MITES AND LICE ON POULTRY. 



CONTENTS. 



Page. 



Mites. 3 



The common chicken mite 3 



Scaly-leg mite, depluming mite, and other 



mites 10 



Chiggcrs ("red bugs" or harvest mites) 12 



Lice 12 



Lice on cliickcns 12 



Lice en turkej's 18 



Lice on geese and ducks 19 



Page. 

 Lice— Continued. 



Pigeon lice 20 



Lice of the guinea fowl and ptafowl 20 



Control cf poultry lice .20 



Scdium fluorid effective against all lice . . 21 



Other remedies for lice 26 



Supplemental control measures lor all pests. . 27 



A me thod of avoiding poultry pt sts 28 



External parasites are one of the most important factors operating 

 to retard the development of the poultry industry, but it is difficult 

 to determine which of the parasites are of greatest importance. 

 Both lice and mites are found in practically every locality where 

 poultry are raised. Where present in any considerable numbers both 

 lice and mites reduce egg production and hinder the growth and 

 reduce the quality of flesh of all classes of poultry. 



MITES. 



THE COMMON CHICKEN MITE.i 



Poultry raisers are all too familiar with the common red or gray 

 mite which infests poultry houses. In general those v.dio are making 

 a specialty of poultry raising have comparatively little trouble with 

 mites, or at least they keep them reduced to a point where they are 

 of little importance. On the other hand, farmers and others who 

 raise poultry as an iccident to other operations frequently find their 

 chicken houses overrun by mites. The attack of this blood-sucking 

 mite is of an insidious nature which does not readily draw attention 

 to its presence, and often the poultryman is not aware of an infesta- 

 tion until he is attracted to it by the irritation produced by mites 

 on his own body through coming in contact with the infested coops. 

 The presence of the pest may be determined readily by the detection 

 of small areas on the boards specked with black and white as though 

 dusted with salt and pepper. This is the excremen t of the mites,which 

 are hidden in adjacent cracks or rough places. More careful examina- 

 tion will reveal masses of mites in hiding, together with their eggs 

 and the silvery skins cast bv the voung. In moderately infested 



I Dcrmanysius galUnae De Gcer. 



