[Aunt Sally]

You make your own assessment and take your own decisions - As long as you know what signs to look out for  :!:

A lot of people get piece of mind from regular worming.

[happy chick]

Just wondering about the resistance of worms to flubenvet.  I really don't know how it works with chickens but when we had horses the prevailing opinion at the time was to worm according to worm counts.  This was obviously due to the increasing resistance of the worms/parasites to the active ingredient being used.  Is this a worry with worming ckickens too regularly with something like flubenvet?

[Aunt Sally]

Worming to worm counts is obviously the best way to do it and it's what I do.  It costs me nothing as I have a tame parasitologist in the cupboard under the stairs     But atest would cost at least £30-40 pounds and I don't know any chicken keepers willing to pay that. So the usual advice is to worm about every six months.

I advise people to take the risk level of their chickens' living conditions into account first.

[Bodger]

Using one particular wormer exclusivley can over a period of time lead to wormer resistance.

In every population of any creature there is likely to be a small percentage that will have a natural resistance. By killing off all the none resistant ones you are left with the remaining resistant worms. Then these breed without any competition and over a period of time you are left with a complete population of resisitant ones.
This is why in horses at any rate, its advisable to vary the type of wormer used. A worm is a worm, is a worm, so surely this advice holds good with chickens as well.

[Aunt Sally]

You could very well be right Bodger,  good point to think about :!:

[chickenlady]

hello can anyone tell me if i will be able to tell if my girls have worms! ie will i be able to see them in their droppings?

[Aunt Sally]

No you won't see them in the droppings unless you have treated them with flubenvet.


If they have a heavy worm burden they will apear off colour and listless and my have diarrhoea.

It is natural for free ranging chooks to have a few worms.  It only becomes a problem when they have too many .

Hope that helps you chickenlady

[Vember]

Hi Chicken Lady

The other thing that you may notice if they are heavily infested is their poops can turn light green


Sarah

[Aunt Sally]

I forgot that point Vember !

[nnbreeder]

One natural remedy that I have heard of is Cayenne pepper, the dried powder type that one would use in good Cajun cooking. Birds do not have the receptors in their mouth for hot seeds so that part won't bother them.
  One tablespoon sprinkled over their feed once a week does the trick for a friend that free ranges his birds. He has his birds vet checked every year, his wife is a vet, and when he puts birds in the freezer he also checks them then and has never found a worm.
  I imagine though it only works for the round worms and as we know there are many others to contend with as well.

[poultrygeist]

Could it be coincidence that they just don't get worms ?

Call me a cynic !    

Rob

[Aunt Sally]

Could it be coincidence that they just don't get worms ?

Call me a cynic !    

Rob

you're a cynic  

So am I  

[Bodger]

One natural remedy that I have heard of is Cayenne pepper, the dried powder type that one would use in good Cajun cooking. Birds do not have the receptors in their mouth for hot seeds so that part won't bother them.
  One tablespoon sprinkled over their feed once a week does the trick for a friend that free ranges his birds. He has his birds vet checked every year, his wife is a vet, and when he puts birds in the freezer he also checks them then and has never found a worm.
  I imagine though it only works for the round worms and as we know there are many others to contend with as well.

That bit about chickens not having receptors in their mouths certainly puts the Kybwash on the method of filling up empty eggs with the hottest mustard you can find to stop chickens eating their eggs. Very interesting.

[Foxy]

Chickens do have receptors for taste - does that mean they dont have receptors for hot pepper?
How the devil do you find out that sort of thing?  

[Aunt Sally]

I've found a fascinating site written by a vet on Avian Anatomy

In the past, it was thought that birds had a poorly developed sense of taste. Taste buds lie at the base of the tongue, in most species of birds. Some birds have taste buds on the inside of the tip of the lower and upper bills and there are several sites on the roof of the oropharynx, near the choana. In parrots, the taste buds are on the roof of the oropharynx on either side of the choana, and on the floor of the oropharynx at the front end of the laryngeal mound. Mallard ducks have less than 500 taste buds, compared to the 10,000 of a human and 17,000 in the rabbit. Birds do have a sense of taste, and do show definite taste preferences, as we all know!