on BYC. Not sure where (or if) I can get Sevin (could on egg producers?). Still trying to identify if I we now hv "chicken mites" or ones fm mice/rats. I hope my description of them will ring a bell for someone with experience here in northern Utah (maybe they're different than warmer climates crawlies?). Oh, also read I could drench her in mineral oil and wash her with Dawn soap. Anyone tried these methods? I'm just at a loss. Hoping I didn't kill her and worried I've gone and infected every living soul here.