The Mite Inspection Routine Every Keeper Needs

There are two categories of external parasites in backyard chickens: feather mites (red mite, northern fowl mite) that live on the bird or in the coop cracks, and lice that live exclusively on the bird and its feathers.

Red mites are nocturnal. You will not see them on birds during the day; they hide in cracks, roost joints, and nest box corners and emerge at night to feed. The best way to detect them: run a white cloth along the underside of the roost bar after dark. Red to rust-colored smears and tiny moving dots are red mites.

Northern fowl mite is the most common backyard species in North America and is detectable on the bird during the day. Look at the vent area — the feathers around the cloaca will be darkened, matted, and may show black speckling (mite eggs and frass). Parting the vent feathers reveals moving gray-to-red dots.

Inspect every bird individually once per month in warm seasons. Mites reproduce fastest between 75-90 F, which is also peak laying season — the worst infestations come in July and August, when production is highest and the keeper is least inclined to do a thorough inspection.

Treatment progression: for a light infestation in one or two birds, wood ash and diatomaceous earth in the dust bath, combined with cleaning out the nest boxes and painting the roost-bar joints with raw linseed oil (which suffocates mites in cracks) is often sufficient. For a moderate infestation, permethrin spray (0.25% solution) applied directly to the birds' vent area, under the wings, and along the back, and sprayed into coop cracks and corners. Repeat in 10 days to kill eggs that were not contacted in the first treatment. Ivermectin drops (0.2 mg/kg applied to the skin at the neck) are the heavy option for severe infestations, with a 14-day egg withdrawal period.