Advice please on pony with dry, scurfy skin

[hayinamanger]

Hi everyone

Pony just arrived with very dry skin all over the body, lots of scurf. Is healthy and very bright in himself. Has been recently clipped and hogged.

He could do with a nice bath but I feel the weather is too cold at present.

I'd like to treat this from within so could you reccomend good supplements and oil for skin problems like this?

Thank you

 

[Dolcé]

Could possibly be lice infestation but we have one that we home bred who had terrible skin right from his first winter, always scurfy and dusty and used to come off in big soggy chunks. When we had the bad freeze last winter and we couldn't feed, because of the set up we were on, they only had ad lib haylage and all went a bit leaner than we would have liked, for some reason his skin has just corrected itself and he has a beautiful coat. When he was scurfy I tried everything in his feed to absolutely no avail, the thing that did help a little was just brushing and brushing with a dandy brush and he had to be rugged all year round.

 

[Lisamd]

Tea tree spray from Ozoil or an aloe vera spray - spray onto coat and wipe over with a damp hot cloth

 

[scrat]

Linseed oil has worked for our cob who was quite dry and scurfy after clipping. You could try hot toweling as an alternative to a full bath.

 

[hayinamanger]

Thank you for the useful tips, he quite possibly has had a lice infestation which has left his skin/coat so dry, I will get to work on him tomorrow with the hot towelling.

 

[kirstyl]

Thank you for the useful tips, he quite possibly has had a lice infestation which has left his skin/coat so dry, I will get to work on him tomorrow with the hot towelling.

If he has a lice infestation you need to treat it pronto! Deosect is what our vet recommends but give yours a call and see what they say. If it is lice and you don't treat it immediately, it will get worse and obviously potentially spread to other equines. I work with donkeys and their coats are dry at the moment and our vet has recommended feeding linseed. Will report back with results!

 

[K27]

I would use some Deosect too to get rid of the lice and then look at the nutrition and feeding too plus add some Linseed Oil- and good grooming- in a while he'll probably look like a completely different pony! good luck with him!