Removing Mite Eggs from feather shafts

maisyfleur · **Posted:** Thu Sep 10, 2009 11:52 am

Hi Everyone

I am currently having a big blitz on mites to try and eradicate them from my flock - I only have a handful that keep getting reinfected but they are then spreading on to the others and I don't seem to be able to completely rid them all at the same time.

I have been bathing them all in pyrethrin mite wash and dosing with moxidectin drops but I notice that the ones that are getting reinfected are the ones that had large amounts of eggs stuck to the feather shafts around the vent. Last time I bathed them I tried picking them off and even trying to cut them off with scissors as the little blighters are like glued on!!!!! However this proved really difficult and I ended up having to leave them there and hope that they would die as soon as they hatched. Obviously they didn't as they now have them again.

Has anyone any ideas how I can get them off as I don't want to return any chooks to the pen with either live mites or eggs!!!

Would I have to pluck the whole feather out?? Would this hurt? Is this hard to do?
Is there anything that I can put on the eggs to make them slide off?????

Any advice as always greatfully rec'd

Maisyfleur

Ann@Nanango · **Posted:** Mon Sep 14, 2009 7:23 am

Hi Maisyfleur

Firstly I'm no expert. But when my daughter had head lice (icky things), I just did some research on the internet about their life cycle and then treated the emerging babies as they came out. The secret to eradicating them is to kill the newly emerged lice before they are able to breed and lay more eggs.

It's hard with chemicals as I'm sure you don't like to overuse them. Another thing is to maybe change products (well actually the active ingredient anyway) as the head lice can become immune, not sure about mites though.

Hope this helps. I'm off to do some research on chicken mites.

Cheers for now.

Ann

maisyfleur · **Posted:** Mon Sep 14, 2009 10:08 am

Hi Ann

Have just spent an entire Sunday treating my whole flock of 25. I have weighed, wormed, moxidected and bathed everyone and recorded everything for next time.

Thankfully out of 25 only 5 have bad cases of lice, about another 5 have a mild case and the remaining have no trace. They all still got bathed and treated though just to make it fair!!!

I found that with a pair of rubber gloves on I could rub the eggs between my fingers and get the worst of them off but you are right the only way to fully eradicate them is to retreat once they have hatched. My poultry vet recommended every 14 days but I think I might do the bad ones every 7 days and the mild ones every 14 days until they are all gone.

I have cleaned and replaced all the bedding in their boxes and have removed the 4 silkies with mild scaley leg mite to the cages in the garage for further treatment. All in all I feel much better that I am finally getting on top of all these creepy crawlies.

Unfortunately I have a real thing about germs and dirt etc and was reluctant to even buy chooks two years ago as I thought they were smelly dirty flea ridden animals that I didn't want to touch...........but low and behold I fell in love with these quaint little creatures and am now a slave to keeping them as clean as I would like!!!!! Oh well I love to spend time with them so its all good!!!

Maisyfleur

bunyanuternie · **Joined:** Wed Jul 11, 2007 10:31 pm **Posts:** 2903

Moxi is great stuff and I use a similar product but it is no good for Feather mites it will kill all bloodsuckers and internals but feathermites will power on , get some maldison 50 dunk all 25 again , and whatever you have left in the bucket after dunking put in a watering can and do your perches and pen with

Stinks like all heck but it works wonders

maisyfleur · **Posted:** Fri Sep 25, 2009 12:48 pm

Thanks for that advice - to be honest I did wonder as the research I have done shows that the lice do not suck the blood they just feed off the dead skin etc so the moxi would not be effective against them.

I will get some maldison 50 - where do you buy it from vets or produce stores????

Thanks
Maisyfleur

greenaus · **Posted:** Sat Sep 26, 2009 2:01 am

maisyfleur wrote:

I will get some maldison 50 - where do you buy it from vets or produce stores

Produce store is fine. You might also find it at Big W or Woolies, etc.

yuni · **Joined:** Sat Sep 26, 2009 3:47 pm **Posts:** 2

maldison 50 is great got rid of the mites of my girls and boy. I repeated the dipping after 12 days and that seems to have stopped the cycle I hope
Yuni

oozcorpse · **Joined:** Sun Nov 04, 2007 8:15 am **Posts:** 2715

bunyanuternie wrote:

Moxi is great stuff and I use a similar product but it is no good for Feather mites it will kill all bloodsuckers and internals but feathermites will power on , get some maldison 50 dunk all 25 again , and whatever you have left in the bucket after dunking put in a watering can and do your perches and pen with

Stinks like all heck but it works wonders

^^^^^^^
like bunyanuternie said - this works a treat and yep it stinks !! :-?

Everyone bear in mnind that if you show your birds you have no choice but to remove ALL trace of the mites from the feather shafts or you will get disqualified for obvious reasons

CJ · **Posted:** Sun Sep 27, 2009 6:19 pm

Be careful using maldison 50, we wiped out half our flock using the stuff, even when it was extremely diluted. We use something called "Poultry Dust" it's the same sought of stuff except in a powder form, been using it for awhile now and it works really well!

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