Fly Season Control: Building a Resilient Insect Management Strategy for Horses

It’s that time of year. Beautiful weather and the arrival of fly season. Much to the delight and sometimes dismay for you and your horse, flies are here to stay until the weather cools down in the fall. Controlling flies means a happier horse and a more enjoyable ride. Whether in the arena or on the trails, having your horse fighting biting insects while riding isn’t ideal.

Controlling flies takes a strategy that doesn’t start with fly spray, it ends with it. Managing biting insects starts with removing the habitat they like to live in. So, let’s dive into 5 tips to help you control flies for this summer:

1. Manure management: keep manure and wet shavings out of the stall and far away from the barn. If you board your horse, muck the stall when you’re there. Dirty stalls attracts flies in droves and allows them to reproduce.

2. Standing water and drainage: ensure paddocks, entrances to pastures and any area around the barn can properly drain to mitigate standing water. Flies will use water as a key source to reproduce. If boarding, ensure your horse always has fresh water in their stall and when dumping water buckets make sure to remove any hay from drains when cleaning up!

3. Keep feed areas clean: build up on feed buckets from food is another key source flies will take advantage of. Boarders can clean feed buckets in their stalls when needed. Also, keep feed rooms dry and separate from the rest of the barn.  

4. Wash and groom after riding: when horses build up sweat on their bodies, this attracts biting flies. Make sure to wash your horse down after rides that produce sweat and groom regularly. Fly Bye! Plus Shampoo works great to protect your horse when washing and bathing.

5. Fly spray to repel insect: spray your horse with fly spray to keep insects from directly landing and biting them. Regularly spraying your horse with fly spray will reduce the accumulation of bites from insects and ensure they are more comfortable. Check out Fly Bye! Plus to repel, flies, biting insects, ticks, gnats and mosquitoes.