The Horse's Maine & NH 153A Pickpocket Rd. Brentwood, NH 03833 & Maine and NH's Own Equestrian Newspaper August 2016 $2.00 Cyan Magenta Yellow Yellow Black 1 Just look at all the POSTAL CUSTOMER POSTAL shows... and MORE! ECRWSS August 2016 The Horse's Maine & NH Page 1 either physically remove them, reprinted with permission from Eventing Nation From Dr. J or they hatch. From egg deposit by David A. Jefferson, D.V.M. to hatch is about five days. The hatch begins when the horse Confessions of a Super Fly brings his mouth down to his leg or side where the eggs are. It is Master Event Rider It was a hot day in early June. slap her hard with an open hand thought that the carbon dioxide by Julie Howard I was in the paddock behind the against the horse the second she from the horse’s breath stimulates barn at Mary’s farm. She had lands. Hesitate and, too late, she’s the hatching. The tiny released Trailer Trash asked me to check “Doc”, a Quar- off again. It’s next to impossible larvae get into the horse’s mouth IT WAS RED! ter Horse with an allergy problem. to catch her in the air. Horses and burrow into the tongue or It is very cathartic, this con- She was holding a lead that was hate the noise of bot flies and their the gums. They stay there for a fessing. Maybe that’s why my snapped onto Doc’s halter. Mary unpredictable actions. Equines at month. Then they burrow out, Catholic friends (mostly lapsed has competed Doc for years. He’s pasture will often take off running, pass down to the stomach, and Catholics, but still) seem so able a seasoned horse and is always totally out of control when the bot attach to its lining with their sharp to “let it go.” Cue Disney character cooperative. That’s why we were fly is at work. mouth parts. In the stomach they bursting into song here. both surprised when he suddenly The female bot fly is unique to grow to look like a grub that you I thank all of you for providing got fidgety, and we saw the whites the insect world. She looks like a might find in the woods under a the canvas for my Jackson Pollock of his eyes. He started stomping scrawny honeybee. Her body is log. They are fat, ugly, and about musings. For the record, Jackson with his left fore and throwing his bent almost double in the middle an inch long. Their stay in the Pollock was an artist that threw head. Finally Mary and I heard so that her egg laying hind end is stomach is like you on a 10 month paint at a canvas and saw what a loud buzzing and realized what tucked under and faces her head. Caribbean cruise. You have access stuck — appropriate reference he was upset about. Doc was the After she lays all her eggs, she to unlimited food and are a world for the writing that comes out of target of a bot fly. These insects dies. The male bot fly’s life is away from the cold winter. my brain. (That little reference is are extremely aggressive. The even shorter. His life is over just Somehow those bots, deep in where I show my mother that my females live only one week and after mating with her. Neither the horse and far away from day- Dartmouth education wasn’t com- have just one goal. Lay as many the male nor female has mouth light or weather, know when the pletely wasted on her horse-ob- eggs as possible on the hair of any parts. They can’t eat. Their only world gets warm. They release sessed spends-time-in-horse-poop horse in the area. They are very function is to reproduce. The their hold and pass through the GI daughter). few neighbors. I don’t know what determined and very fast. entire life cycle of a horse bot is tract to go out with the manure. You, gentle reader, are a gift, my parents were thinking. Every The bot fly darted in, laid a few one year, and at least 10 months of Once on the ground they burrow being my imaginary audience time I had a Pony Club meeting 2 eggs on a front leg, flew away a that time is spent, not in the air as beneath the surface and stay there and all. Remember your giftiness or a lesson, I had to ride to it (10 short distance and then attacked an insect, tormenting horses, but for a month. Just like a butterfly when you are soaking your horse’s miles round trip). Very undignified from a different direction, her actually inside your horse. coming out of a cocoon they abscessed foot in Epsom salts in a indeed (but, as Denny Emerson Cyan wings making that buzzing noise. Each egg that the fly lays is metamorphose into the next stage, 20-degree barn on Christmas Eve. would say, I was AND my horses These “super flies” may lay up to a cemented to a single hair. They which is the flying insect, the bot A gift. Yeah, that’s it. were FIT). Magenta hundred eggs on one horse. The look like tiny yellow grains of fly. Males and females find each So let’s just talk about horse Show season was a logistical fact is that she will lay those eggs rice. The eggs will stay glued other and within hours the female trailers here for a minute. As you spaghetti of who was going when, unless you kill her. You have to to the horse’s hair coat until you with her fertilized eggs flies off to who have read my blogs know, what time, which state, and on and find a horse to lay them on, and the I collect riding pants. There was on. Somehow we managed to get Yellow Yellow yearly cycle starts again. a time when I collected trailers. to shows, but goodness knows I don’t see as many bot flies as (Those were halcyon days when how. Credit my force-to-be-reck- I used to. I think it’s because iver- I was employed). TRAILERS. At oned-with mother as she juggled Black mectin and moxidectin (Quest) at one time I had two and my eye parenting my twin brothers and the proper dose kills all the bots in on a third, sold one, bought one their sports schedules with my the stomach, and most horses re- and coveted all. In the three years firstborn’s need (demand?) for From just starting out to advanced riders, ceive one of those wormers at least of my adult horse ownership, I organization and clarity around once a year. That doesn’t mean have owned three trailers. If that my horse lesson, Pony Club and we can help that you won’t ever see the bot fly seems excessive, you are right. It show schedule. Army generals your dreams come true or her eggs, it’s just that right now is excessive. Unnecessary. Stupid. have nothin’ on that woman. they aren’t as common as they And secretly fun. I think that is where the obses- were 25 years ago. Perhaps they When I was a young rider from sion with trailers began. As adults, Home of proven will develop a resistance to those the age of 8 to 17, eventing and we make our own decisions (that’s medications over time. For sure doing Pony Club in New Hamp- what we tell ourselves, anyway). If champions they will always be around. If shire, we did not own a horse we want to buy something, we buy you buy a horse with an uncertain trailer. And we lived in what was it, dammit. So when I acquired my From leadline, to National or Olympic level history, and it’s winter, it would be then a very rural (but now unfor- and everything prudent to worm with one of the tunately suburbanized) area, with Master Eventer, page 22 wormers mentioned. Incidentally, in between because the bots attached to the stomach don’t lay eggs, there is no Both Bates riders, Katherine Kirwin and Hannah Kiesler, were in the top way to check for their presence in ten of their divisions at the IHSA National Horse Show in Harrisburg, PA. a fecal exam. So, what are the implications Please feel free to call for rates and for your horse? Actually, unless there are huge numbers in the a tour of one of the finest facilities in the area stomach, horses tolerate them OK. The bot is one of those parasites lessons • training • boarding that have it pretty well figured Ginger Klingenstein Albert out. Attach to the host and get nutrition, but don’t drain the horse 400 Hodsdon Rd., Pownal, Maine too much, or you both lose. There 207-688-4117 • cell 207-329-0514 www.venturefarmmaine.com Dr. J, page 33 Page 2 The Horse's Maine & NH August 2016 A Few Guidelines for Personalized Care Submitting Articles Preventive Medicine For the most part, putting Intensive Client Education articles into The Horse's Maine THOMAS A. JUDD D.V.M. MULTI DISCIPLINE MONTHLY NEWSPAPER EXCLUSIVELY FOR & NH is very easy. Email your A - LILA H. SOLOMON D.V.M. THE StatEWIDE EQUESTRIAN COMMUNITY OF MAINE & NH articles and photos to us. 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