Frequently (and not so frequently) Asked Questions
BRIEF: Could you tell me an additive I can give to my animals to treat fescue poisoning?
QUESTION:
I am trying to find an additive to put in mineral or salt or feed for treating and
preventing the affects of fescue..
ANSWER:
Which specific effects??? There can be many.
If you are focussing on late gestation havoc played by fescue on horse
reproduction (abortion, delayed parturition, etc.), then pulling horses off
the fescue pasture and hay at 300 days of gestation (or earlier, if you
can) will take care of most of those kinds of problems. Also, frequent
clipping/mowing of fescue pastures to prevent seed formation will reduce
the amount of ergovaline and the other endophyte alkaloids eaten.
For other hypoprolactin mediated effects, the domperidone is your best bet.
I have started using a mineral
with ctc in it, chlortetracyline, which i do not know if will help or not..
ANSWER:
It will not reverse ergovaline effects.
Some feel thiamine might help with the non-repro symptoms, but I don't know
first-hand.(of course, other diseases and conditions can affect fertility, too...)
Keep the fescue vegetative (graze or mow so you don't let flowers or seeds
form, just leaves) and remove horses at critical periods (late gestation,
breeding maybe), and you should see that foal crop figure improve. You may
have to buy some non-fescue hay for those times, of course.