Monday, June 27, 2011

Have you ever heard of Neck Thread Worms?

It's just beginning to be continually hot where I'm at and Sugar and Rally have been ITCHY! Rally scratched spot on his chest so badly it was raw skin. Sugar had a spot on her chest that was bleeding slightly. This took only 2-3 days to happen.
So off to the internet I go for research on the first day of scratching. First of course there's Sweet Itch, but after more research I come up with Neck Thread Worms. Nasty little things, here's a thread on COTH about them: http://www.chronofhorse.com/forum/showthread.php?t=155469
So I email the resident COTH expert and get the exact treatment, and reassurance that it will not kill my horse, or Rally. Then I go trucking off to Tractor Supply for Equimax wormers and medicated shampoo.
The next morning we bathe both horses and worm them. By the next morning, it was obvious that no more scratching had occurred and it looks like the chest scratches are healing. Sugar has a scratch on her neck which I am concerned about, but have been medicating. It appears to be healing.

I have taken pictures on my cell phone of their chests, and I will post pictures as soon as I am back home with my phone to computer cord.

I just had to share this because I learned that many horse owners have never heard of them. If your horse is rubbing all his hair off his body, or especially mane and tail hair, this is worth looking into. Rally has always rubbed his tail, I am excited to see if this "cures" it. Rally has also rubbed his belly a good bit. Sugar rubs her mane occasionally, and has recently developed a cut on her neck, I believe this is due to her scratching her neck on the wooden wall. Her chest looks worse than his however, and it starting to heal up.

3 comments:

  1. What the heck??? I have never heard of these nasty things. We are pretty fortunate up here. Our weather is so extreme (+30C summer, -30 winter) that it kills a lot of nasty stuff...except those gawd awful flies!!!

    Thanks for sharing!

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  2. I had never heard of them until about a week ago!
    Ahhh, those flies!!!

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  3. I hadn't heard of them either. I really get creeped out by what nasty little creepy crawly things can do to animals and plants! Yeeuucckk!

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