Since it got so warm (and the chickens got new straw), these little insects have been sitting in and around the hen house by the thousands.
They are less than a millimeter in size (photo was taken with a macro lens) and are grey-brown in color (most of them anyway).
They are not easy to push flat (I suspect this is because they are so small that you don’t have a base on your fingertip to push them flat).
Answer
The animals you photographed are not insects, but mites or ticks (scientific name of this group: Acari or Acarina, sometimes also Acariformes), a very species-rich group of small arachnids. You can see this clearly from the fact that the animals in your photo clearly have 4 pairs of legs (such as spiders and harvestmen). Insects, on the other hand, have only 3 pairs of legs. I can’t say what species this is, but the fact that you found the animals in “thousands” in your chicken coop may be an indication that it could be some kind of bird mite (eg Dermanyssus gallinae or Ornithonyssus bursa). If this is the case, it may be best to treat your chicken coop (see brochure) in order to protect your chickens. On the other hand, my suggestion that it might be bird mites is nothing more than a very loose suggestion. The only thing I want to say with certainty here is that the animals in your photo are not insects, but mites or ticks.
Answered by
Dr Thierry Backeljau
Biology
Rue Vautier 29 1000 Brussels
http://www.naturalsciences.be
.