Itchy

The scaly leg was getting worse and there was what I thought was a bit of summer moulting or perhaps too much rooster action, then we found eggs on the shaft of a black hen's feathers so it was pour-on drench time. Two things I found out.
1. I weighed the birds in a square bucket on the bathroom scales. It was easy to put them into it by lowering them head first, that way they don't stick their wings and feet out at angles and struggle.
2. A bottle of fugly green nail polish marked the feet so that if they got de-segregated the next day (I didn't have the energy to do them all on the one night) I'd know who had been dosed.

But then there's my itch. Every night I go out and pick one rooster off a roost in the covered run and the other off a perch in the house proper. I go out comfortable, come back with my hair / head furiously itchy. I blocked off the entrances and sprayed the house with kerosene but it hasn't stopped the problem though I think it lessened it a bit. My hair just brushes the central "beam" of the house, not so much that I bump my head or even feel my head scraping against it. I now wear a hat or hood to go out there at night.

Every day I have to go into the house in much the same way, to collect eggs, sometimes take a broody off a nest and out to the naughty girls' quarters. Daytime whatever it is doesn't make me itch.

I didn't think chooks shared their itchy things with humans. And what is a safe treatment for the house, which is ancient, wooden, made of an old shipping crate I think. It was here and looking old in 1967! I read that carbaryl was safe and effective, then I read further and decided it sounded distinctly risky. Pyrethrum is a contact-only insecticide but if whatever they are vanish into the crevices in the daytime that's not much use.

We're in New Zealand. There are several pesky things I've read about that we don't have here. Perhaps one of you may be able to give me a clue about what's the cause and what's a cure for this terrible maddening itch. The chooks don't seem to be itchy. I noticed one fossicking in her feathers today but I think she was attending to newly sprouted feathers.

A L P
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