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As much as we don’t like to admit it, flies are a vital part of the ecosystem helping to break down natural waste materials. An over-abundance of flies, however, becomes an utterly annoying nuance not only to us humans but likewise our animal companions around us. Walk into many stables spring through summer and you’ll hear that dim buzz which reaches its peak as you walk in to an individual stall. In the heavily marketed world of horses we’re spoon fed how we can do this or that to get relief from flies. I’ve been a horse girl my entire life, started freelance writing in 1995 and working specifically in equestrian publishing in 2007 so I’ve been around a significant amount of flies and tried a plethora of “cure all” fly fixes. To let you down, there’s not a single thing that can 100% rid your stable of flies. Nope. For me, fly control is a partnership of resources; proper manure management, odor control, and eco-conscious products. I've personally used all these products and, other than working with the awesome folks at Spalding Labs, have no other commercial relationships with any them so this is not a paid endorsement.

STALL CLEANING
The management of manure waste is a multi-part process. With sustainability and earth-friendly concepts in mind, I look to the 1st R – reduce. By using a pelleted bedding, I'm able to significantly reduce the amount of bedding used. Find a pelleted bedding that is 100% kiln-dried pine which will clump urine spots. Unlike shavings which are removed in droves with stall cleaning, a quality pelleted bedding sifts easily.

Keeping stable organization as clutter free as possible, I've used the same a multi-purposed cart for muck buckets, hay, bedding transport, water bucket refills, landscape, lawn care, and generally moving farm and home items about the property since 2010! I’ve also been using the same Shake’n Fork® and Flex’n Fork® since 2014. Have you ever heard the phrase, “I’m gonna come unglued like a Walmart coffee table?” Rather than buying cheap today for it to only break a month later, I believe in buying the best one can afford, once. The Shake’n Fork sifting action saves me time cleaning the stall, saves my arms from repeat actions with its push button mechanical sifting so I can save my hands for dressage training and writing. The Flex’n Fork fine tined version allows me to pick the small bits of manure and the miniature horses stall easily.

ODOR CONTROL
Flies have a massive sense of smell and flock to the smells of urine and manure. Finishing off the stall cleaning process, I spray Bye Bye Odor® where the urine spot was on the stall mat. It’s not an odor cover up but rather the microbes in Bye Bye Odor eliminate odor all together. We all know how abrasive the smell of ammonia is and unkept it hovers over the first 6 inches of your stall. Lean down and take a whiff near your stall floor... you know, that area where you horse lays or typically eats their hay to realize what they breath to realize how much good adding Bye Bye Odor to your management program will be for your horse's overall health and well-being.

MANURE MANAGEMENT
All the manure and urine goes to the pile. If you live in a dry area and are lucky enough to have a spreader well congrats as this is wonderful manure management tool too. Remember to run your spreader at least every 7 days so as to beat any flies that might try reproducing in it. If you live in a wet area, it's best to pile your manure since flies can only breed in the first few inches of a pile whereas further in is simply too hot for breeding. Regularly turn your piles to help it compost faster. I use Fly Predators® to discontinue the production of adult flies. Unlike traps or baits, Fly Predators kill the flies before they even hatch thereby fixing the problem before it occurs! There are other fly parasite brands but the most advertised ones are not the same as Fly Predators and all 8 scientific study shows they are not effective for large animals. Stick with brand recognition with this one. Those other brands won't work.

ADULT FLIES
My neighbors behind me are not as fastidious with fly control but I have a fix for that. I have a super 6 foot tall privacy fence running the back length of the property which I hang house fly odor traps on the neighbor side of my fence. The key with odor traps is to make sure they are away from your pastures and stables as they are design to attract flies. To go a little further, I sprinkle little of my monthly Fly Predators shipment on my neighbors side of the fence where their horses normally manure. Fly Predators can travel up to 150 feet in their lifetime so they can reach those unpicked manure piles. My 2 neighbors on the other side of my property both use Fly Predators as well and this helps tremendously! To help with biting stable flies, I use the biting stable fly trap placed just outside my pasture in the sun set down at horse leg height on a wood dowel.

After all this, there will be nary a fly. Again with the brand recognition, there are cheaper products out there but, they too, come apart like Walmart coffee tables. I use Bye Bye Insects Fly & Mosquito Spray. It’s extremely humid in North Carolina but training and turning out in the sport of dressage is a must! I turnout in a Kool Coat white sheet with hood in the summer for the purpose of sun reflection in the low heat of early morning and late evening.

All of this sounds like tremendous amount of work, no? When I was at my North Carolina farm there’s a small garden, mini-orchard, 3 horses, 6 chickens, 2 dogs, 2 cats and a human with the production of rabbits and goats in the works AND I work full-time in writing and publishing. Therefore, it’s all about efficiency to run such an operation solo and making wise purchasing decisions when the end goal is sustainability. I can clean the 2 horse stable, prep feed & hay for the next 24 hours, refill waters, manage manure, and water newly planted fruit trees in under 25 minutes leaving me a good half hour lunch break allowing my mind to wander thinking about the next writing or development project before getting back to work.

I hope you find one, two or perhaps all of these options helpful to implement to your routine! Cheers!

Photo credit Mark J. Barrett.

Before 1944 my equine experience was limited to horses. This included draft horses, Morgans, and other breeds. Then, as a senior in high school I was told that the National Ski Patrol was accepting volunteers from high school seniors for the Tenth Mountain Division, part of the U.S. Army. It trained in the Colorado Rockies. I applied because I knew that after high school, at 18 years of age, I would promptly be induction into the armed forces that were fighting in World War II.

The Tenth Mountain Division appealed to me because I loved horses and, although the Cavalry was now entirely motorized, mule packing was a major part of the 10^th Division training, and mules were half horse. Moreover, skiing was an essential part of the training regimen, and because I wanted to learn to ski, as well as being a mountain lover, I acquired the necessary letter of recommendation from my Scoutmaster and former horse owning employers.

The National Ski Patrol sent me a letter stating that, following infantry basic training, I would be transferred to the Tenth Mountain Division Training Center in Camp Hale, Colorado.

I excitedly looked forward to the mules, the skiing and Colorado.

My mother, however, was dismayed. She had learned that the Tenth Division, fighting in Italy, had suffered the highest casualty rate of any U.S. Army Division in the war.

I comforted her by telling her that my transfer to the Tenth Division meant months of additional training before I was sent into combat.

As it turned out, the atomic bomb ended the war abruptly and I never got to serve in the Tenth. Instead I was shipped to Germany and spent a year in the post-war occupation, ending up as a 19-year-old criminal and denazification non-commissioned officer. No mules! No skiing! (But I did learn to ski on a furlough in the Bavarian Alps.)

Anyway, that was followed by eight years of college which included a lot of horse courses and patients, and summer jobs with horses like packing for the U.S. Forest Service (no mules), wrangling on ranches, cowboying. Even during the school years my equine jobs included working at the racetrack, working for a veterinarian, but… no mules.

Finally, in 1956, just short of 30 years of age, I became a practicing veterinarian. I can only remember one mule as a patient during my first two years of practice.

Then, after a few more years, we attended Bishop Mule Days in Bishop, California. The small, historic mountain town located along Highway 395 which runs along the Eastern border of the Sierra Nevada mountains. It calls itself “The Mule Capital of the World”, is headquarters for several packing outfitters, which serve both government and private projects, but mainly vacationers.

The Mule Show is a combination of a race meet, a rodeo, a gymnkhana, both an English and a Western Horse Show, a county fair and a circus.

The versatility of the hybrid beasts intrigued me. I became not only a regular attendee at Bishop Mule Days, but I decided to become a mule owner.

After adopting one mule and purchasing another I decided that the only way I could obtain the behavior I cherished in horses was to raise my own mules and handle them from birth onward.

We raised one or two foals a year on our small ranch, keeping some and selling others.

So, in 1980 we bred two good Quarter Horse mares to a Jack I had never seen. But, I had seen his offspring at Bishop Mule Days and was sure he would produce the kind of mules I wanted.

He did! Jordass Jean (my wife names them) was born first. She was the easiest equine to start that I ever experienced, before or since. “Jeanie” became famous, competing at Mule Days, winning the Hall of Fame. She excelled at English events, never refusing a jump in her life, and never – ever – showed hostility to a human. She did make pack trips, cattle roundups, and is the only mule in history to be invited to participate in the Olympics (Los Angeles, 1984, Santa Anita Racetrack, Equestrian Competition.) She did a flawless exhibition jump course.

Two weeks after “Jeanie” was born, a male mule was foaled at our place. Debby named him “Jassper”. I used him as my saddle “horse” until he was sold at age 12 and became a winning Team Penning mount. He ultimately ended up in Kentucky, ponying Thoroughbred colts during their race training days.

As the years passed, we raised and trained other mules. Why do they fascinate me?

The great horseman Pat Parelli, founder of The American Mule Association, once said, “Mules are just like horses, only more so.”

I know what he meant. The qualities of equine behavior, both the desirable and the less desirable, enhanced by hybrid vigor in two different, but compatible species – the horse and the donkey, are exaggerated in the mule.

If trained properly, the mule can often surpass both of its parents in many ways: strength, endurance, vigor, versatility and temperament. Typically smooth gaited and intelligent, they can bond strongly with people (like me).

I will be forever grateful to the Spalding Labs company for their Fly Predators. I have previously described how our relationship began many years ago. It was 1978. I had read about the Predator Flies, and my practice partner, Dr. Larry Dresher, was using them satisfactorily.

It was noon, on an August day. The temperature was over one hundred degrees Fahrenheit. I was at a large stable in an isolated canyon, working on a mare’s leg, trying to determine the cause of her lameness.

I suddenly became aware of the lack of flies. I asked the ranch manager who was standing nearby, “What are you using for fly control?” I assumed it was some kind of insecticide spray.

“Fly Predators,” she replied.

“That’s all?” I asked. “No insecticides?”

“Nope,” she responded. “Just Predators works great!”

I ordered Fly Predators the next day and have been a user ever since.

My place is in an isolated canyon, but off from the marine air layer that gives Western California its benevolent climate, summer temperatures reach extreme daily highs and consequently, the warm season (half the year) has a nasty fly season. The regular use of Spalding Fly Predators has tremendously reduced the fly problem. (I have persuaded my neighbors to use them too. They have horses, cattle, goats, and even emus that the coyotes haven’t yet wiped out.)

Spalding now has several other products available. They include various fly traps and sprays and Bye Bye Odor. I hope that Spalding achieves the success with these items that they did with their Fly Predators. I have become a loyal customer.