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SubscribeChecking sheep regularly and thoroughly for lice is an essential tool for maintaining a lice-free flock.
For those who like to see all the information and simply read through it in order. Each heading is a link to a page of information—the dot point provides a summary of the page.
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Monitoring sheep for lice
A description of how to properly go about checking a mob and individual sheep for lice.
Causes of rubbing in sheep
Description of conditions aside from lice that will cause sheep to rub their fleeces.
Description of itch mite, its diagnosis and control.
Rubbing Tool
An interactive tool that allows users to determine the cause (or causes) of rubbing in their sheep.
For those who prefer a problem-based approach to learning, answer the following questions.
Each of the questions below links further down the page to the answers.
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All mobs should be checked for lice at least twice each year. Useful opportunities for monitoring are when sheep are yarded for drenching, crutching, marking and shearing or other management procedures. Any sheep seen with rubbed fleece or pulled wool should be checked as a matter of urgency. It is also a good idea to ask your shearers and shed hands to look out for lice at shearing. Make sure to check every mob on your property, including the cull sheep and rams.
All newly purchased sheep, agisted sheep or sheep returning from other properties should be inspected before release onto the property. New rams can pose a significant risk, but are generally introduced only in small numbers; therefore, an automatic policy of shearing and off–shears treating rams for lice on arrival (refer to the product label to ensure you use it with enough time to kill all lice before the rams are joined) is recommended.
Any stray sheep found in the mob or returned after straying should be closely examined for obvious lice. However, lice may be present, but not found if:
Management options range from a high risk, where the sheep are returned to their mob, through various quarantine and treatment options, through to immediate disposal of the sheep (least risk).
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Look for sheep showing signs of rubbing or biting at their fleece.
Rubbing is a very powerful indicator of lice infestation and sheep will begin to rub with quite low lice numbers. Rather than inspecting random sheep, time is most efficiently used by carefully going through the mob to identify any sheep with even a small amount of rubbed or pulled wool, although the worst-rubbed sheep should be checked first.
If on thorough inspection, sheep are not rubbing, lice may still be present, but in such low numbers that it will be almost impossible to find them and fleece damage will be minimal anyway.
If there is a concern that the sheep may have become infested with lice or that the last treatment was not effective, check again for rubbed wool in another month—or if shearing is within a month, treat off-shears for lice anyway as a small infestation without treatment will increase and is likely to reduce the value of next year’s wool clip.
Other causes of rubbing include grass seeds, fleece rot, lumpy wool, flystrike and itch mite. Sheep with tender wool or frequently walking through bush or long grass, and some breeds that shed their fleece may also appear to be rubbing.
Read the LiceBoss Note: Causes of rubbing in sheep or use the Rubbing Tool in Liceboss to help to diagnose other causes of rubbed fleece.
Subscribe the the Boss Bulletin for monthly updates and articles about all things parasite management
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