Natural worm control?

[menagerie]

I was looking for a reasonable natural fly control solution and came upon this. Has a wide range of uses but the one I found most interesting is worm control in pets and horses. Has anyone here ever tried it or have any knowledge of this?


http://www.gardenharvestsupply.com/product/diatomaceous-earth-food-grade

[myhorsebud]

my friend used that for a while for her dogs and horse but when she left she left the stuff here and never came back for it so i really don't know how well it works but if i can get any info out of her i will and let you know what she thought of it. might be a while though....:o

[menagerie]

Hey Myhorsebud, if and when you could get some feedback on it I would be grateful. I would much rather use a natural method of worming then a chemical one so this would be awesome. More trouble of course but then the natural methods usually are.

Keep me posted!

[Gypsy Rose]

I've been doing some digging, too. I've read articles about natural worm control before, and of course, research won't back it up, but then again, it doesn't back up the Devil's Claw and Boswellia that Gypsy's getting for her arthritis that makes her feel so good, either!

[menagerie]

I know what you mean Gypsey, its like they totally ignore the natural safe options altogether sometimes. Its kinda like the garlic spray we use for mosquito control here. There are a ton of chemical remedies on the market for that and none last very long or aren't really feasible for our entire property (15 acres) but the garlic spray works wonders. In my searching last nite for fly control I found a cedar oil spray that seems to be used in similar fashion. Its alot more expensive but I'm thinking of trying a bit of it to see if it will keep the horse flies at bay as well.

[Ryle]

Texas A&M did a preliminary study on DE as a dewormer for horses and found absolutely no results from it.

Deworming is often done way more than necessary, but it doesn't mean that chemical control is totally un-needed. Horses who live in stalls all the time, likely only need deworming twice a year--spring and fall--or horses kept in paddocks where feces are picked up daily. For pastured horses, deworming 2-4 times a year based upon their own natural resistance to parasites and the environmental conditions where they live is what is now recommended. If you are in the northern US, you should run a fecal egg count in the middle of summer (3 months after dosing in the spring with ivermectin or 4 months after dosing in the spring with moxidectin) and use that result to determine if you should deworm once or twice during the summer if at all. Northern US residents don't need to deworm during the winter months because the environmental conditions minimize reinfection rates during that time of the year. For the southern states, it's the opposite. You don't need to deworm in the summer months and run your fecal egg counts in the winter months.

For detailed information, check out the new deworming webinar on www.thehorse.com (http://www.thehorse.com)

[Miracle Whip]

I used it one year - I just put it on their oats a couple of times a week, with some Apple Cider Vinegar to cut down on the dust. Make sure you use food grade D. Earth. D Earth is in Bug Check and maybe other fly control products.
I don't know if it really worked for worm control as I wasn't doing fecal checks then. I do know her coat was super shiny, but I was also feeding Black Oil sunflower seeds at the time so I don't know how much of it was from parasite control and how much was the sunflower seeds.
It can't be any worse than the commercial tube wormers. Do you own your own property? It helps if you have control over the amount of manure in your horse area.

[menagerie]

Hey thanks for the input Mirclewhip! Yea we own our property, I think I'll give it a try and see how they respond. If it works (I'll get our vet to check) then I'd much rather use that then traditional wormers. Can I ask why you stopped using it?

[luvs2ride1979]

I would NOT use the kind sold for gardening to feed the horse. You can use that kind of spread on your manure piles to keep flies down, and prevent reinfestation, but it can be "rougher" than the kind of DE meant for internal use.

Here's another source for that same brand. I'm thinking of buying some for myself. A friend of mine is taking it and she's noticed a big difference in her hair, skin, and joint problems.
http://www.earthworkshealth.com/
This site has it a lot cheaper than the site you listed. Their 10 lb bag is $14, only $3 more than the other site's 5 lb bag.

[Miracle Whip]

No particular reason. I had ordered it online and it was bit pricey. I wanted to use it this year and was planning on buying some Bug Check, which does have D Earth in it but I have not gotten around to it. This year I've done the fecal checks and both horses are clean. Due to financial constraints I have not purchsed the Bug Check.

As for the fly control part of it, once I got the second horse, they stand together and swish flies so not as much of a need for commercial fly control products. I am using Golden Marlin pellets for fly control right now, I've still got 1/2 a cannister of that.

Yes if you feed it you need FOOD GRADE. Humans can use it, sort of like a laxative, but it makes my anus bleed a bit so after that I kind of wondered what it was doing to the horses although I never saw any indication of it bothering them. Coats were wonderful.

[Country Girl 43]

There are several people here that use it. And yes you have to get the FOOD GRADE DE. I bought mine from the local feed store. 80lb bag for $20.

We also use it on ant hills and spread it on manure piles to help keep the flies down. It has a lot of uses, although I don't use it as a dewormer. I have sprinkled it on their hay before, but I mostly use it for bug control arond the barn and the house. :)

[menagerie]

Well I ordered me a bag of food grage DE, thanks Luvs2ride for that link it was indeed cheaper! We'll see how it does. We have 7 horses here and they are separated in different pastures so I'm thinking for informational purposes and to really be able to tell if it makes a difference I'm going to feed it to the 3 in the front to compare. I'm gonna take it too to see if I get the same results as your fried Luvs, I mean who doesn't want beautiful hair, skin and nails! lol

Countrygirl thanks for your input too, I'll check around here to see if anyone carries it local. I'll be surprised if they do as we are in a small town but one never knows!

I'll let ya'll know if I see results.

[Ryle]

That is still far from going to tell you whether or not it's effective. You would need to run fecal egg counts on each horse, dose and then check fecal egg counts in 10-14 days and compare the number of eggs at that time to the number of eggs in the first fecal egg count. You can't simply compare egg counts on seperate horses because each horse builds up it's own natural immunity to parasites to a different level. About 50% of horses will normally have low FECs without the advent of chemical deworming while 20-30% will have high FECs. So if you compare FECs on a horse with a normally low amount of shedding to those with a normally high amount of shedding your results are going to be skewed. You have to test and dose and test again on the same horse to have any kind of valid result---AND not change anything in the way that horse is kept.

[menagerie]

Hey Ryle,

Just to clarify, when I made that last post I was referring to mainly the 'cosmetic' side of the effects its suppose to have. If I really intend to try it for worm control I will indeed have them tested by my vet to ensure that it is working to be sure. I wouldn't just take anyone's word for its effectiveness on that subject.

Thanks for the input though as I was not aware that each horse could naturally have a different egg count, interesting.

[Miracle Whip]

The powder is dusty. I don't know how you could put it on hay. I always sprinkled some on the oats and then wet the oats down with Apple Cider Vinegar...

[Country Girl 43]

The powder is dusty.

Yeah... don't spread it on a windy day or you will look like the Pillsbury Dough boy! :hysterical: I made that mistake once and scared the horses when they saw me coming! :hysterical:

[SedonaThunder]

You can't simply compare egg counts on seperate horses because each horse builds up it's own natural immunity to parasites to a different level. About 50% of horses will normally have low FECs without the advent of chemical deworming while 20-30% will have high FECs.

Case in point... I had FEC's done on my four horses on May 22nd - they are all on close to the same diet (the young'uns don't get bute or glucosamine) and are kept the same way. I had one come back "under 20", one "225", one "400" and one "1,075"!!! Per my vet... the 225 wasn't anything to worry about so I gave the high two (the youngest and oldest...) Herbal Tonic for a week and should be pulling samples again at the end of this week to see if we made progress or if I need to resort to chemicals.

[Ryle]

Sedona Thunder, it's not surprising that your FEC's were highest in your youngest and oldest horses (I'm assuming the oldest is a senior citizen). I would really really really recommed that you watch the deworming webinar on www.thehorse.com (http://www.thehorse.com) and go with the parasitologists recommendations. He doesn't recommend the 6 times a year deworming "no matter what" that has been in vogue for so long. He recommends deworming as infrequently as possible but doing it in a strategic manner. If it's been 3 months since your last deworming with ivermectin (or 4 months since you used moxidectin) then the "under 20" would get dewormed just spring and fall, the middle two would be dewormed 3 times a year (spring, fall and once in between the two in summer) and the highest one would be dewormed spring, fall and then twice during the summer months. This would minimize dewormings per year while still controlling parasite contamination of your pastures.

[menagerie]

MircleWhip, I just got my DE in today and wanted to ask you how much ACV you used when you put it in with the oats?