Help on hand with your horse and pet worming

My name is Simon Wetherald and I am the senior E-SQP at wormers-direct.co.uk. I am ably assisted by both my long term employee Miss Kelly Rothery who is also an E-SQP. and the rest of the team here in Leeds.

An SQP is a category of professionally qualified persons who are entitled to prescribe and/or supply certain veterinary medicinal products under the Veterinary Medicines Regulations. It is the duty of an SQP to ensure that the statutory requirements in respect of the prescription and/or supply of certain veterinary medicinal products are respected.

At wormers-direct.co.uk we have a passion for knowledge and further learning with regard to managing animal health planning and helping our clients to look after their horses and pets and welcome your calls and questions at any time.

There is a myriad of articles, ideas, theories, conclusions, speculations and conflicting advice out in the public domain about worming horses and we strive to improve our own education in these fields by conducting regular continual professional development and hopefully collating all the help and information that is out there ready to pass onto our clients.

Please feel free to contact us if you have any issues you have about worming or arranging testing your animals no matter how trivial or complicated and we will strive to answer your queries with unbiased advice.

I am lucky enough to be the Virbac E-SQP of the year for 2013 and my company trading as wormers-direct.co.uk wholly owned by myself is Bardsey Mills Ltd.

Bardsey Mills Limited is a company registered in England and Wales with company number 1024711 wormers-direct is a trading name of Bardsey Mills Limited who are member of the British Equestrian Trade Association (membership number 775) Our VAT registration number is 169 1690 34 Registered office at Unit 1E Woodside Trading Estate  Low Lane Horsforth  Leeds LS18 5NY
Wormers-direct.co.uk Ltd is a company registered in England and Wales with company number 6081924
Registered office at Unit 1E Woodside Trading Estate  Low Lane Horsforth  Leeds LS18 5NY

Call on free-phone 0800 331 7758 or if you have minutes on your mobile call free on 0333 320 0510

Pinworm in horses

Yet again 2013 is proving to be another year when equine Pinworm burden is becoming more widely reported by UK horse owners. Pinworm (Oxyuris equi) is not generally thought to be harmful as they pass through the intestine but more of a nuisance and an irritant when the female pinworm lays her eggs around the horse’s anus. The female can grow up to approximately 10cm in length and are white in colour. They reside in the large intestine and attach themselves to the intestinal wall to ingest the contents for food. Adults produce eggs approximately 5 months after the initial infection. Eggs are laid around the anus and within a few hours of being laid they develop into embryos and are infective in 4-5 days.  On occasion the actual female worms can be seen in the process of egg laying. Eggs find their way onto the pasture, into water and feed supplies, on fences, stables and walls and onto grooming kits

Eggs are ingested by the horse and L3 larvae are released in the small intestine, they then migrate to the large intestine to develop into the mucosa to L4 larvae which then emerge and mature into adults. The female adults then migrate from the large intestine to the anus where they lay eggs in clumps in a sticky substance on the skin causing irritation around the anus leading to tail rubbing.  These can be removed on a daily basis by cleansing the area around the tail, anus and hindquarters with warm diluted disinfectant The pinworm likes to emerge in the night to lay eggs so cleaning first thing in the morning is best. The recent prevalence of pinworm burden which  be in some manner due to the different strategies recently introduced involving worming horses so treating for pinworm needs to be considered when creating a animal health plan..

Active ingredients that treat for adult and pinworm larvae are Moxidectin, Ivermectin, Febendazole and Mebendazole with Pyrantel treating adults only.

Not all brands are licensed so care needs to be taken by checking the brand’s label.

Extra care should be taken in the stable environment to help reduce the risk of re-contamination from buckets, feed bowls, haynets and rugs etc.  A thorough clean with a disinfectant in these areas and most importantly the stable after removing all bedding will help and is always a good idea in areas of animal care and management. Do not share grooming brushes.

SH Wetherald

E-SQP

www.wormers-direct.co.uk

advice@wormers-direct.co.uk

0844 808 6070