Hi all,
My horse lives in a 1/2 acre pasture with a three sided shelter. Despite cleaning it, the flys are crazy, and he often ends up with belly sores/irritations, not to mention bites, and generally being bothered by them. He lives in a fly mask in the summer, and I’ve considered the fly belly shield, but don’t think it will last with outside living.
Have been looking at buying a Pak of fly predators as sold in a package on a popular online horse goods website. Also looked at a monthly order of a feed thru fly kill “supplement” that is high in garlic to ward off bugs??? The extra MSM wouldn’t be horrible and it has Diaganus Earth in it.
What is your experience with these items, and where would you “plant” the Fly Predators if releasing those. According to this website, one has to incubate the Pak of predators in a warm spot before releasing? Thanks in advance! A little help for my horse would be awesome.
I use fly predators. You have to use them monthly all throughout fly season or they won’t do anything. You disperse them on fresh manure piles after you see some live ones in the package they come in. They do help somewhat. If you have livestock on neighboring properties, they probably won’t help, unfortunately. My mare wears a fly mask and fly sheet about 7 months of the years. She also gets the belly sores. I use Catron and/or Alushield on that. If she gets really itchy, she gets benedryl.
Predators are great. You may need to place them in a warm not hot place to hatch prior to spreading or they may have already started to hatch when they arrive. The instructions give details. I have not seen garlic or other natural fly feed through controls make a difference . Predators, traps, abd proper manure management have worked really well for me in many situations.
OP, don’t you mean Diatomaceous Earth? If that is what is in the “supplement,” it won’t have an effect on biting/flying insects. As for garlic, have you tried applying liquid garlic on face, ears and belly with a damp cloth? I bought a bottle of it for a friend, but she didn’t want it, so I’ll give it a go.
Fly Predators will not work if you just buy them once and never again.
I have been using Fly Predators for years and I think they do a great job. The instructions are pretty clear on how to use them. Since we have chickens we put the contents of the package in a bucket that we hang out of the elements (under an over hang) near the manure pile.
We cut way back on the Predators one year and wow did we notice how much they did when we did not use them.
Fly predators are excellent for controlling many fly species, just not all. And, it’s not an instant results thing, it will take a year or 3 to see a significant reduction in flies, depending on how bad the current situation is. And if you have close enough neighbors who don’t do any fly control, it will be a waste.
You don’t just get “a pack” though You get regular shipments every 3-4 weeks, depending on the number of horses and the level of problem, for the whole season. You use them every year to maintain control.
The bags arrive with the pupae in sawdust. Some might have started to hatch, though usually that doesn’t happen until later in the year. But they will start to hatch after you get them. Once they do, that’s when you put them out. You put them out at dusk, so they have time to find shelter before birds find them. You put them under some piles of manure, scratch up a little dirt and sprinkle them around other areas where flies like to lay eggs, such as around vegetation near water tubs. You do this with every bag that arrives.
Diatomaceous earth is for sprinkling around places bug with an exoskeleton like to hang out. And, if that’s out in the elements, you have to reapply after a rain.
We had 1000 chickens in the summer when I did farm markets. I used to apply food grade DE to the perimeters of our poultry barns, dust the birds themselves with it, and put it around the house. It definitely helps control crawling bugs with exoskeletons. I found it very effective control for mites on the birds themselves. As far as I know it does nothing to knock down the fly population. While it is non-toxic and overall very safe, you must take care to prevent you or the horse from accidentally inhaling the dust. The sharp edges of the microscopic particles can cause lung irritation if they are inhaled. Food grade DE is commonly used as a caking agent in pelleted feeds. It just has little to no effect on internal parasites.
