Help my horse has sweet itch!!
Its almost that season again when blood sucking insects appear and sensitive horses will become itchy again.
Many horse owners think they know the answer as to where sweet itch comes from. They say that the horse is allergic to insects bites and you cant do anything about it.
But is this true?
Yes these horses are allergic or hypersensitive to insect bites. Once they have a special rug on them the itching becomes less, because the insects cant get to the skin and bite. But the question is, why does a horse develop an allergy to these bites and other horses don’t?
In order to get to the bottom of this we need to take a look at the horses metabolism. One of them is the waste disposal of materials. This happens via excretory organs.
1. The intestine excretes indigestible waste but also waste from the liver
2. The kidneys excrete waste together with the help of the detoxification process in the liver. Usually the kidneys do this via urea. But they only have a limited capacity. Which means that when there are too many toxins the kidneys need to excrete them via a different route. And this is when they use the skin in an emergency. The waste that then ends up on top of the skin can be very irritable. The skin irritation leads to inflammatory reactions of the immune system.
The saliva of the insects cause an overreaction of the immune system as well. Thus an allergic reaction.
In some horses the metabolism is so overloaded that the skin becomes the main excretory organ. These horses scratch all year long. Even in winter time when there are no insects. The cause of this is mostly a disturbed gut, and chronically inflamed intestines. When the intestines are inflamed the mucosal cells release a lot of histamine, which leads to allergies, especially in the skin.
The allergy that the horse develops is not the cause of the itch. But it is only a symptom.
The sweet itch usually originates from a disorder of the intestines, liver & kidneys.
Many sweet itch horses also develop other symptoms, such as coughing, faecal water, colic, bad hoof growth, acidification in connective tissue, poor coat change, up to a metabolic syndrome or cushings.
SO HOW CAN WE HELP THE HORSE?
The use of special rugs, creams, ointments, sprays do not help sustainably. They only temporarily relieve the symptoms.
But of course it is advisable to use a sweet itch rug so you reduce the stress of the horse. We always advise using them the first 2 years of sweet itch therapy. It can take 2-5 years to get your horses metabolism back to balance again.
For external use you could use a calendula ointment, or a skin relief herbal mix to spray on the horse.
In addition you can also spray microorganisms ( EM-A) on the horse. This helps to improve the skin flora and recover faster.
Most vets will advise you to give the horse Dexamethasone ( steroids/ corticosteroids ) medicine. This is used to treat the inflammation, but there are risks of using this medication. It may cause acute laminitis.
A risk free and more healthy option is the use of feeding wild seeds, hemp seed or flax seed. The essential fatty acids support to moisten the skin and some also help with inflammation. But never feed seeds longer than 6-8 weeks because then the horse might get too fat and you also have a chance of burdening the liver too much to help break down the oils.
Also a change of diet is needed. Most sweet itch horses have a disturbed intestinal environment. Haylage must be banned for ever and the diet should not contain any sugary feed. Instead of haylage you can feed hay and if it has a high sugar content then you can soak or steam it.
There are certain herbs and supplements that can help to build up a good immune system, help as an antihistamine, help with allergies, help with inflammation and an itch. Such as bee pollen, licorice root, daisies and many more. But never experiment with this yourself and always consult with a certified expert on herbs and nutrition.
At Vital Horse Care ( The Horse Therapist ) we can help you set up a plan, give you custom made nutritional advise, custom made herbs to support the horse and also look into an intestinal rehabilitation plan.
We can also get a laboratorial test done for KPU ( Cryptopyrroluria ) which I will discuss in a separate article. This lab test will give you an indication of the health of the intestines & liver.
Each horse is different and they all have their individual way of becoming healthy again. And we are here to help get your horse back to health again. Because a healthy horse is a happy horse!