Natural thrush treatments

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Zipzop

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Horse has a little bit of thrush and some degree of white line separation making him quite footy on stones.
I'm not up for chemical, peroxide, iodine treatments, can anyone suggest anything natural?
I have never had to deal with this before.
Many thanks
 
Zipzop said:
Horse has a little bit of thrush and some degree of white line separation making him quite footy on stones.
I'm not up for chemical, peroxide, iodine treatments, can anyone suggest anything natural?
I have never had to deal with this before.
Many thanks
Click to expand...

Personally, for thrush... I would go all out, you certainly don't want it to hang around or get worse, I used to go for hydrogen peroxide, however the worst case I treated was cleared within a few days with iodine.
 
I use the blue spray from the vets but in between I use anti fungal hoof oil which smells like tea tree. But as above I would nip thrush in the bud with whatever worked.
 
I wash out with Milton (baby disinfectant product) then use sole cleanse.

I've used peroxide in the Past and it's fine, it's pretty much water chemically and doesn't damage the Foot, only oxidises on contact with dirt.
 
Weirdly I've never actually had a horse with thrush so may have made this up! Isn't Eucalyptus oil brushed on the sole and round the frog good? I use it with a horse on box rest as a preventative measure.
 
Neem oil. I slap it on everything. Sore bits, small cuts, bites etc. Doesn't sting or harm healthy tissue.
I have used it on frogs with good effect.
 
DE powder, sold for mites on chickens. It's 100% natural and very useful. Buy it in a puffer bottle as they are good for puffing the powder in the crevices of a hoof.

Also good for feather mites
 
Just treated a horse for quite severe thrush, but did use chemical products (copper sulphate spray from vets, along with iodine).

Most important is to get it as dry as possible (iodine helps a lot with this). If you're set against 'un-natural' products, I'd wash and scrub the hoof really well with a stiff brush, giving the grooves especially a good scrub and then allow to dry well (my horse was kept in on a clean dry bed while treating). I'd then look at the Red Horse products, as suggested above. I used the field paste once mine started going out in the day and found it to be effective, I think its mainly composed of eucalyptus, clay and honey. The sole cleanse is also good and I'd be looking at picking/scrubbing hoof out and then spraying sole cleanse daily until its looking clearer.
 
WelshD said:
DE powder, sold for mites on chickens. It's 100% natural and very useful. Buy it in a puffer bottle as they are good for puffing the powder in the crevices of a hoof.
Click to expand...

Is DE a fungicide? My understanding was it damaged the exoskeletons of things like mites, fleas etc but I wasn't aware it had anti fungal properties?
 
Natural? Iodine is a natural product.

Milton is just rather dilute bleach.

Red Horse Products are extremely good, but are they "natural"?

DE is Dichotomous Earth; not a fungicide.
 
Iodine is a naturally occuring element so is just as natural as oxygen or nitrogen or hydrogen! Just like us horses need iodine for proper thyroid function so they have it in their bodies anyway.
 
My old (now retired) farrier used to recommend Stockholm Tar. It's very messy, but seemed to work and smells pretty good too. Totally natural product .....
 
Apple cider vinegar. I tried all sorts and i found this tge most effective. Apparently it has to have the 'Mother' don't know how important it is but google dolphin fitness, very cheap and efficient website.

I tried all sorts and most of the above suggestions but personally found this the best. Oh yes, dilute 50:50 or maybe neat if it's bad thrush
 
Elemental iodine is nasty and dangerous stuff to handle. It needs to be diluted to be safely used to treat thrush. The same applies to a lot of other substances.

If we are allowed to combine a few naturally occurring elements, my favourite thrush treatment - better than dilute bleach, iodine tincture, hydrogen peroxide, copper sulphate or Stockhold tar in my experience (I have tried 'em all) - is formalin, a dilute solution of formaldehyde. It just water with a carbon atom (!). On the advice of a vet, I used a 10% solution squirted carefully and sparingly into affected sulci. This is twice the strength of the standard foot-rot treatment for sheep where they walk through a shallow bath of the stuff. You definitely don't want to breathe the fumes or get any formalin in your eyes, but it is extremely effective. Not only does it kill the thrush bacteria, but it seems to dry and harden the frog.

However, OP didn't want "chemicals" (presumably industrially synthesized chemicals specifically because all substances including those that are naturally occurring or synthesized by plants or animals are chemicals). In which case, I will put in a word for tea tree oil. I haven't tried this with thrush because of the expense, but have used it to good effect with rain rot (dermatophilosis) in horses to soften and remove the matted tufts where the bacteria dwell. The bacteria implicated in both thrush and rain rot are anaerobic, i.e. they hate air/oxygen and like damp places, so I imagine that tea tree oil would work with thrush too. It's relatively skin-friendly, unlike the chemicals listed above, but you still wouldn't want to get it in your eyes!
 
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