# Scrubbing down stalls?



## Acadianartist (Apr 21, 2015)

It's me again! The newbie with a million questions. 

I've had my two horses in our brand-new barn since June 5th. So going on two months now! I couldn't be happier and love hanging out at the barn every night. I don't even mind cleaning up the manure they've so generously left for me throughout the day. Their stall doors remain open 24/7 so they spend some time in their stalls (their choice) when it's too hot or too buggy, and go out into the paddock for a stroll whenever the mood strikes them. Yes, it's a hard life they lead. At night, they are in the grassy pasture. 

However, my quality horse time is being impinged upon by uninvited guests. Flies. A lot of them. I think I have pretty aggressive manure management (the entire 80 x 120 paddock and the stalls are cleaned daily and the manure is removed to a pile pretty far away from the barn area) and keep the bedding clean. Aisles are swept daily and I have fly tape in several locations. I've tried other fly traps with much less success. I am using pellets, and carefully shovel away wet spots and pick out any manure, sometimes twice a day. 

That said, my two equines do not feel any inclination to keep the premises clean. I feed them hay cubes with supplements and there's nothing they like more than to shove their faces in their corner feeders and lift them up to grin at me as they dribble slop all the way down the walls and fronts of their stalls. Flies love to feed on the dried-on grime. The screwed-in corner feeders are a pain. They get pretty grimy and I'm not going to screw them in and out each time they need to be cleaned, so I'm going out to buy two more than I can just set into the screwed-in ones and just pop out for a good rinse every few days. So far, I have been washing them with vinegar and water, then wiping down with water. It will be much easier with ones I can pop right out to clean.

There is also the small matter of Kodak, the new mare, trying to impress her stablemate Harley by making sure she smeared her runny feces down the side of her stall where it meets up with his. I've hosed down, then scrubbed with water and vinegar, then hosed down that wall three times already. 

My question is (yes, I do have a question), how do you sanitize your stalls? Is a bleach solution overkill? I don't want to use anything that will be bad for the horses. I don't think I need to power-wash everything, but I'd like to reduce the fly population a little so I plan on completely stripping the stalls this weekend. Sadly, my bad back does not allow me to yank all the stall mats out, but they are currently laying directly over concrete so there shouldn't be too much organic material under them. How do you clean your barns and how often?


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## HombresArablegacy (Oct 12, 2013)

Flies come with the territory when it comes to having horses. You'll never get rid of all of them. Sounds like you're doing as much as you can to keep the population down. 
As for the mess they make with their corner feeders, I would suggest replacing them with flat backed buckets. Easy to hang, easy to remove and clean.


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## Avna (Jul 11, 2015)

Ditto on the buckets. I have the square kind with the prongs that hang on a horizontal 2x4 or a pipe fence. 

I do suggest you review your fly-prevention protocols. Flies lay their eggs in damp, uncovered manure. If you are just piling it, you are making a fly nursery. Keep it completely covered with a tarp and the edges weighted down with boards or something. Also use fly predators. They really, really help. Houseflies are their only host, I believe. Spalding is the place to get them, they send a package of larvae once a month in fly season. And, use fly traps. Don't use the bait ones near the horses -- they draw the flies. Use those on the perimeter and sticky type traps in the stable. 

I'm sure you have worse fly problems than I do because it's wet there and dry here, but I am sure that without all the above I'd have clouds of flies. I have almost none.


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## egrogan (Jun 1, 2011)

I've actually completely removed my mare's bucket from her stall now that her feed is being soaked. Instead, I use a large rubber pan. It gets rinsed every day, and has the benefit of encouraging her to eat from the ground.

Maybe it's because I board, so the stall is more "out of sight, out of mind," but I can only think of one time when the stalls in our barn have ever been scrubbed with bleach. I did it once about 4 years ago when my horse was the only one on the farm to have a really nasty case of pinworms. I'm convinced the BM at that time (who thankfully moved on right after I bought Isabel) got sloppy with the deworming routine, and wasn't picking paddocks as often as she should have. Anyway, the pinworms do this disgusting thing where they crawl out of the rectum in the evening to lay eggs under the tail, which is obviously uncomfortable for the horse, so Isabel was rubbing everywhere she could in her stall. We did a Panacur powerpac with her and I did bleach all the stall walls myself then to try to combat the residue from her rubbing. Fortunately the powerpac cleared them out. Ick. Once of the grossest horse experiences I've had!


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## waresbear (Jun 18, 2011)

To reduce the fly numbers in the barn, hang a bunch of the sticky fly strips. I have seen these in many barns, so they must work?


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## horseluvr2524 (Sep 17, 2013)

I've never been at a barn that has as few flies as my current one. Honest to God I don't even notice flies anymore, when normally we are swarmed and my horse is super fly sensitive. They are obviously there because she has a few bites here and there, but I almost never see them.

BO uses a feed through fly control. That is literally the only difference I can find between her barn and others I've been at. She is also extremely aggressive about stall cleaning and taking out urine spots every single day, so that makes a difference too. The flies this morning had no interest in me or my horse. I didn't even see them until I found them in my coffee, stupid flies.

I mentioned them before and will say again, Fly Predators. You have a stationary manure pile which is exactly what they are for. Feed through fly control and fly predators, you will probably see a big difference.

As far as the feeders go, better to feed them in loose rubber pans on the ground for grain, supplements, soaked feed, etc. Far less messy to clean up. If you put another feeder inside your fixed feeder they will still slobber and mess the fixed feeder.

I don't have any cleaning suggestions other than looking into a washing soda and vinegar solution. I recently used it to clean a bird cage and it literally took off rust without destroying the powdercoat on the cage. I don't know if its safe for wood though.

ETA: I did apply the washing soda to the cage first and then pour the vinegar directly on it. The chemical reaction happening directly on the cage seems to be what got rid of the rust. I did have to use a degreaser on the cage afterwards, as it was greasy from sitting in garage and the vinegar/washing soda did not get rid of that.


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## Dreamcatcher Arabians (Nov 14, 2010)

I have found that barn fans help move a lot of flies out. Keeping the poo and pee picked up, and broken cuts flies back further. Predators work great, sprinkle them on the manure pile or you can sprinkle lime on the pile and in the barn. I've never been impressed with traps or feed throughs, the feed throughs are good for 7 different varieties of flies, we'have a whole bunch more than that, I've forgotten exactly how many. I also have fly sprayers up in the barn, that helps a lot too. This year is wet, it has been bad for flies.


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## jaydee (May 10, 2012)

I use the sticky strips - not pretty but very effective and satisfying (cruel streak in me!!)
I have a couple of battery operated fly spray dispensers at either end of the barn
I spray around the outer edges of the stables because flies tend to lay eggs in those places
I use Stall Dry on all wet patches
I have fans running most of the day and into the evening
If a horse poops on the wall or rubs its bum on the wall or slobbers food all over the wall and leaves a messy patch I spray it with a mix of soap liquid and disinfectant, leave for 10 minutes or so and then scrub it off with water with a bit more of that soap/disinfectant mix in it. If you do it on a daily basis you don't create as much wet area on the floor
I avoid bleach in the stables as it reacts with the urine and has the potential to be very unpleasant


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## Prairie (May 13, 2016)

Horses are better off fed at ground level since it aligns their jaws like they would grazing on pasture as nature intended with the result of fewer teeth issues.


To control flies takes a multidirectional approach--


1. Pick up manure daily and compost it away from the horses. Also drain any standing water to prevent mosquitoes from hatching


2. Spray the horses with fly spray and put fans in their stalls to deter insects


3. Use fly predators to reduce the number of larva that hatch


4. Put out fly strips in the barn and both Terminator traps and Bite Free traps around the paddocks and pastures 


5. Get your neighbors with horses to follow this program so you don't have flies moving in from other places.


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## Dehda01 (Jul 25, 2013)

Fly predators!!! 

I will bleach or spray "stall safe"once a year in the barn... But honestly it is overkill unless you are really actively showing or you have an outbreak of a virus. I will spray stall safe in each temporary stall I visit at a horse show however before I put my horses in them. 

I like to sprinkle a little bit of a watered down veterolin solution down my aisle to make it smell nice, some people use pinesol. Use a stall dry powder or solution like PDZ or "bye bye odor". Less odor attracts less flies and smells better to both horses and people.


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## natisha (Jan 11, 2011)

Before cleaning I use a barn/stable spray on flies in the stalls.
Stain your stalls, you won't notice the stains as much.


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## Prairie (May 13, 2016)

The issue with bleach for disinfecting stalls is that bleach is "neutralized" by dirt it doesn't kill germs. Better is just a bucket of hot sudsy water and a brush to scrub down the stalls and rinsed or PineSol in hot water. Sunshine is nature's great disinfectant and works well for drying buckets, feed pans, stock tanks etc after scrubbing them out.


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## Darrin (Jul 11, 2011)

Didn't see this suggestion so if I missed it I apologize. Move the manure pile as far away from the barn as physically possible. If there are runs, also pick up that manure in those daily. Often runs go days or weeks between cleanings.

Using predators can't be repeated enough. Best barn I've been in for flies had the manure pile 200 yards from the barn and used predators.

Automatic sprayers? I've read enough articles about people who have developed health issues from those that I wouldn't use them. They are purported to be safe but long term exposure like barn owners and trainers get seem point to them not being so safe.


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## Prairie (May 13, 2016)

Personally, we've found that fans in the stalls set on high work better than any of the spray insecticide systems. All four of ours are piled into 2 stalls (they seem to think they need a buddy in there!) standing in front of the fans right now---it's not so hot, but the air is so humid, you could cut it with a knife and for once windy Kansas isn't windy.


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## Acadianartist (Apr 21, 2015)

Thanks for all the suggestions. As stated in the original post, my manure pile is already very far away from the barn. About 250 feet. It may not be realistic when winter comes, but then flies will be gone. And yes, all manure and urine is removed daily from stalls and all the manure is cleaned up from the paddock where they spend their days. Pastures are dragged as rotation allowed (so far, I've only done one section as the horses graze the other). 

I may very well get those rubber dishes and let them eat off the floor. However, that means I have to hang around until they're done eating or leave the dishes in the stall for them to stomp/throw around like a frisbee/throw dirt into. I suppose that isn't a huge deal. They look pretty durable and the horses can't hurt themselves on them. 

As for fly predators - can anyone recommend a supplier in Canada? Yes, I did find some online, but I'd like a recommendation from someone who has actually used a specific company. I'm not thrilled about introducing a new species in an ecosystem, so it needs to be adapted to the eastern part of Canada. I don't think I want to try a feed-through at this point. Both horses are very sensitive to what they eat and I've finally got both of them on the precise diet I want them to be on. I've read that some feed-throughs can also kill useful gut bacteria. Both my horses have sensitive guts so I don't want to risk that. I do use fly spray, but sparingly. Again, all those chemicals make me uncomfortable. I reserve them for when we're going to be riding or when the flies are particularly nasty. I may get stable spray... but wouldn't the horses ingest some when they're eating hay in their stalls? I use hay nets, but inevitably, they spill some on the floor.

Another issue is that I don't just have barn flies or face flies. I have deer flies, wasps, gnats, no see'ums. Sometimes also mosquitoes. They all seem to take turns. Conditions that are not favorable to one species seem to favour others. I'm pretty sure they're not just taking shifts to torture us, so my guess is that when there is a gap in the population of one species, it's quickly filled by another. So unless the fly predators eat all those species, will I just be making space for a new bug to come in and fill the spot left by whatever species the fly predators eat? 

Fans are a definite option. Air flow is pretty good in the barn, but I'm sure the horses would enjoy a breeze in the heat of the day.

In the end, I feel a clean barn is the best way to combat flies which is why I was asking about how you keep your stalls clean. So I will wash the walls of the stalls and strip down all the bedding completely in the hopes that this reduces the flies somewhat.


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## Kato (Apr 20, 2011)

I farm sit for a lady and in the 6 months I have stayed at the farm over a 2 year stretch I have seen exactly 3 flies in the barn. She has screen doors on her barn doors so she does not keep the barn screen doors open at all they only open if she is actively going in and out. She also has no barn swallows because of them. She uses fly predators. Her "fresh" manure pile is 300 feet from the barn and every other week she uses the tractor to move it to the big pile which is at least 1/4 mile from the barn. She has fly traps on the outer edge of what she has mowed and considers the yard. There is 1 fly tape in the feed room. The stalls are cleaned daily, and all buckets are rinsed. I also power wash the stalls and barn once a year for her. She does wipe down any bigger messes that happen. All that with 3 horses, 1 pony, 3 minis, 2 donkeys, and 2 goats in the barn.


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## walkinthewalk (Jul 23, 2008)

1. FWIW I do not like rubber buckets and I really don't like rubber feed pans. They wear out after awhile and become difficult to clean.

I have been using these since 1998; I still have two originals from 1998. I know this type are over-the-rail and not feasible for your set-up but they may have something that will work.

https://www.southernstates.com/catalog/p-8949-duraflex-20qt-fence-feeder.aspx

I also use this type of material in water buckets. They can be cloroxed a bazillion times without issue. I wash all the feed pans twice daily and dump the water buckets every morning during the hot months. Things get cloroxed as needed, then left in the sun for the day.

I wait for my horses to finish eating. Even when I worked, and had four horses. It only took everyone about 15 minutes to eat, less than five minutes for me to gather feed pans, wash them, put them upside down in the counter. There was plenty to do in that 15 minutes I was waiting, to keep me busy

2. I don't like box fans either; I want enough air blowing to just about send the horses into the next county. It's been so humid lately, I even soak them down with wash rag while they're standing in front of their fans. 

I buy those big floor model barrel fans, from TSC.

CountyLine Portable Barrel Fan, 42 in. - For Life Out Here

We have the 36" fans.

I mentioned this to you before but I will say it again because it's a safety feature:

The fans are on heavy duty outdoor timers and plugged directly into the timers without extension cords. This time of year my barrel fans kick on at 6:45 AM and off at 1:00 AM the next morning.

3. If you figure out what to do about the horse and deer flies, you bought yourself an early retirement by marketing it, lol

My manure pile is a good 800 feet from the barn, as the crow flies. Clear over in the far pasture. We don't have mosquito issues, horse flies aren't bad, deer flies are the boogers.

We also have three houses of Purple Martins which help immensely to keep the bug population down. We only have one nest of Barn Swallows but she had two broods so both parents have been busy catching the flying bugs.

Purple Martins fly high, Barn Swallows fly low to catch bugs so they all help to keep a lot of pesky flying critters away.


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## Avna (Jul 11, 2015)

Canadian sources: 

http://www.goodbugs.ca/
Natural Insect Control, NIC specializes in Canadian Beneficial Nematodes, grub control, Beneficial Insects, good bugs to control bad bugs. Organic, environment friendly products for home, garden, orchard and farm.

There is no need to be worried about introducing a non-native species into the ecosystem with fly predators. Seriously. They are parasites of house flies, and house flies only. No house flies, they die off. They've been in use for I'm guessing at least 20 years, worldwide, and I have not dug up any concerns that have arisen. I would be far more concerned about the long-term effects of chemical pesticides -- those are well-documented to be harmful to ecosystems. 

I too try to limit the chemical sprays. I use them only when riding in a buggy area, luckily we have a reliable onshore breeze in the summer coming through the pasture. They wear fly masks and that's it.

There are also eco-controls for other kinds of flies and pests -- just look into those websites, they have a lot of information. 
It's one thing to be properly cautious, it is another to be unable to act effectively because you have not researched the options.


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## Acadianartist (Apr 21, 2015)

Avna said:


> Canadian sources:
> 
> http://www.goodbugs.ca/
> Natural Insect Control, NIC specializes in Canadian Beneficial Nematodes, grub control, Beneficial Insects, good bugs to control bad bugs. Organic, environment friendly products for home, garden, orchard and farm.
> ...


Thanks for providing a Canadian source Avna. Have you used this company? Please understand, I don't have a fly infestation. Most people I know happily go on living their lives with the small amount of flies I have in my barn. I just want to be cautious about introducing new species. The only literature I've been able to find online about fly predators is supplied by companies who sell the product. That doesn't satisfy me. But I will continue to read about them. I do wonder if the elimination of barn flies might lead to an infestation of a different bug as they leave a space in the food chain. As I said, we have a very wide array of insects that will happily take the place of barn flies if given the chance. 

A bigger fly problem for me is biting flies during trail rides which are really putting a dent in my riding time. This thread wasn't really about how to control the fly population, but rather about how to keep my stalls as clean as possible to discourage large outbreaks of flies.


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## Acadianartist (Apr 21, 2015)

Kato said:


> I farm sit for a lady and in the 6 months I have stayed at the farm over a 2 year stretch I have seen exactly 3 flies in the barn. She has screen doors on her barn doors so she does not keep the barn screen doors open at all they only open if she is actively going in and out. She also has no barn swallows because of them. She uses fly predators. Her "fresh" manure pile is 300 feet from the barn and every other week she uses the tractor to move it to the big pile which is at least 1/4 mile from the barn. She has fly traps on the outer edge of what she has mowed and considers the yard. There is 1 fly tape in the feed room. The stalls are cleaned daily, and all buckets are rinsed. I also power wash the stalls and barn once a year for her. She does wipe down any bigger messes that happen. All that with 3 horses, 1 pony, 3 minis, 2 donkeys, and 2 goats in the barn.


Wow. That borders on OCD! I do have screens on all my windows, but since I have dutch doors that remain open 24/7 so the horses can come in and out as they please, screens everywhere are not realistic. I do have fly tapes everywhere and replace them regularly. One issue I have with power washing is that when they built the barn, they left cracks between the stall boards on the walls. They're not spaced apart, but they're not sitting tight enough together to be waterproof. So inevitably, if I power wash, the water will run between the boards into the walls. Mind you, it would run down onto the concrete floor and dry up eventually. But for future reference, make sure your wall boards are nailed together tight if you're building a barn!


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## Acadianartist (Apr 21, 2015)

walkinthewalk said:


> 1. FWIW I do not like rubber buckets and I really don't like rubber feed pans. They wear out after awhile and become difficult to clean.
> 
> I have been using these since 1998; I still have two originals from 1998. I know this type are over-the-rail and not feasible for your set-up but they may have something that will work.
> 
> ...


Thanks for the links! We are planning a trip to Maine sometime in August so maybe I can find something at a Tractor Supply store there. As always, we have a limited selection of feed buckets locally. I use flat-backed buckets for water and I also dump all the water out (including water outside) every day, sometimes more than once a day and refill with fresh. 

It only gets hot here between about noon and 6 pm so I would probably just run the fans then. But really, it's as much to keep the air flowing through the barn as it is for the flies. The horses generally come in sometime in the afternoon and just doze in their stalls. The flies aren't bad enough to really bother them in the barn since I keep it dark and cool. 

And yes... those horrible deer flies... also, there is some kind of nasty wasp - yellow and black stripes, but smaller than a yellow jacket - that are making my riding miserable. They've stung me and the horses and are extremely aggressive. Nothing deters them and they're fast and agile. Fly tape doesn't catch them, nor does it catch any deer flies.


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## sarahfromsc (Sep 22, 2013)

I have boarded at barns that left the barn open for the horses to come and go. The problem I saw was the horses would go into the barn, but they would have flies on the faces,etc. so literally the horses were bringing the flies in with them.

One barn solved the problem by buying screen material and hung it. Then cut that into strips and duct taped the cut ends. Horses walked through the screening and the flies were knock off. The bonus was also the screening kept the flies from entering the barn when horses or you are in it.

As for deer flies, there is nothing that kills those mofos. They are so bad here no matter what time you ride. You and your horse are besieged by the little suckers. I carry two shy flies and am constantly swishing me and my horse. I have never seen them this bad!


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## Acadianartist (Apr 21, 2015)

THIS is what I'm talking about! My darling Harley just loves to eat with his mouth hanging over his stall. I know I could just put bars on, but I like the fact that it's open and he would just slobber all over the walls anyway. You can see the mess they're both making around their corner feeders. The saliva really attracts the flies so those feeders have to go. I'm thinking the only way to avoid getting all this slobber all over the place is feeding from the ground. I think if I hung a different bucket, they'd still hang their heads over the stalls to chew while watching me getting their next meal ready in the tack room. Which means having to enter the stalls to feed them. I don't have a problem with this, but it might make it more difficult to get my daughter/husband or horse sitter do it. I will try to teach the horses to stand back politely before I will set down their food, otherwise, Harley will maul people for his meals. He REALLY loves his food  

I've also included pictures of the stall walls where Kodak managed to get runny stool all over. The two big stains have already been washed, but you can see they didn't come out completely. And yes, Natisha, I could stain my stalls, but who has that kind of time/energy? Maybe someday... I don't really care what they look like though, as long as the stains are not attracting more flies. These wall stains have been scrubbed with vinegar and baking soda so they don't attract any flies at all. 

Also, photos of my centre aisle and tack room which are virtually fly-free. All my feed and supplements are kept in an old freezer (the blue thing) or a mini-fridge (you can't see it in this pic) so there is nothing out that flies can feed on - although this is mostly for rodent-control purposes. The flies are just hanging around the dirty feeders and walls around them, and on the bedding in the stalls. Because I use pellets, I don't strip every day. I will strip them all as clean as I can, sweep, disinfect and let the floors dry out to see if it helps.


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## natisha (Jan 11, 2011)

Those stains are like the first scratch on a new car.


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## Avna (Jul 11, 2015)

Looks pretty durn clean to me. 

I don't have experience with those companies because I live in California. 
Seriously, interrupting the life cycle of pest insects is the only thing that truly works. And to do that, you need to first understand what the life cycle of that particular pest requires, and second, a multi-pronged approach to disrupting it. The name for that process is Integrated Pest Management (IPM). I worked in/around the organic agriculture and horticulture industries for years. This is not a new thing.

Cleanliness is ONE aspect. It cannot be your whole focus. Cleaning should be targeted to the needs of the particular pests you have. For example disinfectants may have so little effect on the species you are trying to control that it isn't worth the bother. Or they might be important. Guessing about it is counterproductive, especially when scientific information is right there at your fingertips. The local Canadian equivalent of the US county agricultural extension service would be a good place to start. 

I am a researching fool so I am just giving you the approach that works for me: knowledge is power.


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## PoptartShop (Jul 25, 2010)

Fly predators work best IMO. Fly tape is good too though, as we have a lot around the barn. They seem to help keep a lot at bay. That's good you pile the manure away from the barn, but they may still be using it as a breeding ground. 
I don't think you'll ever fully get rid of them, because they just love being around horses! Fly spray works too (good fly spray).


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## Kay Armstrong (Jun 28, 2015)

I use a feed through fly control. Prevents the fly eggs from hatching. Although I've found that the brand I'm using causes the horses to itch a bit...I think takes a bit of getting used to....horses are rubbing their tails a little. But....with a new barn also....have relatively few flies.


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## Acadianartist (Apr 21, 2015)

Ok, so stalls have been stripped clean and walls scrubbed with vinegar and baking soda with a touch of dish soap, then hosed down. I let the stalls dry out completely for a few hours without adding any new bedding. I hung four fly tapes above the stalls because the flies were all confused and had nowhere to go. HOLY COW, those fly tapes are already full. I always have 2-3 fly tapes hanging, but they usually take about a week to get that full. Will take them down in the morning and hang new ones. 

Corner feeders are gone and (for now) replaced with rubber pans. We'll see how those work out. The number of flies buzzing around the barn was significantly less by the end of the day. The horses were much happier too, coming into clean, fly-free stalls. Of course I realize I haven't broken the cycle of new flies hatching and I am considering fly predators and feed-through control if I can find something that is natural and doesn't disrupt their digestive system, but in the short term, cleaning and stripping everything down to the floor was very helpful.


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## Acadianartist (Apr 21, 2015)

natisha said:


> Those stains are like the first scratch on a new car.


Worse. I don't care so much about my car


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## Acadianartist (Apr 21, 2015)

PoptartShop said:


> Fly predators work best IMO. Fly tape is good too though, as we have a lot around the barn. They seem to help keep a lot at bay. That's good you pile the manure away from the barn, but they may still be using it as a breeding ground.
> I don't think you'll ever fully get rid of them, because they just love being around horses! Fly spray works too (good fly spray).


P.S. Poptart, I like your signature: "Ride more, worry less." I may need to make that my motto.


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## walkinthewalk (Jul 23, 2008)

Things come to me, if I think long enough on a subject. I've reached a point in life where, in the words of my beloved grandfather, "I have forgotten more than some people will ever know", lol

A few years back, someone from Canada on another forum, talked about this black horse fly trap. She lived in an area where the horse flies almost carried horse and rider away at certain times of the year.

HORSE PAL® Horsefly Trap - Newman Enterprises, Omro, WI - biting flies, horse fly, deer fly, yellow fly, greenhead, horsefly, deerfly, fly bites, fly trap, bitingflies, horsepal

She said it worked unbelievably well but one has to follow the building instructions to the letter.

If you Google "black horse fly traps", a few things will come up, but this is the one the lady I was forum acquainted with spoke about.


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## Acadianartist (Apr 21, 2015)

walkinthewalk said:


> Things come to me, if I think long enough on a subject. I've reached a point in life where, in the words of my beloved grandfather, "I have forgotten more than some people will ever know", lol
> 
> A few years back, someone from Canada on another forum, talked about this black horse fly trap. She lived in an area where the horse flies almost carried horse and rider away at certain times of the year.
> 
> ...


Yes, I've seen that one before. Right now, the big biting flies are totally non-existent in and around the barn. On trails is a different matter, but I can't very well clear 13 acres of flies. Seems like the regular, non-biting barn flies have taken over. 

The situation is much improved though, since I did my scrubbing and cleaning. There are significantly less flies now. The hard part will be keeping it that way, but we've only got about another month of this and then the cold will kill them all off, thankfully.


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## jaydee (May 10, 2012)

I've found that leaving an old wide topped container full of water in a sunny spot will attract a lot of the bugs that are attracted to bright shiny surfaces - they drown themselves
I found with the sticky poles that the bright yellow ones got more bugs stuck on them than the black ones did
We also use one of those electric zapper things in the evenings, its staked out on the lawn - they attract mosquitos and fry them but you need to have the ones with small enough mesh to not fry moths as well


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## avjudge (Feb 1, 2011)

walkinthewalk said:


> A few years back, someone from Canada on another forum, talked about this black horse fly trap. . .
> 
> HORSE PAL® Horsefly Trap - Newman Enterprises, Omro, WI - biting flies, horse fly, deer fly, yellow fly, greenhead, horsefly, deerfly, fly bites, fly trap, bitingflies, horsepal


I learned about this trap from the fly predators people (Spalding) - they have a brochure (really a booklet!) about controlling flies, and for horse & deer flies they basically say this (or similar trap) is the only thing that works. Here's the information on their web site:

Guide to Fly Control: Types of Flies

Guide to Fly Control: Types of Flies: Deer and Horse Flies

"Best placed close to the source of these pests as it can be ineffective when used near areas with many animals (with real blood) as these biting flies are not that dumb." (Love that quote!) 

I've also explored via google, and you'll find lots of people on youtube walking around with blue Solo cups coated with tanglefoot attached to the top of their ballcaps. Looks ridiculous but they say it works!

Also web pages of people who set up traps, then record how many deer flies they catch each year. Some seem to have actually reduced their local populations! Though that won't help when out on trails. On one hand I think they must have way too much time on their hands (or be totally fixated on flies - but if the deer flies are swarming you, it's hard _not_ to be), but on the other I'm grateful to them for giving us actual data.

Anne


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## Darrin (Jul 11, 2011)

Not much you can do about deer and horse flies on the trail. The *******s are hungry and persistent, I haven't found a fly spray yet that will stop them. Best bet is get your horse to understand when you tell them to freeze, you mean freeze so you can slap the ******. Trust me when I say horses can learn in a hurry what you are doing and know that you are trying to help and not punishing them.


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## jaydee (May 10, 2012)

We break off a reasonably solid leafy twig (well something between a twig and a branch!!!) and use that to swish off flies that try to settle and bite that you can't reach with your hand but that's another thing you have to desensitize the horse too or they see it as a weapon of mass destruction or a cue to go faster


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## Kato (Apr 20, 2011)

jaydee said:


> We break off a reasonably solid leafy twig (well something between a twig and a branch!!!) and use that to swish off flies that try to settle and bite that you can't reach with your hand but that's another thing you have to desensitize the horse too or they see it as a weapon of mass destruction or a cue to go faster


This is what I do on trail. A nice sized branch. I pull it off a tree when we first start. At first my horse was nervous but she loves it now. Not to mention the sound me snapping a branch off was something she got used to as well. So when we were riding and she heard a twig break she knew she would feel it soon. We were riding in the orchard on a windy day and a decent sized branch broke off a tree and hit her in the neck. She didn't even flinch. She did look at me like "why did you hit me so hard" though.


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## PoptartShop (Jul 25, 2010)

Acadianartist said:


> P.S. Poptart, I like your signature: "Ride more, worry less." I may need to make that my motto.


Thank you! GO for it!


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