Allotment Gardening Advice Help Chat

Poultry and Pets => The Hen House => Topic started by: chooknewbie on August 12, 2009, 20:29

Title: mites....but not red!
Post by: chooknewbie on August 12, 2009, 20:29

ok..stupid question alert...

do red mites start off red?? and if there are no chooks to bite, and therefore nothing to feed off...are they red???

I have got mildreds of the little blighters running about in a coup and I dont know what sort of mite they are.... I have put loads of mite powder down, and am going down to spray with Duramitex tomorrow morning in that coup and the other 2 houses... glad I have got a couple of bottles in....

I've had a shower and I'm still itchy!!!!

Title: Re: mites....but not red!
Post by: hillfooter on August 12, 2009, 20:42

The answers to your Q? are no / no

Red mite eggs hatch to a larvae, which moults to a protonymph, which moults to a deutonymph before becoming the adult form you may  be more framiliar with.  All in 7 days in the idea conditions!

Checkout this thread from BarnBrian

http://chat.allotment-garden.org/index.php?topic=42676.msg502578#msg502578


Regards

Title: Re: mites....but not red!
Post by: chooknewbie on August 12, 2009, 20:58

cheers Hillfooter...

I was of the opinion that red mite came out at night tho....stayed holed up until then.... but these lil * werent shy!! out and about and on me quick as anything.... I have seen redmite in my other coup last year, that was at dusk, and they were indeed red....

These are more like the other person described, an off white sort of colour...not that tiny really in comparison to the pictures of red mite I have seen on the net...although small enough....

I treated once last year with Duramitex and havent seen them again since until today...in a diff coup.  Gonna blast the place tomorrow.... every nook and cranny gonna get a soaking... hopefully no matter what the mite its gonna be no more after that!!

Title: Re: mites....but not red!
Post by: cochin on August 12, 2009, 22:14

Red mite start off as being transparent they stay like that until they have found blood and started to suck it :( when you find really RED mite it means they have  already started to do damage to your chooks.

Title: Re: mites....but not red!
Post by: chooknewbie on August 13, 2009, 11:41

in that case thank god they havent been suckin, at least not too much!!! they are all pretty damn difficult to see!!

The house has been well and truly soaked with duramitex liquid so hopefully, fingers crossed that should be that.... only time will tell.