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HorseAdvice.com » Horse Care » Worms, Deworming, Parasite Control » Deworming Schedules » |
Discussion on Question about the value of doing fecals | |
Author | Message |
Member: sondra |
Posted on Saturday, Apr 30, 2011 - 10:02 am: Hi Dr.O,I have read your articles on parasite control and have some questions. Since fecals do not reveal small encysted strongyles or tapeworms, why is doing a fecal always recommended if they are not definitive in this way? In other words, if it comes out negative, I still wonder if I need to deworm! Second question is, since Quest Plus has been sadly discontinued, can I safely deworm with Quest (regular gel) AND Equimax at the same time, in order to target everything plus tapes? If not, I can't decide if I should do Quest now (since it's Springtime) and wait to do Equimax? If I choose Quest do I have to wait 3 months to deworm again with Equimax to get tapes? I guess I'm really missing the old Quest Plus, which apparently was discontinued when the company was bought out. ARGHH P.S. His last deworming was in early January with Quest. He lives in the NY area but spent the winter in Aiken, SC. Thank you in advance. |
New Member: suemc |
Posted on Saturday, Apr 30, 2011 - 2:36 pm: Hello Sondra. I have wondered the same thing as you. My horse has been diagnosed with inflammatory bowel disease and I keen not to put any drugs besides the prednisolone into his system other than what I have to but how can you tell if they have encysted ones from an egg count? Ive had two counts done - both zero but still wormed just in case! |
Moderator: DrO |
Posted on Sunday, May 1, 2011 - 12:18 pm: Hello Sondra,You have to remember strongyle infection is a big cycle and consider where is the easiest place to interrupt that cycle. Horse's become exposed to these parasites because your horse's are passing eggs out in there stools thereby contaminating the pasture. The fecal test is not so much to diagnose the parasite burden of the horse as it is to determine how heavily contaminated your pastures might be and answer the question of whether what you are doing to prevent it might be working. More lately fecals also are being used to help prevent resistance through the overuse of anthlemintics. The bottom line is the horse on pastures where the fecal egg counts have been low for the past few years and where there are good anti-parasite environmental practices are very unlikely to develop any kind of problem with intestinal parasites because there was no place for the infective strongyle larvae to have come from. We handle these issues, and the tapeworm, consideration, in great detail in the article |i{HorseAdvice.com » Horse Care » Worms, Deworming, Parasite Control » Overview of Deworming}. DrO |