My mare likes to snatch and eat dog fennel. I think it is dog fennel- with fine white flowers that fly everywhere including the riders face. I’ve heard dog fennel is toxic, but it’s everywhere on the trail and right at nose level for the horses.
Has anyone muzzled their horse while riding to prevent constant snatching at food? My mare can be good if we are moving out, but I’ve been ponying my young horse so she knows my attention is split between them and she takes advantage.
My horses hate wearing a muzzle. I can’t imagine riding them in one. Plus that won’t work well with any type of bit or even bitless or even a halter?
I would say you need to keep your attention on them both. I did a lot of ponying with my youngsters as well as racetrack layups we had . It was all out on the trail. It can be done.
My mare was the best trail/mountain horse ever but she had an insatiable appetite. Riding on narrow, mountain trails with heavy vegetation was exhausting. All the training in the world didn’t stop the snatch and grab. She perfected eating while trotting without breaking stride. It was very frustrating for me because I always had to be on my toes and could never just relax and enjoy the scenery. Along comes the riding muzzle and OMG, what a life changing experience!
In the 90s and early 00s the camp I worked at had muzzles on all trail horses. They were leather cage-style muzzles similar to grazing muzzles and they snapped to the halters (all horses were in kimberwicks that also were snapped to the halter or wore a bridle over the halter). It worked well enough for our purposes but I have no idea where you would find an identical muzzle these days but the mesh ones look interesting.
I looked in several toxic plant references and did not see dog fennel listed (Eupatorium leptophyllum).
There are some toxic members of this genus, but I suspect that snatching a mouthful here and there is unlikely to cause ill effects.
I’ll continue poking around.
I’ve found a different eupatorium species listed as dog-fennel as well –E. capillifolium
(that’s one problem with common names)
Is there any possibility you can get an accurat ID on the species?
Any photographs?
If maresy is repeatedly grabbing mouthfuls in passing but no ill effects, it’s not toxic or not toxic in the amount she’s getting.
There’s lots of plants that could cause liver damage or vitamin imbalances if they are the main forage in a poor pasture but are not toxic at small.doses.
Plants that are scary toxic in small doses include yew and water hemlock.
I’ve had horses gravitate towards the mildly toxic things like horse tail, bracken fern and buttercup on grass walks. I discourage that, but a few mouthfuls has never caused problems.
It looks like dog fennel has these alkloids which are cumulative
These things are amazing.
I know more than one person who can enjoy trail riding again after having gotten one of these because their horse is like one @Alterwho described.
Where DD and I rode in WYO on a 2 week horse back pack trip through the Wind River mountains, horses work a net or mesh “baggie” over their muzzles to prevent grazing while being ridden. It was very loose fitting. The horse could easily drink through it. The purpose wasn’t to keep horse from eating, so much as to keep the (sometimes inexperienced) riders from losing reins on difficult terrain. The same kind of device was used on some mules on our ride to the bottom of the Grand Canyon. Easy enough to make with some netting and Velcro.
My mare learned really fast that there was no point in even trying to munch when she had her riding muzzle on. It was great. (Conversely, she knows very well when I do t use it, that she can go back to trying)
