No More Itchy Horsey & Update on Feeding Oats (pictures)

[Marty]

I've had a bad problem with a mare for the past two years. She's been itching like crazy. She has been sitting in my fences, body slamming my fences, body slamming the walls in her stall to get a full body scratch. She's been wrecking the place and herself. She itched sores on her neck and face down to the hide. It just suddenly began one day out of nowhere two years ago and when I say I've done everything for this horse I could think of, I did. I clipped her religiously so she would be comfortable but she kept itching .I thought it was maybe blade wash so I cleaned my blades in alcohol instead. I bathed her in iodine and aloe. Heck I fed her aloe juice. I fly sprayed her with an assortment of sprays. I de-loused her and increased her de-wormer. I stripped her stall several times, put down mats, changed bedding, changed bedding companies, gave her vitamins for her coat, you name it, I did it. I have worked myself insane till I was blue in the face but I could not get this mare comfortable for nothing .And oh, please note, this also went on during the coldest days in winter too. Summer, winter, this horse was allergic to herself I thought. I was about to give up and take her to the hospital for maybe a steriod or skin scraping. But trust me, this horse was getting worse and worse up until about two months ago. Then it suddenly just stopped. That fast. Then I realized what it was. The feed. Ever since I changed over to just plain old oats, she no longer is having that problem. Before you ask, and not wanting to cause a stir over feed I'm just saying I found the culprit. She was on the Purina Miniature Horse and Pony Feed for the past two years and that's when it began.I cannot imagine what could have been in that food ingriedients to set her off but that's it. Before that, she was on Strategy with no itching.

Which leads me to tell you how my experiement with feeding straight oats is going. Pretty good. I can't complain except I have one mare that was not happy about it and picked at it at first.. We are getting our minerals, good quality hay and grassy pasture and there is no complaint. We have very little grass bellies too now. Here's an example of how they look

This is Merry Lee my 2 year old filly taken two weeks ago



This is her sister the pig, Double Wide and thank heavens she dumped some weight



And this is Glory taken two weeks ago

 

[chandab]

They look great. I'm trying the oat experiment too, although, not all of mine need the oats, they are all getting a vit/min supplement instead of commercial grain mix.

I have a couple that are itchy and I haven't figure how the culprit, yet; so I'll have to keep investigating.

 

[paintponylvr]

Hmmm, I have several this year that are itchy (one is a son of a mare that has always been itchy). I really feel that part of it is the gosh-awful weather we are having (they all live outside 24/7) and our barn is at least 12" deep in muck so they couldn't stay in if I needed them to! They are drinking a lot of water, I'm cleaning each of 4 - 100 gallon water tanks daily, but I still find both bugs and mosquitos in the water tanks (ugh! - never before).

We do still have standing water and several areas that seem to have sprouted "natural springs" due to the excess of water here and the ground being so saturated. More rain last nite and the bugs were awful this AM. Supposed to get a lot more rain over the next week - a change from last week (but who knows it could change again - I hope so). Quality hay - WHERE do you find that - LOL???? If the hay guys can't get hay cut, we won't even have a 3rd cutting (a few got theirs done - their fields drained and they were able to get into them between rain storms BUT is their hay really any good this year?). Some didn't get a first or a 2nd cutting. My main supplier just torched 60 acres because he can't get the tractor/mower into them and wants them to start growing the next cutting. OMG, everyone is very short hay here and I'm very worried about this winter! Yes, we can get hay from outside sources, but...

BUT have been trying different things that aren't working or are working minimally. I have fed oats in the past and may be going back to it... Even our oat suppliers are having problems - I couldn't have gotten oats this year locally as most got turned under - due to not growing at all, not being able to get to it when ready for harvesting or being drowned...

Your "crew" look AWESOME!! Thanks for sharing your oat experiment.

 

[Riverrose28]

I'm in the same boat as paint pony, it has been raining alot here, and therefore hay is scarce. Some that we bought looked great, but was wet inside and had to broken open and scatered about just to dry. No scond cutting, I'm buying round bales now and they are really low on the scale. I have one mare that I had to bring into the barn as she is a hard keeper and really losing weight, now some of my stallions are looking a little skinny, why, I think the hay is really low quality. I've tried supplimenting with alfalfa from TS but my budget is now limited, (doctor bills have started rolling in), I did start them on hay replacer, but it doen't seem to do much and one mare, my black one is itching like crazy. I've got to go the feed store tomorrow so I'll check into oats instead of hay replacer. Thanks for the advice

 

[atotton]

They are all looking great.

 

[Tab]

They look good Marty.