Flies in the Goat Stall

[DellaMyDarling]

Ick! Help!

My goats and chickens share the same barn. Flies might fly around in chicken pen but don't reproduce there. The flies in the barn are clearly from the goat's stall!

Deep litter chickens.
Goats have rubber stall mats, then stall pellets (think horse product) with hay over top.
Every week I've been going in and turning hay, find the wet spots, remove wet yucks, sprinkle PDZ, flop hay down. Clearly, that's not enough.

I was worried about their stall being soft enough (probably nonsense, since caprines are mountain beasts?)
Should I ditch the stall pellets, use only the hay, and completely refresh it all once a week? That much less material in there, I could probably refresh more than once per week.

Of course, cost is a consideration here.
Since the chickens make much less wetness, pine shavings, hay, and grass clippings work great for them. Goats were really making a wet mess of the pine shavings. It's just far too costly and icky to replace that every few days.
But again, perhaps I'm way overdoing it on bedding for these guys anyway.

 

[oldhenlikesdogs]

Sounds like the only place flies can breed is in your deep litter or under the stall matts.
Have you looked under them? Deep litter is a perfect place for flies, we clean ours out in the warmer weather.

We don't provide bedding this time of year. My goats prefer raised wooden platforms for lounging. They don't mind laying on hard surfaces as long as it's dry. I don't keep any milk goats, bedding is more important for them.

We also use fly jars if the population gets to be too much, but cleaning everything out thoroughly is the best to eliminate places for them to lay their eggs.

 

[DellaMyDarling]

Asked the neighbor, who has horses. She says the flies are especially bothersome this year and sprays are doing nothing.
So, at least I'm not alone, but I would think there's still things that I can do!

I'm especially embarrassed because there's company coming tomorrow, family, to see the homestead progress. Flies are not...impressive.


So, you think I should just remove all goat bedding and stick with hay on floor over the mats? Less hay as well? Less hay means easier to clean and refresh, I would think.

 

[DellaMyDarling]

Ah, sorry, these are indeed dairy goats and they do not have raised sleep platforms.

 

[oldhenlikesdogs]

Flies are horrible here too because it's been so wet. I don't know dairy goats. We use to milk cows and bedding is very important to dairy animals to prevent udder injuries and mastitis.

Flies eggs generally need moisture, so technically it shouldn't be the dry bedding causing problems.

How far away is the neighbor? Could the flies be coming from them?

@cassie used to keep dairy goats. Hopefully she has a better idea on it than me. I have only kept pets.

 

[cassie]

Here are my suggestions for fly control. You can and should use all of them. First of all, order some fly predators. You can get them on line. They are most effective if you start using them at the beginning of the season. If managed properly they do a great job. Secondly, get some fly traps. You can buy them and I think if you look online you can find out how to make your own. The third method is fly strips that come on a reel. I don't know what they are called. You string the strip across the barn and when the flies land on it they get stuck. When the strip is full you just reel it in to expose a fresh area. I haven't checked but I think you can get these strips at www.caprinesupply.com. These forms of control can all be used with fly predators. You can also use a unit that emits a puff of insecticide at timed intervals. These work pretty well inside the barn but if you are using fly predators you can't use them. The predators are far more susceptible to insecticides than flies. It goes without saying that you need to keep the barn and bedding dry. Without moisture the flies cannot breed. You may have another problem. A friend of mine had a goat dairy and for a while the flies were horrendous. She was situated right next to a fly breeding cow dairy and apparently the flies came over to her place to rest. The traps and the strips helped her get things under control.

 

[DellaMyDarling]

Interesting @cassie !
I like the idea of natural control with predators. Any idea what I should be looking for?
My dog is overwhelmed and stopped trying to eat them Lol!

Im going to flip bedding today and remove a lot, and not replace it so deeply. Looks like my cushy bedding is a big nono, at least in warm weather.

 

[cassie]

Interesting @cassie !
I like the idea of natural control with predators. Any idea what I should be looking for?
My dog is overwhelmed and stopped trying to eat them Lol!

Im going to flip bedding today and remove a lot, and not replace it so deeply. Looks like my cushy bedding is a big nono, at least in warm weather.

I am not sure I understand your post. You asked what you should be looking for. I wasn't clear in regards to what.

 

[ShannonR]

Get rid of the stall mats! Hard surface will not hurt them, in fact it is good for their hooves....goats are adapted to hard, rocky, uncomfortable surfaces....
The bedding might be part of the problem too. Try using just the stall pellets.

 

[DellaMyDarling]

I am not sure I understand your post. You asked what you should be looking for. I wasn't clear in regards to what.

Natural predators.
I'm guessing spiders?

Get rid of the stall mats! Hard surface will not hurt them, in fact it is good for their hooves....goats are adapted to hard, rocky, uncomfortable surfaces....
The bedding might be part of the problem too. Try using just the stall pellets.

The mats are there to keep them from pee rotting out the floor


Yesterday I went in, removed all hay, scraped wet spots in pellets, spread PDZ and sprayed some Permethrin. Added a bag of stall pellets to cover just what was removed. Let it air out all day before I added pellets. Just a thin spread of hay in there now, from their nightly hay tossing.
Hoping this'll do the trick. Removing hay and wet spots is real easy if I do it this way, once a week.