Martin's Viper Insect Dust & Mites

[BackyardDove]

Today I made the grim discovery that I have mites in my coop. A few days ago I had a chicken drop dead out of nowhere, and today I had another chicken suddenly become weak and lethargic, despite being fine a few hours ago. Well, I've done all I can for the chicken, now it's just a wait and see if she pulls through. She been given electrolytes with added vitamins and had food and water available to her, and she's of course been separated from the others. She's also been dusted for mites.

She has a pretty bad infestation of mites, which is apparently common for Silkies to get due to their unique feathers. Anyways, she appears perfectly healthy(no feather loss, noticeable weight loss, etc.), but once you finally find her skin underneath all the fuzz, she's got mites running around everywhere. The base of her neck feathers are practically caked in eggs. I've never had a mites issue before, but I have a suspicion that a wild hen who's been sneaking into their coop and run these past few weeks gave them mites. I check my girls at least once a month, but never seen anything wrong with them or any mites. Anyways, in my haste to try and save this chicken, I went out and bought the first mite pesticide I could find at my feed store. I bought Martin's Viper Insect Dust. Is this stuff any good, or do I need to find something else? I noticed that the instructions only specifically mention that it kills the Northern Fowl Mite, but I'm not sure what species my girls are infested with. They move way too fast for a picture, but they're quite small and a clear or whiteish color.

Meanwhile, I'll be ordering some netting material to keep those **** wild chickens out of my run. They pick on my girls, but I lived with it because they lay their eggs in my run too. But I won't let my chickens be bullied AND be given parasites by wild hens.

Edit: After further research, it looks like my chickens have lice, not mites. Still, I don't know if Martin's Viper Insect Dust is a good treatment or not.

 

[Folly's place]

It's permethrin, and ??? (I couldn't read the tiny print) and is labeled for poultry. It will kill lice and mites, but be careful and wear at least a N95 face mask when you dust the coop and birds! Clean out the bedding, and dust the floor under the new bedding. Go out when the birds are roosting and dust all of them. It's a miserable job, but those lice/ mites need to be gone! Mary

 

[BackyardDove]

It's permethrin, and ??? (I couldn't read the tiny print)  and is labeled for poultry.  It will kill lice and mites, but be careful and wear at least a N95 face mask when you dust the coop and birds!  Clean out the bedding, and dust the floor under the new bedding.  Go out when the birds are roosting and dust all of them.  It's a miserable job, but those lice/ mites need to be gone!  Mary

Yes it's .25% permethrin and some other ingredient I can't remember the name of. The sick chicken I dusted has much less live on her now, but I did still find a couple lice running around. Should I dust her again? Or maybe I wasn't thorough enough? She's a Silkie, and their feathering is so soft and thick that it's hard to know if I was able to rub enough of it to the skin.