I have the same issue with my horses, seems like all the sprays (commercial or homemade) only seem to work for maybe 30 minutes, it’s frustrating.  I recently started allowing my chickens into the horse paddock and that has made a small improvement in the fly population.

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Joelle

I made a horse fly repellent last week that surprisingly works well! It combines 2 cups of ACV, a little mineral oil, a T of dishsoap with Citronella and Eucalyptus – I liked it a lot and it works well on our horses. Lots of chickens help too :>)

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Sigrid Griffitt, Karen, Joelle, Kim, Danise Peters

Just jumping in here. Cedar might be mostly famous for repelling moths, but it also repels other kinds of annoying insects. Cedar oil might be well worth a try in a home-made bug spray. Hope this helps.

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Joelle

For what it is worth, we run our cattle on the desert and up in the forest. My husband uses the fly-repellent tags in our cows’ ears. We put them in when we move our cows from spring grazing to summer grazing, and there is an immediate difference in the number of flies bugging our cows. The effect lasts all summer. We often tie a tag to our horses’ bridals when we go up to the forest where there are bogs and ponds and lots of flies and mosquitoes. We have found it keeps the number of insects buzzing around our heads and the horse’s faces significantly lower. The horses are actually able to concentrate on their job and so are we, instead of swatting at insects and tossing their heads or biting at the flies biting them. It makes the ride a lot more enjoyable. It’s not a perfect fix, but it helps, and our cows come off the forest every year with far fewer pests on their backs than cows belonging to others in our association. The tag manufacturers say that you need to tag all the animals in your herd for the best results, and we don’t tag the other ranchers’ cows, so…not perfect, but better. Maybe you can make a necklace for your pasture friends with a tag for the pendant. It’s not an herbal solution, but it does reduce exposure and skin contact with pesticides.

• This reply was modified 1 year, 9 months ago by Michelle Babcock.

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Sarah Riley, Mykianne Sparks, Joelle

I also use Fly Predators to keep the fly population down.  We’ve used them for about 10 years now and they have helped so much.  We have them shipped monthly .  Also, Biting fly traps work fantastic for those flies that bite your horses lower legs.  They are not attracted to the smelly fly bags like other flies, but go for the shiny trap.  I would love to find a homemade fly spray recipe as well.  I currently  use one I purchase that is more natural.  The effect lasts for about 6 hours!  pretty decent and my horses aren’t sensitive to it like the commercial sprays.

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Joelle

I just recently heard of a salt supplement that Redmond sells that is suppose to help a ton with flies… I have a milk cow I was looking into it for, and it supposably doesn’t taint the flavor of milk (or meat) and it is a natural garlic mineral salt. I haven’t tried it yet, but it may be something worth looking into.

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Brinna Pinkerton, Joelle

We use a homemade fly spray  that has apple cider vinegar, essential oils (like lavender, peppermint, and geranium) , castile soap, and water and I have seen an improvement with flies on our Jersey cow. We also do garlic salt from Redmonds (it doesn’t effect the milk) and that has helped as well. This year we invested in fans in our barn and that has been a great solution  for the cow as it keeps her cool in the summer and also keeps the flies off her back. We also rotate our chickens in the cow field to scratch up the manure and they are great at breaking up the fly larvae and eating it. Fly traps work as well .You can also swipe some coconut oil on the cow’s skin once in awhile as a cream to dispel some of the flies.