Chicken Mite Identification
Have you ever found your chickens scratching like crazy and wondered what’s causing them so much discomfort? It might be chicken mites – those tiny bloodthirsty parasites that can wreak havoc on your flock. As a backyard chicken keeper myself, I’ve had my fair share of battles with these pesky critters and trust me, early identification is key to winning the war!
In this comprehensive guide, I’ll walk you through exactly what chicken mites look like, how to spot them on your birds, and most importantly, how to get rid of them before they cause serious harm to your feathered friends.
What Are Chicken Mites?
Chicken mites are small external parasites that feed on your chickens’ blood These tiny creatures are oval-shaped with a hard exoskeleton and typically measure about 1-2 millimeters in length – making them difficult to spot with the naked eye.
When I first encountered mites in my flock, I literally got the “heebee jeebees” thinking about these tiny vampires crawling all over my precious birds!
Physical Characteristics
Here’s what to look for when trying to identify chicken mites:
- Size: About 1-2 millimeters long (smaller than a grain of rice)
- Color: Usually brown or reddish-brown, especially after feeding
- Shape: Oval-shaped body with eight legs
- Behavior: Most active at night, especially certain species
One important thing to note is that chicken mites can change color depending on whether they’ve recently fed. After feeding on blood, they often appear red or reddish-brown, giving them a “rusty” appearance. When they haven’t fed, they may look more pale gray or opaque.
Common Types of Chicken Mites
There are several species of chicken mites that can infest your flock. The most common ones include:
1. Red Mite (Dermanyssus gallinae)
Also known as chicken mites or poultry mites, these are perhaps the most common. They’re about 0.7mm in size and usually pale gray in color, but turn reddish-brown after feeding on blood.
Key characteristics:
- Nocturnal – they hide in cracks and crevices during the day
- Can survive up to 5 months in a vacant chicken coop without a host
- Often called red, gray, or roost mites
2. Northern Fowl Mite (Ornithonyssus sylviarum)
These mites are slightly smaller than red mites and dark gray to black in color. Unlike red mites, they spend their entire lifecycle on the chicken.
Key characteristics:
- Present on chickens day and night
- Commonly found around the vent area
- Often mistaken for red mites
- Rapid life cycle of just 7 days
3. Scaly Leg Mite (Knemidocoptes mutans)
These microscopic mites burrow under the scales on a chicken’s legs, causing thickening and deformity.
Key characteristics:
- Cause crusty, swollen legs
- Can lead to lameness in severe cases
- Target primarily the legs of chickens
4. Other Types
There are several other less common mites that might affect your flock:
- Depluming Mite – Burrows into skin at the base of feathers
- Tropical Fowl Mite – Similar to Northern Fowl Mite but found in warmer regions
- Cyst Mite – Forms nodules in bird’s skin and muscles
- Feather Mite – Feeds on feather oils and debris
How to Identify Chicken Mites on Your Flock
Finding these tiny invaders requires some detective work. Here’s how I check my chickens for mites:
-
Examine at night: Since some mites (like red mites) are nocturnal, check your chickens after dark with a flashlight.
-
Look in the right places: Focus on examining:
- Under wings
- Around the vent
- On the skin near the base of feathers
- Legs and feet (for scaly leg mites)
-
The blow test: Hold your chicken and gently blow on their feathers to reveal the skin. Count how many mites you see to assess infestation level.
-
Check the coop: Examine cracks, crevices, roosts, and nesting boxes for mites or their droppings (tiny black spots).
Mite Count Assessment
According to experts, here’s what your mite count means:
- 5 mites counted = Possible infestation of 100-300 mites per chicken
- 6 mites counted = Possible infestation of 300-1,000 mites (light infestation)
- 7 mites counted = Possible infestation of 1,000-3,000 mites with tiny clumps visible (moderate infestation)
- 8 mites counted = Possible infestation of 3,000-10,000 mites clearly visible on skin and feathers (moderate to heavy infestation)
- 9 mites counted = Possible infestation of 10,000-32,000+ mites with large clumps and scabbing (heavy infestation)
Signs Your Chickens Have Mites
Mites can be hard to spot directly, but your chickens will show symptoms if they’re infested. Watch for these telltale signs:
- Excessive scratching and preening
- Restlessness, especially at night
- Feather loss and damaged skin (especially around vent and underwings)
- Pale combs and wattles (indicating anemia from blood loss)
- Decreased egg production or refusal to lay in nesting boxes
- Soiled feathers with mite excrement
- Weight loss and lethargy
- Stress and depression
In severe cases, mite infestations can even kill chickens due to anemia, particularly young birds and broody hens.
Can Humans Get Chicken Mites?
Yes, unfortunately, chicken mites can bite humans too! While they don’t live on humans as they do on chickens, they can cause irritation and discomfort.
When checking for chicken mite bites on yourself, look for:
- Small red or pink bite marks (1-3mm in diameter)
- Itching or inflammation around bite sites
- Bite clusters, often on the face, neck, arms, or areas with lots of hair
I’ve personally experienced this unpleasantness – finding tiny mites in the litter when cleaning my coop and then feeling like they were crawling all over me afterwards. Not a fun sensation!
How to Get Rid of Chicken Mites
Once you’ve identified that your flock has mites, it’s time to take action. Here are some effective treatment options:
Natural Treatments
-
Diatomaceous Earth: This powder made from fossilized algae is my go-to treatment. Sprinkle food-grade DE in the coop, particularly in cracks and crevices, and dust it on the birds (avoiding their face and respiratory areas).
-
Garlic Juice: Mix with water and spray around the coop to repel mites. You can also add a few teaspoons to your chickens’ drinking water to boost their immune systems.
-
Essential Oils: Eucalyptus, lavender, and peppermint have natural mite-repelling properties. Dilute properly with water and spray in the coop.
-
Herbal Nesting Box Blends: Herbs like mint, lavender, and rosemary in nesting boxes naturally repel mites with their aromatic oils.
-
Dust Baths: Ensure your chickens have access to dust baths, which help them naturally control parasites.
Chemical Treatments
For more severe infestations, you might need stronger solutions:
-
Permethrin: Effective against mites but follow instructions carefully as it can be toxic if mishandled.
-
Ivermectin: A powerful anti-parasitic that should be used under veterinary supervision.
-
Pyrethrin Spray: Can be applied directly to chickens (avoiding face and eyes) and in housing.
-
Poultry Protector: A safer commercial option with no egg or meat withdrawal period.
Important Note: Avoid using Frontline or similar products meant for dogs and cats, as these chemicals can appear in eggs. Also avoid Sevin Dust (Carbaryl), as its use on animals has been revoked due to cancer concerns.
Prevention Is Better Than Treatment
To keep mites away from your flock in the first place:
-
Regular coop cleaning: Clean and disinfect weekly, especially during warm months when mites multiply faster.
-
Deep clean occasionally: Do a thorough clean of the entire coop, addressing all hiding spots.
-
Proper ventilation: Ensure good airflow in your coop to discourage mite populations.
-
Regular inspections: Check your birds weekly, especially during summer months.
-
Dust roosts: Apply food-grade diatomaceous earth to roosting poles.
-
Quarantine new birds: Keep new additions separate until you’re sure they’re mite-free.
When to Call the Vet
Sometimes, despite your best efforts, you might need professional help. Contact a vet if:
- You notice severe symptoms like extreme feather loss or skin lesions
- Your chickens show signs of anemia (very pale combs and wattles)
- The infestation doesn’t respond to your treatment efforts
- You’re unsure about what type of mites are affecting your flock
Final Thoughts
Dealing with chicken mites can be frustrating, but with proper identification and prompt treatment, you can keep your flock healthy and mite-free. Remember that these pests won’t go away on their own – a single treatment isn’t enough, and you’ll need to be consistent with your approach.
I’ve learned through experience that prevention truly is the best medicine. Regular coop maintenance, frequent health checks, and providing dust bathing areas have kept my flock mostly mite-free over the years.
Have you dealt with chicken mites before? What treatments worked best for your flock? I’d love to hear about your experiences in the comments below!
Disclaimer: While I’ve shared my personal experiences and research on chicken mites, always consult with a veterinarian for the best advice for your specific situation, especially when using chemical treatments.
How to Check for Chicken Mites
Chicken mites are extremely small and often barely visible to the naked eye. Mite infestations are often easier to identify since egg masses have built up and the parasites will be regularly feeding, making them appear larger and darker in color. However, once a parasite problem reaches the infestation stage, it is more dangerous to your flock’s health and harder to treat.
The easiest place to examine a chicken for external parasites is around the vent region, or amongst all those fluffy butt feathers! Most of the time you can part the feathers about an inch above the vent and find a clear patch of skin where there are no feather tracts. Examine that patch of skin for crawling parasites.
You can also use the tape trick to try and get a sample of external parasites if your birds are infested. Use a piece of tape and stick it against the base of the feathers around a chicken’s vent. Don’t stick the tape on the chick’s vent. Gently pull the piece of tape away and examine it for any parasites that got stuck to the tape. If you have a microscope at home, you may find it fascinating to examine the small bugs under the microscope. Microscope examination can help you accurately identify what type of chicken mite your flock is dealing with too.
Another way to check for a mite infestation is to examine the chicken coop. The mites will be most active at night around the roosting area since this is when they can come out and easily feed off of the chickens. Use a flashlight to look for tiny, dark, crawling bugs on the roosts. You can also stick a sharp blade into any cracks or crevices around the roosts. If the blade comes out with red smears, then you know you crushed some mites that had just been feeding. Wiping a white cloth or white piece of paper along the roosts is another way to check for red smears which indicate feeding mites.
If you have diagnosed a might infestation in your flock, you will want to start treatment right away. The longer the parasites are left untreated, the more they can grow in number. Each individual mite lays an egg mass that can hatch hundreds of more mites, allowing the parasite population to grow exponentially and leading to serious health concerns for an infested chicken.
Chicken mite treatments can range from all-natural approaches to synthetic drug treatments. For serious infestations, drug treatments will be your best choice to treat the parasites as quickly and effectively as possible before they cause more damage to your flock. If you catch the chicken mites before they become a serious infestation, some simple all-natural treatments may get rid of the parasites effectively.
Types of Chicken Mites
The three most common chicken mites to affect chickens are northern fowl mites, red mites, and scaly leg mites.
- Northern fowl mites feed on a chicken’s blood and are most common in northern regions since they prefer cool weather. They can live both on a chicken and in the chicken coop. They are one of the most common external parasites to affect backyard flocks.
- Red mites also feed on a chicken’s blood but are more common in warm, humid climates. They are not as common in the United States and can also live on and off a chicken.
- Scaly leg mites are tiny burrowing mites that live under the scales on a chicken’s feet and legs. They feed on the keratin found under the scales and are quite common.
Thankfully, most chicken mites have a short life cycle. They live, reproduce, and die all within about a week to ten days. However, they can be hard to completely get rid because most treatments don’t kill the parasite’s eggs, also called ‘nits’. A treatment can kill any live parasites, but the parasites can return once the nits hatch.
A parasite infestation will negatively affect a chicken’s health. Mites can cause anemia since they feed on a chicken’s blood and, if an infestation is left untreated, it can be fatal. Scaly leg mites are not known to be as fatal, but they can cause extreme discomfort for a chicken and can cause loss of toes.
How To Check Chickens for Mites & Lice
FAQ
What does a chicken mite look like?
Adult female chicken mites are small, at only roughly 1/32” long. They have flat, oval bodies, and are nearly white when unfed, but become bright red when recently fed, turning gray to black when the blood meal is partially digested. Chicken mites are covered with tiny hairs across their back and have long, whip-like mouthparts.
What is a chicken mite?
Chicken mites are extremely small bugs, or external parasites, that can live both on and off their host. The general shape and color of these small parasites varies depending on the species of parasite. The best way to identify different species of external parasite is by the shape, color, or number of legs the parasite has.
How do I know if my Coop has chicken mites?
You can tell you have chicken mites if your flock shows visible distress, like excessive scratching or restlessness. You may also notice changes in appearance, such as feather loss or damaged skin, especially around the vent and underwings. When inspecting your coop, look closely for these critters, especially in cracks and dark corners.
What do northern fowl mites look like?
Unlike the red mite, the Northern fowl mite spends their entire life on the chicken. They are very tiny (around 1/26 inch) so they are barely visible with the naked eye and are a black/red color. If you suspect mites then you should pin up a white cloth in your coop near where your chickens roost.
Do chickens have red mites?
Unlike red mites, they spend their entire life cycle on the chicken, causing severe skin irritation and stress. Infestations are noticeable around the vent area, where they feed and lay eggs. These mites can lead to feather loss and decreased egg production.
What are the different types of chicken mites?
Here’s a closer look at the most common types of chicken mites: Red Mite (Dermanyssus gallinae): These mites are small, about 0.7mm, and usually have a pale grey color. However, after feeding on blood, they turn a reddish-brown. They live in cracks and crevices in the chicken coop and come out at night to feed on the chickens.
How can you tell if chickens have mites?
Do humans get chicken mites?
Yes, humans can get mites from chickens, though not in the long term, as chicken mites are host-specific and cannot survive indefinitely on people. You may experience temporary skin irritation and itching from these bird mites, which are essentially a temporary nuisance. The bites are usually not harmful but can cause small, red bumps or a general rash. To remove them, you should wash and shower immediately to cleanse the mites from your skin and clothing.
What kills chicken mites instantly?
What do chicken lice look like?
Chicken lice are small, wingless insects, often golden or brown, that look like a squashed sesame seed and are most easily spotted by their tiny, white, cluster-like eggs (nits) attached to feather shafts, particularly around the vent, under the wings, and at the base of the tail. While the adult lice are visible, they can be hard to see against the dark feathers, making the white eggs the most reliable indicator of an infestation.