How long to continue treating for lice/vent gleet before giving up?

[spuddenly]

Hey y'all. 4 weeks ago, I bought two older pullets (hatched in late May/early June from what I can tell). I thought it would be OK because I was buying from an NPIP breeder, but I made the mistake of not inspecting them closely until I got home, and when I found them literally crawling with lice (every feather I parted, I would see lice visibly scurrying away), I honestly didn't have the heart to return them anyway (there were 30+ chickens in a 10x10 space with almost zero natural lighting).

The youngest pullet was in the worst shape with the most lice, a fairly large patch of missing feathers on her saddle area, dry/scabby skin, and extremely smelly vent gleet (we bathed her on the first day and again with Epsom salts + trimming a bunch of her poopy butt feathers on week 3). They were given rooster booster in their water and 18% feather fixer feed, and the youngest no longer has any bare patches of skin and has tons of new pin feathers coming in everywhere. We've also been giving them weekly permethrin dustings, and we no longer see visible adult lice in their weekly inspections, but unfortunately still see lice eggs under their wattles (that I'm combing out with a nit comb). The youngest also still has some level of poop issues as she had some yellow yogurt-like crust around her vent this week, although she's not close to as dirty or smelly as before.

To be clear, the 2 pullets (or as we have dubbed them, the "Sickens") have shown great improvement in the 4 weeks we've had them. In the beginning they were terrifyingly lethargic and barely moved even to eat or scratch on grass. They're now acting like normal chickens, eating grass, preening themselves, dust bathing, scratching up a storm, racing around and doing silly chicken dominance things. They're clearly healthier and much happier chooks - but unfortunately until the lice go away (if they ever? will they ever?) I would absolutely not feel comfortable integrating them into our main flock. I really do not want to introduce lice into our main batch of hens that I hand-raised from chicks and have to deal with that on all my chickens.

Fortunately at least, we've had no issues with contagious respiratory illnesses, Marek's, etc. (the 2 sickens flew outside their quarantined fencing a week ago while we were out and hung around all afternoon outside the main chicken run, so they likely would have caught something from that interaction if there was anything to catch).

So I guess, here's my questions in a nutshell:

1. How much time does it usually take to squash a lice infestation for good? How much more time past 4 weeks should I give these 2 new pullets? It's not much fun maintaining two separate chicken setups (food, water, cleaning, locking them up at night, etc.) and the 2 pullets are in a temporary quarantine area that isn't meant to be maintained long-term and is closer to my neighbor than it probably should be (smell, noise, etc.).

2. If it comes to it, can I in good conscience sell a chicken that I know has minor lice and vent gleet issues at (e.g.) a poultry auction? Or are my options to either find a rehab shelter willing to take them in, or cull for meat once they're large enough?

 

[spuddenly]

On a lighter note, here's a picture of the sickens (older one on the left, younger one on the right). They have absolutely beautiful feathering that has only gotten glossier recently!

As a fun aside, they were sold to me as Blue Laced Red Wyandottes and are definitely not that (they have white/pink legs, not yellow, and single combs, not rose) - I'm guessing they're EEs.

 

[spuddenly]

Just wanted to give an update on this in case someone else has a similar situation in the future.

• I did a bit more research and realized some of the larger lumps of nits/eggs I was finding was potentially empty egg shells from already-hatched lice, and not actually a sign of recurring lice (which made sense since I never saw any actual live lice after week 2).
• I ordered Elector PSP off of eBay ($20 for 10ml). If you buy it directly it's something like $150 for 8 fl oz, but there was absolutely no way I was going to use that much for 1-2 chickens, so I looked for smaller amounts on eBay.

So on Week 5, I put the chickens on a table+high perch and went through their major problem area (under the wattles) with a flea/nit comb until I was confident I'd gotten all the larger nit clumps. I then dusted them again with permethrin.

On Week 6, I checked again and found no more clumps of nits. I did still find 1-2 stray eggs on the youngest pullet, but it was difficult to tell if those were brand new or if again there were just singletons I'd missed in the first combing pass. Either way, the Elector PSP had arrived and (supposedly) works on eggs, so I sprayed them down on their necks/breasts, under the wings, and around the vent. At this point I feel confident that their lice are under control.

So I guess the TL;DR, for those that want it:

1. Comb or cut out all nit clumps as soon as you can (instead of waiting a month in like me) - don't expect them to just go away. This will both help control the infestation and help more accurately identify when lice are gone.
2. Buy Elector PSP and alternate between PSP and permethrin (to reduce the chance of lice building up a resistance)
3. Taking 1-2 months to fully squash the issue is apparently normal. You can probably be faster than my 6 weeks if you do steps 1 and 2 immediately.

 

[Eggcessive]

Did you empty all of the bedding, and treat the roosts, coop, and nest boxes after the first treatment? Permethrin 10 can also be used to treat the coop after bedding has been emptied. Lice hatch out every 10 days, so if the Elector PSP is still working, the newly hatched lice should die. If not, they can be retreated at 10 days intervals, and the new lice will die before they reproduce.

 

[spuddenly]

Yes, bedding was changed every week (sand/sweet PDZ with some permethrin dust mixed in, not terribly conducive to parasites). The temporary quarantine "coop" (a large plastic dog crate - neither pullets are old enough to lay, so no nesting boxes) was sprayed down with both permethrin and elector PSP. From my understanding poultry lice tend to live on the chicken, unlike mites, so I'm not overly concerned with that being the vector at this point, but definitely worth mentioning for completeness. I think most of the instructions for permethrin and PSP will mention spraying down the environs.