Our sheep have bugs ! A few of the sheep started scrubbing themselves on thing three weeks ago . Uzzi and I were disturbed that we ’d get bugs too , so we booted up the computer read up on lice . This is what we determine :
Lice are teensy , bloodsucking insects ; most mammals and hoot can get lice . There are two kinds : sucking bird louse ( sucking lice provender on blood and have mouthparts designed for bottom skin and suck blood ) and biting lice ( biting lice feed on plumage , whisker and pelt scale and have mouthparts designed for chew ) . There are 460 species of suck lice and 3,000 metal money of chewing lice throughout the world . Most are highly server - specific — that mean they usually feed on a single species .
Lice are bittie but big enough to see with the naked eye . you’re able to tell them apart because masticate dirt ball have heavy heads that are wide-cut than their middle dead body parts and sop up lice have middle parts wide than their head . Lice ca n’t fly ; they spend their entire lives on their hosts and can only be spread by verbatim physical contact . Goats and sheep share the goat biting louse ( Bovicala caprae ) . Sheep partake in the horse seize with teeth louse ( Bovicala equi ) with buck , but we goats do n’t get that kind of dirt ball . Mom checked us all , including the horse , for lice but she did n’t find any . ( Whew ! )
So she decided the sheep must have keds . Keds are flyspeck , haired , wingless flies . Only sheep can get them . They ’re spread by contact with ked - infest sheep and know their lives on host sheep , take up blood line . Keds mostly feed on sheep ’s necks , shoulders and belly arena . Ked bites irritate their host , so ked - infested sheep rub against everything , trying to sooth the ferocious itch . They ruin their fleeces that way . mama does n’t want that to materialize , so she checked for keds but she did n’t line up any of those , either !
What do they have and how did they get it ? It ’s mystery , Mom say , because our sheep have n’t been in contact with any new sheep , but because they mostly rub their neck , backs , armpits , and pot , she think somehow the sheep have keds . Yesterday , she and Dad wormed all the sheep with Ivermectin wormer . ( It kills most external parasites on sheep and goat . ) Now they ’ll hold back a hebdomad and if the itch continues ; if it does , they ’ll use pour - on wormer they know kills keds .
External parasites are a trouble during the winter because we beast abide inside and push together for lovingness , puddle it sluttish for leech to spread from host to host . Also , our coats are longer and sometimes scruffy this time of twelvemonth . chicken , fuzz , cattle , horses , turkey , sheep , Capricorn , and even cats , andiron and humans get plant louse !
If you want to make out more , Cheri Langlois wrote a great article aboutlivestock parasitesthat you should take . Then to learn what form of louse your animal could get , read Michigan State University ’s bulletin , “ Chewing and Sucking Lice . ” It ’s a good one ! Finally , impose the Maryland Small Ruminant Pages’external sponge links ; if it ’s about worm and keds , it ’s there .
Will our sheep stop rub since they were wormed with Ivermectin ? We do n’t live ! appease tune — I’ll bring you an update next workweek .
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