30/07/2020
𝑊𝑒 𝑙𝑜𝑣𝑒 𝑜𝑢𝑟 𝑑𝑜𝑔𝑠, 𝑏𝑢𝑡 𝑛𝑜𝑡 𝑎𝑙𝑙 𝑜𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑖𝑟 𝑎𝑛𝑡𝑖𝑐𝑠 𝑎𝑟𝑒 𝑝𝑙𝑒𝑎𝑠𝑎𝑛𝑡, 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑠𝑜𝑚𝑒 𝑎𝑟𝑒 𝑝𝑜𝑡𝑒𝑛𝑡𝑖𝑎𝑙𝑙𝑦 𝑑𝑎𝑛𝑔𝑒𝑟𝑜𝑢𝑠. 𝐼𝑓𝑦𝑜𝑢𝑟𝑠 𝑙𝑖𝑘𝑒𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑡𝑎𝑠𝑡𝑒 𝑜𝑓 𝑚𝑎𝑛𝑢𝑟𝑒, 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑢𝑠𝑒𝑓𝑢𝑙 𝑎𝑟𝑡𝑖𝑐𝑙𝑒 𝑖𝑠 𝑤𝑜𝑟𝑡ℎ 𝑎 𝑟𝑒𝑎𝑑. 🐾🐕🐾
"My dog loves to eat horse manure. Horse poo is safe for dogs to eat, right?"
Wrong
Horse faeces itself is rarely a problem for dogs, though it may cause some mild vomiting or diarrhoea in some dogs. There is however a risk of toxicity if the horse was recently treated with a worming product (containing the active ingredients Ivermectin or
Moxidectin).
Symptoms of toxicity include significant neurological abnormalities such as disorientation, wobbliness, tremors and seizures. Severe cases can also result in blindness.
Certain breeds of dogs (such as Collies, Australian shepherds, Old English sheepdogs) with a multidrug resistant (MDR) gene mutation are extremely sensitive to this class of drugs and therefore more at risk as a much smaller quantity can cause toxic effects.
Of course, if the manure came from your own horse, you are likely to know whether it was recently wormed but dog owners should exercise caution when walking dogs with a taste for horse poo along bridlepaths as there is no way to be sure whether any horse manure present contains worming product.
