Itching caused by the swallows?

[fatpiggy]

My elderly horse is out 24/7 during the summer but occasionally has a night in (she only lies down in her stable) or if the forecast is wet as she hates being rugged. I've noticed that she is super-itchy in the morning, to the point of considerable distress: I open the door to put her feed in and she all but throws herself into my arms to be scratched. Last time she had trashed her stable, flattened all the banks in her attempt to rub herself on the walls. The worst areas seem to be her legs, belly and around her udder which suggest she is coming into contact with an irritant. There is a single swallow nest which causes a pile of droppings at the front edge of her bed, and the odd feather or two on the ground. I am careful to remove the dropping thoroughly every few days, and definitely before she goes in for the night. She is also liberally sprayed with fly repellent. I am now wondering if something is coming from the droppings/feathers and crawling about in her bedding and biting her when she lies down. There are no obvious bites but I find small scabs on her lower legs if I stick my fingernails in. Now, assuming I'm right, how can I get rid of this problem but without harming the swallows? Any ideas anyone?

 

[goldypops]

I moved our little pony into a different stable as couple of weeks ago as there was a bees nest in his usual one! The one i moved him into had a swallows nest in it and after a couple of nights I noticed he was swishing his tail and stamping his feet a lot even though there were no flies about. Noticed then lots of small bites down his neck and he had rubbed the top of his tail raw. The only thing I could put it down to was the nest. A friend of mine had a birds nest in her attic and the mites from the birds and nest came through the floor boards and into the bedroom and she was covered in little bites and had to have the room fumigated. I can only assume that the bites on misty were from mites from the nest. Luckily I had yet another stable I could move him to and since then there have been no more bites or rubbing so it was definitely something in that stable. I suppose i will have to bin all the bedding in that stable - dont know how long mites live for!!!!. Is there another stable you can use???

 

[fatpiggy]

Hmmm, no unfortunately, and I'm on aubiose so can't just open a few bales and start again (too expensive and I've recently lost my supplier anyway). All the stables have swallows in and out of them to be honest anyway.