>>> and theres like what, five icelandics in florida and I have two of em.
That's a good point - with such teeny-tiny numbers, it's almost impossible to draw meaningful conclusions. In fact, with only 2000-3000 Icelandic horses (domestics and imports) in the entire country, living in many different climate/geography regions, I think it will be hard to draw many meaningful conclusions for a long time, if ever. I believe that I understand that there are three (at least?) major factors in if/how SE presents: 1) the immunities developed soon after birth 2) the natural tendency the horse to have an allergy to cullicoides (I believe that is what is shown in the number given by the allergy tests) 3) the geography/climate where the adult horse lives. It would appear that Tivar didn't not develop the necessary immunities at birth to be able to fight the gnat population in Florida - item 1. Bodega Bay California is probably about as different a climate from the panhandle of Florida as you can get in the USA. I believe that it shows in the number from the Cornell allergy test - item 2. The only thing we can look at with Tivar so far is item #3 - he has changed geography/climate...and not by a major degree either. Honestly, I'm very surprised that he's looking so much better here in such a short time. (As always, I'm still praying this isn't temporary...) >>> But I have told Karen Teev is doing so great at her place i honestly >>> believe he just got addicted to scratching and rubbing and since she has >>> a big field where he cant rub on anything he is getting his "habit" >>> extinguished thank God. I agree that's a factor in the TREATMENT of SE once it appears. What surprises me is that he shows so few signs of SE...SO FAR... Meaning that I don't think he's really showing SE here, not to any serious degree. He DOES love to rub - he's a little Obsessive-Compulsive about several things in his life, and that's just one of them. BUT...he has a few opportunities to rub here, and he just chooses not to most of the time. He will, but not obsessively, making me believe that he's not itching very much at all. To me, the big questions about Tivar's individual case are: 1) Is the improvement going to last? This is the HUGE question. If it doesn't last, then the following questions are moot. 2) If so, I ask this and the following: Why better in NC than in the Panhandle of FL? It's warmer there than here, but not by a long shot - I've been monitoring our temps since Tivar first showed his symptoms, and I've been surprised by how close our weather is. 3) Is the soil a factor? We have clay soil here, and Janice has sand. I know that there are totally different types of gnats that live in the sandy soil areas of the NC/SC coastal plains....In fact, one of the nicknames for Cullicoides is "sand flies." And it seems to me that the places on earth that have the highest incidence of SE are coastal areas. SE is also called Queensland Itch, and I believe that Queensland is a flat coastal area - I wonder what the soil is? I don't believe that Anneliese's soil is sandy, and I know she has had a lot of SE in imports, so that makes me think it's certainly not the only factor...but is it ONE factor? In other words, will the particular variety of cullicoides that live/breed in sandy soils make for a worse case? I don't know, I'm just asking. 4) I'm keeping Tivar in an open pasture on a little hill - not a mountain by any means, just a rolling hill that happens to be the highest point in the immediate area. We're in the Piedmont section of NC - more hills than in the flat coastal plain, but not in the mountains at all. This particular pasture is a little breezier than some areas so I wonder if that's a factor. I tend to think not, because when I ride him in the woods, which are damper and have less breeze, he doesn't seem affected there either... My first guess is that we don't have so many of the allergy-causing cullicoides in this part of the state...? So, I don't think we can draw too many conclusions from Tivar's case - maybe no conclusions at all. But, this does make me ask more questions. Karen Thomas, NC
