by Country Animal Hospital

Tis the season to get your mite situation under control….

we are seeing a lot more cases lately and we want you to work on treating them before it’s time for your health certificate exam! (If we see suspicious hair loss at the exam, we will need to do skin scrapings, and will note negative results on your health certificate. Positive results may keep you home from the show…)

Typical signs of chorioptic mange mites (our most common mites) include hair loss on the face and ears, thick, crusty lesions between the toes, and sometimes “itchiness,” especially leg scratching.

There are many proposed treatments for mites, unfortunately none of them are fool-proof, and none of them have been proven curative in scientific studies.  The study that showed the best results as far as decrease in mite numbers was one that used ivermectin injections at twice the cattle dose (so, essentially 1 cc per 55 lbs), weekly for 5 weeks.  It also showed that the mites tend to return once the treatment is over….so, we recommend also treating the environment (mites have been shown to live off the animals for up to 70 days!!).

Our current recommendations to control mites:

• Ivermectin injections (use subcutaneous injections of 0.4 mg/kg, which is twice the labeled cattle dose), give weekly for 5 injections (you may want to continue through show season…).  Do not use pour-on eprinomectin, moxidectin, or doramectin, the topical dewormers don’t work in camelids.



• Also use an insecticide like Frontline Spray or Cylence pour-on every 1-2 weeks for 5 treatments.  Concentrate on the interdigital area (between the toes).



• Clean up used bedding. Spray stalls, sheds, etc, with lime sulfur spray diluted to 2%.  Repeat every two weeks.  Lime sulfur is available at garden supply centers.  A local source for “bulk” lime sulfur is the Wilbur Ellis Company in Auburn at 253-351-6591 (thank you to Eagle Valley Alpacas for finding them!).

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