Opinions on Daily Pellet Wormer?

[CL_Moonriver]

I was wondering what you all thought about the use of daily pellet worker. Until very recently, I’ve used Strongid C2X daily pellet wormer in my horses in the belief that I am keeping them worm free all of the time. But I recently took one of my mares off it because she had a hoof abscess that ended up requiring a course of antibiotics. I wasn’t comfortable giving the wormer and the antibiotic at the same time cause of the potential for stomach irritation. After the antibiotic treatment was done, I waited about a week, paste wormed her, and then planned to start her back on the daily pellet wormer again.

But after doing a bit of research in the meantime, I’ve found that perhaps daily pellet wormer may not be a good idea since it may contribute to parasites becoming wormer resistant.

So I have a bit of a conundrum now. Is daily pellet wormer a good idea or not?

Thanks in advance for your input.

[joiedevie99]

Definite no. My vets stopped recommending it for almost all horses 15 years ago. We kept a couple of 25+ year olds on it because they had been on it their entire lives, but that’s it. I’ve heard of one vet that uses it short-term on some severe neglect cases.

I much prefer the current practice of running fecals and de-worming as needed. I’ve got low shedders who only end up getting the bare minimum (twice per year).

[merrygoround]

It has been determined that it is indeed a causative in drug resistance. It is no longer considered effective.The active ingredient in strongid is only effective in double doses over 5-7 days.

Fecal counts and worming with an effective product are now in.

[4LeafCloverFarm]

Like @joiedevie99, my new vet about 13/14 years ago didn’t care for the daily worming practice (really thought it was a waste of money and not nearly as effective as advertised). So after two years on the Strongid program, I took all three of mine off it. I paste worm them now.

[walkinthewalk]

No, no, and no:)

None of the vets at the two facilities I use have ever recommended daily worming meds in the 15 years I’ve been using them. They don’t even like to hear “monthly” in most cases.

i do fecals in the Spring. I only de-worm twice yearly, maybe three if I suspect pinworms in late summer. I’m down to two horses but even when I had four horses on 25 acres twice annually has been sufficient.

Fecals are really important as to a de-worming schedule, where “less is more”

[Bogie]

Nope. I always do fecals and de-worm only as needed.

[Garythesquirrel]

Where have I been? I didn’t even know daily de-wormer was still being sold, thought it went off the market years ago.

[JB]

@merrygoround

The active ingredient in strongid is only effective in double doses over 5-7 days.
.

Double dosing for 5 days is done with fenbendazole, aka a Power Pack. It is for encysted strongyles, though along the way it usually manages to kill some adults.

A daily dewormer is pyrantel tartrate, a cousin to pyrantel pamoate (aka Strongid paste). You can make pt as effective as pp by using a much larger amount, I think it’s a 5x dose of pt to equal a 1x dose of pp (but don’t quote me, it may be even more).

That said, neither pp nor fenbendazole have any real effectiveness anymore for adult strongyles, and because of prolonged use and frequent underdosing of Strongid Daily, meaning too many people used 1 scoop for their horse who weighed more than the 1200-ish lb that 1 scoop was good for, and/or too many boarding situations didn’t give even that 1 scoop every day.

So essentially, no, don’t use a DW for any but the rare unicorn horse who simply cannot manage parasites on his own even with 6 paste dewormings a year.

Look at The Horse website, and look at all their info on Strategic Deworming, or just google “strategic deworming horse” in general. That is what needs to be happening - deworm as little as possible but as much as necessary.

[Simkie]

The AAEP deworming guidelines are also a good overview. Click the link at the bottom to download the PDF.

https://aaep.org/guidelines/parasite-control-guidelines

[CL_Moonriver]

Thanks for all the replies. Seems the overwhelming opinion is that yeah, it’s not a good idea. I won’t be doing it anymore. and will just be doing fecals and then deworm as necessary.

[JB]

Just remember that FECs won’t tell you anything about bots or tapeworms, so 1-2 times a year those will still be necessary to target.

[CL_Moonriver]

Thanks, JB. I do worm for tapeworm using praziquantel, but one of the newest mares I got in had a pretty nasty reaction to Zimecterin Gold (no need to go into details, since you responded to me on the other post where I gave details.) I’m not 100% certain at this point whether she reacted to the praziquantel itself, or to some kind of carrier agent in the Zimecterin. But I’ve also read that a double dose of pyrantel pamoate is just as effective. And since she’s never reacted to the Strongid C2X which contains pyrantel, I may try hat next time instead of praziquantel.

@JB

Just remember that FECs won’t tell you anything about bots or tapeworms, so 1-2 times a year those will still be necessary to target.

[joiedevie99]

@CL Moonriver

Thanks, JB. I do worm for tapeworm using praziquantel, but one of the newest mares I got in had a pretty nasty reaction to Zimecterin Gold (no need to go into details, since you responded to me on the other post where I gave details.) I’m not 100% certain at this point whether she reacted to the praziquantel itself, or to some kind of carrier agent in the Zimecterin. But I’ve also read that a double dose of pyrantel pamoate is just as effective. And since she’s never reacted to the Strongid C2X which contains pyrantel, I may try hat next time instead of praziquantel.

Many of us will not use Zimectrin Gold due to negative reactions. I’ve never had an issue with Equimax.

[CL_Moonriver]

@joiedevie99

Many of us will not use Zimectrin Gold due to negative reactions. I’ve never had an issue with Equimax.

Yeah, that’s how I originally ran across the thread where I saw all of the reactions that were very similar to the one I had. I’ve used Zimectrin for around 15 years on many horses, and this is the first time I’ve ever had a reaction. But after researching it, it does seem like these reactions are common enough that I won’t be using it anymore.

[bt1]

another NOPE on daily and Z Gold

[JB]

@CL Moonriver

Thanks, JB. I do worm for tapeworm using praziquantel, but one of the newest mares I got in had a pretty nasty reaction to Zimecterin Gold (no need to go into details, since you responded to me on the other post where I gave details.) I’m not 100% certain at this point whether she reacted to the praziquantel itself, or to some kind of carrier agent in the Zimecterin. But I’ve also read that a double dose of pyrantel pamoate is just as effective. And since she’s never reacted to the Strongid C2X which contains pyrantel, I may try hat next time instead of praziquantel.

ZG and Equimax have the same ivermectin, and Equimax has more praziquantel. The issue is in the carrier ingredients Merial uses for ZG.

Double dosing pyrantel is almost as effective. But, since the general need to target tapeworms also comes with the need to kill bots, you’d still need to use ivermectin. MIght as well do it all with Equimax (or Quest Plus).

[CL_Moonriver]

@JB

Double dosing pyrantel is almost as effective. But, since the general need to target tapeworms also comes with the need to kill bots, you’d still need to use ivermectin. MIght as well do it all with Equimax (or Quest Plus).

I’ll probably try the Equimax on her next time around. At least this time I will know to administer dex right away if she has the same reaction. Hopefully, she doesn’t. But if she does, I guess I’ll just have to administer ivermectin and pyrantel separately iin the future instead of a combo that has ivermectin and praziquantel with this particular mare.