Yes we all have seen a huge surge in all forms of mite this year, it is not our fault but that of amazing weather conditions but treatment is costly so accurate treatment is vital.

We have had so many orders for red mite powder this year which is great for me but overall not good news for you, but correct usage will help you and your birds and save you a few £ and lose me a bit of revenue. Our aim though is also to sell you a product that works.

If you have a chicken house that has thousands of mites or even 100’s then red mite powder will NOT work, this is classified as an infestation. At this stage you must let the birds out do NOT clean the house and use our mite kill spray very liberally then close the house for 60 minutes and let it do its job. The mites are dead. Now clean the house (if you cleaned the house before you were rescuing them by removing them outside before spraying them. Repeat this spraying in 5 days no later than 7 days as all the eggs will hatch and you will be infested again, kill them in 5 days and you have d=broken their cycle, do not spray in 5 days and the first spraying becomes a costly respite only as they are back.

Now you have sprayed the second time the red mite powder comes into effect as a PREVENTION rather than cure, sprinkle small ammounts of red mite powder where the perches meet the walls of the houses and in the knooks and crannies of the house. I work on the principle of mites come down to feed and back up to hide and rest so think like a hungry mite and you will know where to sprinkle and kill them.

Large ammounts of red mite powder are usless, think light dusting on a regular basis and it will work, a large clump makes it ineffective.

Hopefully this will save you a few £, keep mites away and make keeping chickens more enjoyable for them and you.

(Sorry if you have a felt roof on your house the above does not really work as the mite will breed under the felt and you can not treat them, please remove the felt and worse case replace with corragated roofing so mites will not live there then use the method above)

We now offer ivermectin 0.8% mite and parasite killer for chickens. This great product has many uses, it can kill chicken lice, red mite (that bite birds) and as a parasite killer it is also a wormer. It is amazing just 6 drops on the nape of large fowl or 3-4 drops on small fowl and the job is done for you it can be found on our site at Ivermectin .

Like any bird wormer there is a withdrawl period of 10-14 days for eggs for human consumption. If you are also using for red mite, this treats the birds only against mites that bite them. RED MITE are house dwellers so you will need to treat the house as well. Ideally using red mite powder and mite kill spray.

Chickens should be wormed every 3-6 months and this makes the job super easy.

Of course we make money selling red mite sprays and powders but we prefer healthy chickens for our customers. Red Mite will live and breed under felt and you will never be able to kill them off, you will spend £10’s to £100’s on treatments that will never kill the safe eggs under the felt on the roof. Please save yourself money and hassle and stay away from chicken houses with felt roofs. It really is not worth it.

If you have a chicken house with felt on the roof and are struggling with red mite, please please get rid of the felt, mite will live under there and you can not get to them. If you have felt roofing strip it off and try a product called onduline similar to corragated sheeting. Now assuming you dont have a felt roof, we recommend using a red mite powder in the nooks and cracks and around the perches each time you clean the poultry house. This is normally a natural product, ours is diatom earth, which cuts the cuticle of the mite as it walks over it and then it dies of dehydration. If you have a big outbreak it is too far gone for this product and you will need to spray the chicken coop with mite kill spray (Not with chickens in it) this will kill all mite there at the time, you must do again in 3-5 days to kill all the young that have hatched since the first spray. After this please revert to using the powder.