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backwoodsnanny

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I have a 2 yr old filly who out of the blue has a case of hives. I used benedryl and they are a bit better today is there anything else that works well? Also I cant figure out what has caused them. For anyone who has had them any suggestions how to decide what caused them.
 
Have her checked by a vet as it might be allergies. Not just hives.

She could have come into contact with poison ivy or poison oak or even stinging nettles will leave welts like hives.
 
I agree with End Level Farms...........It could be nettles or poison ivy, etc..... OR an allergy! Benedryl is a basic antihistimine which we also keep available for the horses. Epinephrine (sp) is also something to keep on hand. This is definitely something to run by your vet with.......
 
I had called the vet he recommended the benedryl I just wondered if any of you had any ideas what causes them. I have one who gets them every time I clip him but this girl has never had them before. Vet said it could be most anything. Thats why I asked if any of you had had hives in the past and knew the cause.
 
Hives can be caused by anything. Take it from me, I know, I get hives often & many times I have no idea what caused them--I even get them from the cold--in fall especially if my legs get chilly when I'm outside, I break out in hives. I also get them from cigarette smoke, and from tylenol....and get them really bad from Advil. I used to have a friend who would get hives every time she ate chocolate. Some people get them from eating strawberries. Thankfully neither strawberries nor chocolate have any negative effect on me--I can eat all I want of both & not get hives from them!

Horses rarely react to poison ivy or stinging nettles--they do not have the same sensitivity that people do. I once had a horse break out in hives from a specific bug spray--the only horse I've ever had that was allergic to that product, and I've used it on a lot of horses over the years. Some horses can have an allergic reaction to sand fly bites--the first summer we lived here we had one gelding that had a bad reaction to the sand flies. Actually with him it wasn't real hives but sand fly bites that swelled up to look like hives--they could have easily been mistaken for hives if we didn't realize about the sand flies. Treatment was the same for both hives and sand fly bites....antihistamine...and the 2nd summer that horse no longer had the sensitivity to the bites & didn't get covered in bumps. A horse could have a reaction to a particular drug, or to some weed in the hay or pasture, or to fly spray, or from a bee sting. Some horses will get hives from rubbing on a wood fence or stall partition that has been treated with something like creosote.

Without knowing exactly what your horse has been exposed to there is no way of guessing what might have caused these hives. You may have to look at everything possible. Is this filly out on pasture? If so, check out any weeds that might be growing. Check out what there is for trees that she might have eaten/rubbed on. Are the biting insects particularly bad? If she is stalled, have you gotten a new batch of bedding? Perhaps there's something different in the bedding this time around? Or perhaps you started using a new batch of grain? A different type of hay? It can be a process of elimination. If she's on pasture you might want to put her some place different--a paddock with no weeds/trees, or in the barn. If the hives go away then you know it may be something in that particular pasture. If they don't, then it's probably not something in the pasture. More likely the grain, or hay if she gets that outside too, or perhaps the bug spray (if you used any). Change to a different hay...or a different batch of shavings...you get the idea!
 
I had one that rolled in ants and I have another that I really think is allergic to clipper oil, the blade wash or something connected with clipping. I use Anti-hist from Jeffers or any place that has it. I don't know the dosgage of benedryl or I'd use that too.
 
BINGO with the clipper blade oil or blade wash!!!!!! We've had more than one or our horses break out in "lumps" from that.

We rinse them off with cool water and after a couple of days, the lumps have gone away.
 
Our four year old stallion has broken out in hives last summer and this summer. The vet happened to be at our farm for something else last year and identified the "lumps" as hives and said to give him the minimum adult dosage of benedryl. He is very small, only about 120 lbs. at 26 inches. The benedryl had no effect but MTG did. This year, benedryl did nothing, MTG helped some, but what helped the most was keeping him in the barn during the day under fans and letting him out in the evenings with a fly sheet on. We are beginning to think that his hives are his version of heat rash when it is extremely hot (It was in the high 90's during the week he broke out). Since the temps have dropped some (low 90's) his hives have disappeared. We also gave him morning baths during this time with a tea tree oil based shampoo and that seemed to sooth him.
 
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She seems better today I think it is something we got in our last hay our regular guy is out and he found us another source . She doesnt have any other symptoms I put some gold bond on her to help with the itch and am continuing the benedryl she hasnt been able to be out for several days because of the weather so its not from the pasture. Thanks for asking Debs. No one else is bothered and they all have the same hay so I am trying to eliminate what else it could be. She still has some welts but they are smaller today.
 
Just an fyi, I've only had two horses break out with hives. One was a QH mare years ago and we could never figure out whether it was from flies or fly spray. More recently, I had a mini gelding break out twice in hives, both times at the same show barn. I wanted to blame the shavings at first but realized both times were after I had used a strong liniment with MSM in it. The first time was moderate, the second time - months later - was right after bathing and slathering him with liniment. Came back to find him broken out and swollen from head to hoof. We gave him benedryl, banamine and dex, and kept washing him down with cold water.

Jan
 
minis out west I did call the vet the benedryl was what the vet prescribed. If you know of something that works better let me know and I will call the vet back. She still has them even with the benedryl
 
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Interesting - and truly I am not intending on stealing the post - - but asking if our condition might be hives? Could someone please describe for me what hives actually look like on a horse?

I've been racking my brain and using Listerine, MTG, etc on two of our yearlings with no clue what was causing their "bumps".

Without knowing what hives look like in a horse ..... these two fillies have tiny (I'm talking the end of a Qtip size) little lumps that stick up under their hair - mostly on their backs. They feel hard to the touch and if you try to pick them off, the hair comes out at the roots. Not ticks, and rain rot looks different I thought - - but never thought of hives.

They actually will come off and leave a tiny little piece of raw red flesh - most likely from rubbing them maybe?

Is this at all what hives look like? Yes, we did spray them with flyspray week ago - and can't remember if I had noticed them before the spray or not. I think we had noticed them then.

Thanks much
 
Benedryl is just fine Nita, glad to hear she's improving and I bet it was the hay.
 
I had a full sized horse one year break out in horrible hives all over. I removed everything I was feeding her but the hay.... nothing made a difference. Called the vet out and he gave her some shots that made them go away very quickly. He told me that some horses, like people, can have allergies to things that they even just breathe, or are exposed to, not just what they consume, and anything could have caused a reaction. (oh great) I moved about a year later from there, but she never in her life had that problem again, though I went back to feeding her as before.
 
She also originally had them all over but now seem to be going away much smaller and most prevalent under her mane where it is warmer. I flipped her mane to the wrong side today so I could put some gold bond where they were most prevalent. She doesnt seem overly itchy any more either so think we may have this licked. Vet wants a call back if they arent gone by the end of the week. Said anything can cause them I was just trying to figure out what did so it wouldnt happen again. As for wht they look like they are bumps but no hair comes out when they are scratched. They are very like the bumps people get when they have hives. The first day they were very itchy she was rubbing on her door and anywhere else she could rub now she isnt doing that anymore and there are no where near as many as there were. They also are much smaller. So the benedryl is working. Probably vet will give her a shot of something if they arent gone by Friday. He gives me a break when I call if its something I can take care of. A farm call is 95
 
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best bet- call the vet. will be gone in 20 minutes.
Gee, if calling the vet works that well I should try it for myself next time I break out in hives!!
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I've never given benadryl to horses--I used to keep an injectible antihistamine on hand, but now I just use Pre-def 2X--similar to & just as effective as dex, but it's considered a little safer. for the horse that broke out in hives due to bug spray, a bath fixed him up pretty quickly.

WhiteTails--hives shouldn't be hard, nor should the hair be coming out. Hives are much like mosquito bites, only without the little bite mark in the middle. If the horse rubs a lot he may rub them raw, but that doesn't really sound like what you're describing. I'd almost guess your 2 horses have had some sort of bug bites, though it's funny they'd all be on the backs of the horses. I've had bug bites react that way, but usually they've been on the lower parts of the horses.
 
Just to confuse the issue, lets not rule out protein bumps!

Years ago when dinosaurs ruled the earth and us oldie (but goodies!) had horses, sometimes they would break out in bouts of these little bumps, usually on their necks and chest. If we couldn't figure out if it were insects, we would assume it was these little dudes called Protein Bumps. That was supposed to be from an overload of protein in the food and the horses not working hard enough to burn off the excess protein. That made sense to me and my group of stablemates since living in Florida, we didn't nearly work our horses as hard as we normally would in summer and we did feed a lot of high protein sweet feed, plus timothy/alfalfa hay and vitamins. Today, some may say that it is a protein overload and others may stick to thinking its insects or something else. Just throwing out the idea of protein bumps to consider.

One of mine is having a bout with these bumps. I wrote it off to something related with the clippers, blade wash or clipper oil, but since its been a while since she is clipped and been washed several times since, I think I am going to remove her feed and replace it with something less in protein as an experiment to try to get to the bottom of these nasty body zits she has.
 
Whitetails, yours does sound more like either rainrot or bug bites. The horse hives we've experienced have been much larger bumps that almost grow/swell together in a bad case.

Minimor, what is Pre-def 2x?

Jan
 

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