A worming question- help needed

[dalesnfellfan]

Being 99% sure Emeralds reaction was to the wormer/mite treatment, I want to avoid a similar situation in future, so need to find a workable regime for future worm control.

What I currently do is do 4 worm counts a year and only worm if more than a low count, then worm all ponies Dec/Jan for everything inc. encysted red worms and tape worms, with Pramox (which she reacted to).  With this regime Spud only ever gets wormed once a year as his count is always not detected, Em however has had a high count each time >2000epg and therefore needed worming, probably due to her insides not fully recovered from being so poor and perhaps never being wormed.  I also poo pick twice daily.

I am considering trying a natural/herbal wormer for her in conjunction with worm counts and then possibly using a chemical wormer to cover everything in Dec/Jan and giving her a few weeks off work following worming in case of reaction, but want to try an alternative to Pramox, which I am wary about using again. Also an alternative to chemical injection for mites should they arise again.

I would very much appreciate your thoughts/experiences about alternative parasite control and whether or not its effective, my daughter has done some research which suggests diamatomaous earth is worth trying, does anyone know anything about it?

[Debbie]

How long is a piece of string? You have to tailor your deworming needs to your region (what worms are known to be present dangers) and to the exposure risks that Ems is facing.

When I lived in Missouri, I used Diatomaceous earth every month for Blossom and my veteran gelding Galahad. It was added to their breakfast and evening buckets of soaked beetpulp once a month for three days, and for them, it worked very well indeed. I only needed to give them Ivermectin paste dewormers twice a year and that was more for my own peace of mind. Another plus was the diatomaceous earth contains trace minerals, so they could catch up on any minor deficiencies and left them with very pretty coats. I also offered it as a dust bath for my chickens, and they thrived on it being in their feed too.

You HAVE to make sure you are using the Food grade diatomaceous earth! There is a much cheaper version that is used for swimming pools and it is not safe nor effective.

It worked very well for us because my two very rarely left the farm, so they had minimal to no outside exposure to other horses. We did have deer and other wildlife that did bring worm burdens in, but diatomaceous earth worked well against that.

When Blossom left to go to her trainers, she was dewormed on arrival at the trainers (all of 2 miles up the road), and I promptly dewormed her when she returned. It was the first and only time she shed hair worms, which I found did come from the trainers. She also had a very bad reaction to the dewormer. I'll pm you the name. It took me at least a month of nervine herbs to get her back to being her normal self and I've never used that dewormer since

I think in your case, you'll need to check with your vet to find out how bad the worm burdens are in your area, which ones pose the greatest threats and which dewormers will work the best for your situation. Diatomaceous earth can be a great addition to a deworming program but you'll want to make sure you're covering all bases for her. Clearly it's not going to do anything against encysted stages, so you'll want to make sure you have a dewormer that can help.

[dalesnfellfan]

Debbie, how much did you give them in their feeds each month?

[Debbie]

I used to get my Diatomaceous Earth from Frank Lampley's franklampley.com/horse-products/basic-mineral.html

Sadly, Frank passed away a few years ago, and the company has continued in his name, but I see his website no longer carries the doses that were on the labels of the products I had.

Last year we moved clear across country ( 2,000 miles one way), and in the move, my hubby left all my diatomaceous earth behind. We have a much different climate here, and our worm burden is nothing like it was back there, so I've not needed to replace it.

I'm pretty sure Blossom took 3 scoops and Galahad 4, but I can't remember what the scoop size was as it came in the 5 gallon bucket I ordered. I know you can't overdose them with it, but if it was too much diatomaceous earth, Blossom would whine and walk off from her food. It's a mild flavor though, and a little splodge of applesauce over the top and mixed in thoroughly with their beet pulp, and they ate it with gusto. Blossom usually licked the bucket clean for me.

[Anna]

I'm not a worming expert but I always thought the tape worm worked best spring and/or autumn when the worms are most active, they are quite dormant dec/jan time so you may be not covering that sufficiently?

[harveydales]

If Em had a bad reaction to a wormer why not get a blood test done for tape worm and then you will know whether or not you should worm her for tape worm? My last horse became very sensitive to wormers so I went down that route and rarely had to worm at all. I think I did try one of the "natural" wormers on one occasion even though I didn't have much confidence in them and he had a reaction to that too!

Because Quest was so sensitive to chemicals, I was told not to use the ones which kill everything in one go but rather do tapeworm on it's own etc and only when needed.

[dalesnfellfan]

Thanks for this, yes Pam I think a blood test for tape worm is a good idea, I'll speak to my vet about the best time to do it, Anna I think you may have a point about tape worms being dormant in winter, I thought doing it in Jan may cover it instead of doing autumn and spring but may not do any good if worms are dormant.

I do wonder whether she would react to herbal wormer as well, being as she appears to be so sensitive and I don't know how effective they are, my vet doesn't think they're much good, I think I need to speak to my vet and weigh up the risks of not using chemical wormers when she typically has a count of 2000epg

[heathera]

Merlin reacts badly to Pramox too but he does fine with Equitape in autumn and Panacur five day for enchanted in early Spring. The worms counts we do always come back low and we poo pick our fields and rotate the grazing so I don't have worries about resistance at the moment.
The vets are currently investigating whether there's an alternative to the Panacur that doesn't contain moxidectin, which is what I think may have caused the problem, as I've followed this regime for a few years now so do run the risk of resistance becoming an issue.