Most people don’t beleive this but a Dressage trainer and horse book author from England toid me this secret. Bacon greese slathered in the ears, legs, underbelly, chest, face, and genital area does wonders for those dang knat and flies bites.
I have mules and they love it when I do their ears. I have hooked up with some local resturants who do about 4-6 pans of bacon daily and give me the greese to me for free. I give them the jars. The cook is always cool with the fact I am helping my animals.
People don’t understand why it works but I think it is the salt. It helps seal and heal the bites. Your horses will love you for it. No, the flies are not attracted to it. They do not like it. Weird, but it works.
I’m not about to slather bacon grease on my animals for various reasons, but that being said, there are some fly sprays in Germany that have a bacon-like smell to them. I haven’t looked closely at the ingredients, as I don’t use them, but it’s interesting that you mention it. I’m somewhat surprised that flies aren’t attracted to such a smell, but then again, I’m not a fly and don’t know what they think. :winkgrin:
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Or you could just use a fly mask, fly boots, SWAT/generic desiten instead.
NO way I’m slathering my horse(s) with bacon grease. Gross. Sure it we works because it’s a thick greasy substance.
Back in the 70s our farrier was convinced the best thing for our horses feet was bacon grease mixed with Fiebings hoof oil. And since we ate a lot of bacon back then (I absolutely won’t touch it today) my mother saved the grease and we’d mix it up and slather it on the feet of all our ponies and horses. Did it work? Who knows!
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I would guess that Bacon Grease works because it is thick and oily. Not because it is bacon grease. Slime anything thick and oily on and it will do the same thing.
Do not put anything that attracts ants and attracts anything else that stings on your horse.
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Hmmm…turning your horse into a tasty treat for the local carnivore population. Not my such a good idea, I think.
G.
P.S. Remember that dogs and cats are carnivores, too.
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Vaseline works the same way.
Forming a barrier over the skin, no matter what you use, creams, oils, fly strings or bonnets or sheaths, any will work that keeps biting annoyances from reaching the skin.
Bacon grease was handy and thick and easy to smear and stayed on well, why it was used for protecting skin.
We have better products and methods for that today.
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Yeah, I was going to say, I have used vaseline in the past to cover a small area on my horse that I didn’t want flies on. And it works because it’s greasy, not because it really has any fly repellent tendencies.
Have at it!:rolleyes::lol::lol:
I’lll stick to my Absorbine Ultra Shield.
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I know it sounds weird but it works. I used to do the Vaseline, Swat, and all that other stuff but when it comes to knats and bitting flies the bacon grease is my choice. (No, it has never attracted any predators and we have many around here.) I believe its the salt that does the trick.
I think Stubben’s leather conditioner has a bit of a bacon grease smell! I have a big tube I got with my saddle and hardly ever use it because the smell is gross, but I loved the non-smelly cleaner that came with it.
There are a lot of things that “sound weird but work”, and though the internet loves to click on them, the vast majority aren’t worth the effort.
Even if this well-traveled equestrian “hot tip” weren’t completely revolting, I find it a better use of my resources just to pay a couple bucks and toss a jar of Swat in my shopping cart when I’m at the feed store than drive around to restaurants with jars asking for their bacon drippings. My time is worth more than that jar of Swat.
Two other problems occur to me:
a) mean as h**l yellowjackets and their carnivorous appetites
b) bacon fat going rancid in my tack trunk
This one belongs in the pantheon of bad equestrian lifehacks, IMO.
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When we were kids, my brother put out two plates on our outdoor table, one with sliced salami and one with honey.
The bees (probably wasps) went for the salami, making weird half octagonal bites.
Our cats would also bite into the saved grease cup.
So fats and the smell of fat attract unwanted visitors, plus what about it getting on your clothes?
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I find MTG accomplishes the same thing and is less gross. Combined with fly spray and SWAT, I think he’s pretty well protected.
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Sorry, but my standing threat to my husband is that if he doesn’t behave himself, I will fry up enough bacon to coat his naked body in bacon grease, tie him to a tree in our back pasture, and let the coyotes have at him.
I could never set my horses up that way!
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:lol::lol::lol::lol:
Nah…there are black bears, cougars, and wolves around where I live, along with the odd grizzly bear. I’m not seasoning my horse for the predators :0 The predators eat the abundant deer, but a bacon-greased horse might be pretty tempting.
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Yeah… A good client has a speshul sunflower of a mare who welts up when a fly looks at her, much less bites. So we use Farnam’s Aloe Cream… Probably go through a case a month. We slather it onto her hair whorls, udder, midline, muzzle, anywhere else the bugs like to bite tender skin. Makes a physical barrier and leaves the hair nice when it’s washed off using only cool water and mild agitation (like a sponge).
This mare would likely blister with bacon great, desitin or vaseline.
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You would have to do a lot more than tell a bunch of strangers on the internet that “it works” in your experience.
Way too many variables that are not controlled for even an individual to know if something really works - e.g. is the temperature and humidity the same in all conditions thereby insuring that there is not an inadvertent decrease in biting flies during the bacon grease trial? Did you apply the bacon grease in exactly the same way and on the same areas on the same horses under similar conditions? Were there really fewer knats and flies? How did you count to know for sure?
That said, even if it was true, the majority of horse owners are not going to put bacon grease on their horses. There are products that work fairly well for most horses in most environments without resorting to something as gross.
Concur that it has an “unusual” odor. I smell old fish more than bacon, but maybe that’s just individual “schnoozola variation”!!! 
But I like what it does for the leather so I use it.
Concur, also, that Leathersafe is an excellent product. I use it all the time!!!
G.
