welts on a mini horse

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I have a sweet little mini horse. Today when I went out to look at her she had welts on her belly and legs. Some were penny size, but one is the size of a silver dollar and quite alarming. We are in the mountains of Montana, does anyone know what this is and what to do about it? Thank you!!

-- Terri Frost (willowbee6@hotmail.com), July 02, 2001

Answers

Do you have horseflies in your area? Here in south Mississippi, the horseflies are terrible. They bite my cows and leave welts on them. If it isn't insects biting your horse, I have no clue what it might be. I'm sure some others on the board will be of more help.

-- Tim (tsduck@bellsouth.net), July 03, 2001.

Insect bites will do this if your horse is sensitive to them; flies and mosquitos the most likely culprit. My present pony mare gets rather large welts as a symptom of mosquito bites that take a day or two to fade. Fomenting them with as warm water as the horse can stand will help, as will rubbing the welts with rubbing alcohol and water with lavender essential oil mixed in for topical relief.

Food allergies can also cause this -- one horse I know breaks out in similar welts if he is fed any corn product at all. Have you changed her feed recently, bought a new product that has different formulation? Some horses react badly to new hay crops every year undtil the hay has dried a minimum of six weeks before feeding, and react with hives.

Also possible is a contact allergen in your grazing since the outbreaks seems to be localized around the belly and legs. You'll need to walk your pastures and look for known irritant plants.

If they persist, spread, or get larger, it would be adviseable to have your vet out for antihistamine shots, since if this is allergic hives, they can fill with calcium from the body system and form permanent lumps under the skin.

-- julie f. (rumplefrogskin@excite.com), July 03, 2001.


I used to work on a petting farm where we had a similar problem with our ponies and minis about this time of year. The only difference was that ours would also break out on their faces as well, so it was easy to determine that it was something they were allergic to (or reacting to) in their pasture. We'd move them for a few weeks and the problem would resolve itself quickly.

-- Sheryl in Me (radams@sacoriver.net), July 06, 2001.

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