240 POULTRY CULTURE 



to a bluish-red color in the adult state. Its head parts consist 

 of a conic-shaped piercing apparatus, with which it pierces 

 the skin and sucks serum or blood. The free extremity of the 

 last segment of the legs are provided with hooklets or claws 

 which enables it to hold onto its host. 



The mite lays its eggs in cracks and crevices and filth of the 

 hen house. If the weather is warm the eggs hatch in a few 

 days into a larva, which is asexual and is provided with three 

 pair of legs. In the course of a very few days it goes through 

 stages of molting and finally reaches the sexually mature 

 eight-legged stage. 



In hot weather, as in July and August, mites multiply very 

 rapidly, and I have seen thousands upon a single hen, causing 

 death of the infested bird. 



Symptoms. — Thousands of mites crawling and biting and 

 sucking blood cause an anemia or loss of blood and emaciation. 

 The bird cannot rest day or night and finally succumbs to the 

 ravages of the parasites. Sitting hens leave their nests, lay- 

 ing hens cease to lay, and such birds may be found dead under 

 the roosts in the morning, succumbing during the night. 



Often under such conditions, if the roosts are taken out in 

 the sunlight, the cracks and crevices may be seen fairly alive 

 with the acari. 



Treatment. — Pour kerosene or gasoline on the roosts. 

 Gasoline is a mild disinfectant and a powerful parasiticide or 

 destroyer of parasites. 



Dust the hens with the insect powder described before, thor- 

 oughly clean the hen house, thoroughly scrub and spray every 

 square inch to saturation, reaching all cracks and crevices 

 with a 2 per cent, solution of creolin, kreso dip, zenoleum, or 

 some other equally good coal-tar preparation. 



Fumigation with sulphur fumes is effective, provided you 

 have a thorouglily tight building, but it is practically useless 

 unless the building can be tightly sealed as for fumigation, 

 as practised by health boards in disinfecting rooms of dwellings 

 following contagious diseases. Therefore, our advice is to rely 

 on the liquid solutions and insect powder. 



If the weather is hot, the hen may be dipped in a 2 per cent, 

 solution of son; e good coal-tar product, as zenoleum or creolin. 



