Legality re Sweet itch selling/buying?

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Bobby2

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Many thanks in advance for advice- regular poster but for obvious reasons prefer this to be anonymous.
Long story short - if you bought a horse with full mane and tail (v. little turnout ) who within 2-3 days of arrival was rubbing mane/tail/generally itchy unless turned out in full neck fly rug ( was sent with fly rug) . Within a week becomes clear it has sweet itch signs.Seller denies any signs before selling - wore a fly rug from just a few weeks ago and was showing.
Now has rubs mane/tail and obviously sweet itch. Horse is good otherwise, now been 2-3 weeks. Seller breeds to sell, but only one a year or so and runs large equine business.

Full Vetting saw no sign sweet itch.
All other horses here do not require fly rugs so this is unusual for this premises.
Legally anyone know the best way to proceed? They will I presume claim it happened when horse moved but had had one previous episode of fly bites with them - never seen a vet for it so no records.
However this was not declared and is going to be a pain to manage.
Any thoughts? Am I entitled to return? Get a partial refund?
 
legally they must declare sweet itch on selling

HOWEVER I think you'd need to try and prove that they must have known unless they sell enough to be seen to be a dealer where you may have more right to reject the pony

Its not unheard of for symptoms to appear on moving if the location is very different eg now next to a steam and trees where the old place had no stream and breezy open fields
 
That was my thought, I have previously bought two good animals off this seller (a long time ago) hence why I am reluctant to fall out with them if it is going to get me nowhere anyway.. but also now have the pain of a shiney new horse with problems.! I'm sure we've all been there!
 
The horse had no sign of sweetitch at the vetting or on viewing or arrival at your yard. I'm not sure what you expect the seller to do.
 
I recently bought a new horse, saw him a week before he arrived tail looked fine. When I went to pick him up I noticed that he had scratched his tail a little. Was told he didn't have sweet itch, but didn't like flies. A couple of days later, he had been scratching badly, originally we thought he had sweet itch but on closer inspection we noticed that he had picked up lice inbetween been viewed and being picked up. since then he's had one treatment from the vet and his tail is growing back nicely.

I would check for any lice, or any thing in his enviroment that could be causing him to itch.

Is your enviromnemt different to where he came from if he came from an open breezy field, where the midges did not bother him and now hes close to a field and/or stream it may now be aggrivating him. If there were no signs of sweet itch when you purchased him perhaps the seller did not know and I'm not sure what you would like them to do.
 
Can't speak for everyone else, but when you know what to look for, signs are still there the following Spring. My mare never has a full tail despite her breed and has white marks where she'd rubbed herself raw previous to me buying her. If your horse had SI at the previous yard, there'd have been signs. The little turnout is probably the answer. Chances are you have a horse intolerant to your grass and the sudden change has caused the itching. If you graze on a bare paddock and reintroduce grass slowly, things may improve. Other diet changes can cause itching too, particularly things like alfalfa.
 
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