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michaela65

Roundworms and help re run

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My chickens have worms, roundworms I think.  Found long spaghetti looking thing in poo.  On flubenvet now.   But I am concerned about their run.  They are confined to a run roughly 10ft by 22ft most of the time and it is bare earth.  It is now getting muddy and it is getting harder to poo pick, which I do twice a day.  Can Stalosan F be used on earth?  They also have access when I am down allotment to an area roughly 10 by 16ft, which is still grass (well more mud and grass now) but I do not poo pick that, should I?  I read chickens were cheap and easy to look after, but they have cost me loads and all I spend a lot of time worrying that I am not looking after as well as I could.  I just want to provide a healthy enviroment for them and not sure how to do it, any advice would be appreciated. 

My routine at present is:

The coop has hemp down on the floor and straw in the nest boxes.  Two of my chickens sleep in the nest boxes.

The run is earth.

I poo pick the coop every morning and add more hemp and straw as needed and sprinkle de around.

I poo pick the run morning and afternoon.  But to be honest by the time I have picked it up they have done more poo.

Every three months I clean out the coop and clean with poultry sheild and put DE in all the cracks and crevices and replace the hemp and straw.

The run does have a roof but the rain comes in from the side and somehow if raining hard enough makes the entire run wet.  

BTW I have four chickens. I have a dustbath in the run which I add DE to.     I think I am doing everything right but it has been one thing after another.  I initially had four black rock chickens that I got in April.  I had to have two put down.  One of the remaining black rock has had infectious bronchitis, the other black rock looked like she was going to prolapse after laying her first egg, her bum would come out but go back in.  But ever since her bum seems lower and she always has lumps of poo stuck to her bum feathers.  I feed them marriages layers mash and pellets and give them treats such as melon, grapes, meal worms, corn and greens late afternoon (I sometimes think they eat better than i do lol).  I think I am doing it all right, but now they have worms and I am sure it is because of the run.

 

 

 

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It sounds like you are doing a good job so I wouldn't worry too much. They can get worms from where they were raised, wild birds, bedding (unlikely) etc so it's not your 'fault'.
I would cut out the sugary fruits, probably all the treats really, as they will wait for those instead of filling up on nutritious pellets. They only need an egg cups worth of treats between them and only a few afternoons a week (mainly in winter). Our chickens rarely get treats, only occasional stuff from the veg patch.

Flubenvet is a good start! Ordinarily I wouldn't suggest it but as you've seen worms I would repeat again in 3 weeks time.

Stalosan F can be used on earth, I used to use the NetTex Ground Sanitising Powder too.

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Thanks for the reply.  Oh dear I have been giving them treats everyday plus corn and meal worms.  Is it bad for their health to have to much then? When you say ordinarily you wouldnt have suggested flubenvet, what do you mean?  Is there a better wormer?   Oh and thanks re sanitising powder, I will get some.   So should I just leave the run as bare earth or would it be better to but something like woodchip down?  I am in the process of doubling the size of the run and the garden bit I let them into, in the hope that the poo will be spread about a bit more, which will hopefully make it healthier. 

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Treats will just take away from the pellets they eat and a bit like me eating crisps every day ...I'll survive but it's not healthy :oops: :lol: 
Sorry, I meant I wouldn't normally repeat the dose - it's a good wormer! An alternative is 1% Ivermectin spot on which will also cover external parasites.

I guess the run is up to you, that would be a lot of woodchip to replace and if it's fine as it is I wouldn't worry too much about covering it.

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Michaela I certainly can’t improve on the advice Lewis has given, I just wanted to second what he said in that don’t feel bad it definitely sounds like you’re doing everything right. I’ve had my own chickens since 2014 and this last month has been the first time that I’ve felt the run is a mess and I feel bad for them. I have woodchip on slabs, so there’s no mud but there are lots of bits around the edges that are so wet it’s horrid. Let’s just hope we get a break from the incessant rain sometime soon.

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Thanks for the replies.  And Lewis I feel such a fool.......your sentence regarding the flubenvet made perfect sense, I just did not read it correctly (brain is turning to mush with age!). 

Its all been a big learning curve with the chickens and I still feel I have so much to learn.  I feel bad because I think penny has had worms for a while as she had poo stained feathers on her bum which I just thought were from sleeping in the nest box.  But just three days into worming they already look cleaner.  

Dogmother is you run fully covered with tarp?  My run has a roof but the rain comes in from the side and also it is clay soil, which was like concrete this summer and now is turning to gloopy mud.  I have covered some parts of the run with plastic but didnt like to do it all........i will try to post a picture of the run. I did put straw down which was fine until it rained :-)

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My runs (cubes mark one) are all covered entirely with glass clear market stall tarps, using bungee hooks to angle them outwards at the bottom so that the rain runs off. I have Aubiose in the runs and it keeps dry and doesn't get muddy. Any dampness in the litter will only exacerbate worm egg issues and eventually foot problems if they are standing in mud and wet. I have fashioned 'porches' on the front of each run, with sheets of clear corrugated plastic wedged under the tarps so that they protrude about 18" over the front of the run. This helps to stop rain from blowing in.

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