Allergies are simply an imbalance of the immune system where your horse’s immune system perceives a threat from something harmless that he has come into regular contact with. Instead of eliminating microorganisms, the body suddenly starts attacking its own tissues, resulting in an overreaction to normal, everyday things such as grass, tree pollens, shavings, dust, molds, hay and straw, environmental pollutants, drugs, fly spray, or a new grooming product or shampoo.

Your parasite management program should give some attention to stomach bots and tapeworms. To control these parasites more effectively, it helps to understand their life cycles.

Today it is critically important to understand the basics of parasite resistance and develop a deworming program that will work for your farm. That program will need to be reevaluated and modified as environmental conditions change from year to year, and farm management and the number of horses fluctuates.