does garlic REALLY work?????

[Rebmik]

does anyone have true hard evidence that garlic works on controlling anything? ticks, flies?
I've been feeding my guys 2 teas./day for about 3 weeks and it seems as thought the ticks are just as bad. The flies just started coming out and it doesn't seem to deter them either.
I just didn't know if I wasn't giving enough or it just doesn't work.
Thanks for any input on this subject.

[cloudyandcallie]

I wish someone would try it and let me know. My friend moved to Ohio with her draughts and said she was going to try garlic, then she quit after a few months.
Some of the literature says that garlic actually attracts some skeeters, but I doubt that, as I grew up on the salt marshes and have a lot of experience with skeeters and sand gnats.
Is there anyone on coth who has used garlic starting in the spring and going all thru the summer and fall? I would think it is like using Frontline and Advantage on dogs and cats, down here in the south I use it all year round and it works, people who wait till a big flea hatch out in the spring say the effectiveness is not good, but they wait too long to start using it.

[deltawave]

Published in JAMA 2000:

Whether this extrapolates to U.S. ticks on horses is debatable. :) I also can't remember how to log into the JAMA site so I can't look at the whole article to comment on study design or how/if they flogged the statistics. ;)

Objectives: To study if Swedish marine conscripts are a population of high risk to tick-bites and tick-borne diseases and if tick-bites could be prevented by consumption of garlic.
Design: Prospective, randomised double blind intervention trial.
Subjects: 100 individuals from south-eastern Sweden in military service during 1998.
Interventions: The survey participants consumed 1200 mg Allium sativum/placebo for eight weeks, had a wash-out period then changed to placebo/Allium sativum consumption for another ten weeks. All participants had uniform clothes, the same diet, participated in similar activities, stayed equal time in tick-endemic nature etceteras.
Main outcome measures: Tick-bites were registered in a diary-sheet after daily inspection of the skin.
Results: Totally 286 tick-bites were registered by the participants. On average the participants registered 0.2 tick-bites per week during military service compared to 0.03 tick-bites during leave. Results shows significant reduction in tick-bites when consuming garlic compared to placebo (p<0.05). Furthermore, during placebo consumption, a greater number of the participants were bitten by ticks (incidence per 10 weeks = garlic, intention to treat 0.5, per protocol 0.6, placebo, intention to treat 0.5, per protocol 0.7).
Swedish marine conscripts are at high risk of tick bites during military service. Preventive measures, including vaccinations against tick-transmitted diseases, should be considered. However, our results suggest that garlic may be considered as a tick repellent for individuals and populations at high risk for tick bite, rather than other agents that might have more adverse effects.

[Androcles]

Not the kind you get in the grocery store. That has had heat treatment that destroys the sulfur compounds that are supposed to be the 'active ingredients' in repelling bugs. But if it's to do anything, I would d think everyone would need to get it though.

[HoofHeartSoul]

I thought they did a study on giving garlic to horses, and it was found that Onions and Garlic caused Heinz body anemia.

it had an accumulative effect.


i know a couple people that give it to their horse and it works pretty well, but i just wouldn't want to take that chance especially since we don't really know the dose that contributes to it and especially since it accumulates.

[grayarabpony]

Didn't work with my horses.... they did reek though...

[BornToRide]

I have not seen it be effective. I have used it on my old QH without much success and another boarder used it on her TB on a regular basis and with fly spray too, yet he was the one who had the biggest bites each summer, while my gelding had very little and that with hardly any fly spray.

I suspect diet is a factor too - that horse was on some kind of sweet feed - my gelding only gets grass hay & low NSC supplements.

To add, we do not have a tick problem in our area though, so I cannot say whether or not it would have been effective against ticks.

[chancellor2]

I was at a barn where the mosquitoes were HORRIBLE one year. The entire barn (7 horses) was put on garlic in an attempt to get rid of the mosquitoes. It worked. I think because the manure pile reeked.....
My best guess is that the entire barn has to be on it for it to work. I've not seen it work when only a few horses were on it.

[Lieslot]

In my experience, no.... did diddlysquat.

[pAin't_Misbehavin']

Are horses not susceptible to hemolytic anemia?

[Simkie]

I thought they did a study on giving garlic to horses, and it was found that Onions and Garlic caused Heinz body anemia.

it had an accumulative effect.


i know a couple people that give it to their horse and it works pretty well, but i just wouldn't want to take that chance especially since we don't really know the dose that contributes to it and especially since it accumulates.

They did. They fed horses a hell of a lot of garlic and they got Heinz-body anemia. The goal of the study was not to show how much was needed to induce anemia--just that garlic COULD induce anemia.

The garlic proponents point to the large amount fed in the study and say small amounts are safe. There is no proof either way.

Since I have horrible luck, I choose to not feed my horse garlic. My horse WOULD develop anemia from 1 T. garlic. That's just the way it works for me :-/

[Bluey]

Here is one article about this:

http://www.equisearch.com/horses_care/feeding/feed/eqgarlic528/

Here is an excerpt, with an interesting question:

---"Until these suspicions are investigated and repudiated, how much risk are you willing to take? Until well-designed, formal research is done on garlic's risks and benefits, specifically in horses, it seems the only safe avenue is the avenue of caution."---


We still don't have any serious studies saying it does anything as intended, just testimonials and we know how accurate those are to really determine cause and effect.;)

[deltawave]

Until these suspicions are investigated and repudiated, how much risk are you willing to take? Until well-designed, formal research is done on garlic's risks and benefits, specifically in horses, it seems the only safe avenue is the avenue of caution."---


I love that quote. Take out the word "garlic" and insert just about any other nutraceutical/herbal product and it ought to read just the same.

[Rebmik]

so it sounds as though I should STOP feeding my horses garlic, correct?:confused:

[Cashela]

I'm trying it this year. I have a friend who has a horse that got erlichia a couple of times and since using Bug Check they haven't had an incident and they do heavy trail riding.

[Huntertwo]

I'm trying it this too. http://www.smartpakequine.com/productclass.aspx?productClassid=108

I started it a few weeks ago - found two ticks on my mare last week. I'm very curious to see if it works to deter flies. I believe it takes a while to get into the system.

If I don't see any changes by mid-summer, then I'll stop it. I just thought it would be great to not be bothered using fly spray.:yes:

[cloudyandcallie]

if you buy siinsosoft by the case off of ebay (cheaper than retail) and mix it with water and with white vinegar and spray it every day, it will, well it did for me, keep ticks and flies and mosquitos and ants and biting sand gnats off of an old bay ottb mare and a grey and white WB.
You have to spray every day, but I think that the smell of skinsosoft repels bugs. I know mosquitos are supposed to be attracted to perfume, but here in the salt marshes and rivers, they are not attracted to skinsosoft. And the white vinegar keeps it from being so greasey.

[EqTrainer]

I have a friend who feeds it. Her horses still have ticks and flies. They also don't like to eat it and they act like they are anemic.

That's my second hand experience w/it.

[Bluey]

if you buy siinsosoft by the case off of ebay (cheaper than retail) and mix it with water and with white vinegar and spray it every day, it will, well it did for me, keep ticks and flies and mosquitos and ants and biting sand gnats off of an old bay ottb mare and a grey and white WB.
You have to spray every day, but I think that the smell of skinsosoft repels bugs. I know mosquitos are supposed to be attracted to perfume, but here in the salt marshes and rivers, they are not attracted to skinsosoft. And the white vinegar keeps it from being so greasey.

We tried Skin-So-Soft oh, some 20 or so years ago and it did squat for us or our horses.
We used it straight, from a spray bottle, so maybe it would have worked better mixed as you do.
It has not worked for anyone I know, until I read that it did for you.:confused:

[Huntertwo]

I have a friend who feeds it. Her horses still have ticks and flies. They also don't like to eat it and they act like they are anemic.

That's my second hand experience w/it.

Eq,
What would be the signs of Anemia?

[elio]

I think it just depends on the horse. Have sen horses it worked on excellently and some....no difference!

[camohn]

I thought they did a study on giving garlic to horses, and it was found that Onions and Garlic caused Heinz body anemia.

it had an accumulative effect.


i know a couple people that give it to their horse and it works pretty well, but i just wouldn't want to take that chance especially since we don't really know the dose that contributes to it and especially since it accumulates.

2 questions here:
first is does it work here. I have tried it and yes, I found it did decrease the number of flies and ticks at 1TB a day. Ran out of garlic/face flies started landing instead of hovering on the horses and the chestnuts had more bug bite welts. Since Lyme is a huge problem around here I am willing to do a lot to deter ticks. Our dog steals horse feed out of their pans (we pasture feed).. I noticed when we started feeding the garlic the dog smelled a bit like garlic and her tick population went way down.

The anemia issue: onion grass and garlic have a compound called allicin in it. Once the stuff is cut the allicin content breaks down/drops quickly. The allicin is what causes the anemia. If the garlic is AIR dried the allacin content is low and so is the anemia risk. I just probably would not use it on horses with a known pre existing anemia problem. However, if the stuff is FREEZE dried then all of the allicin is maintained and concentrated. An ounce of freeze dried garlic has 20 times the amount of allicin an ounce of fresh garlic does.
SO.......not all garlic is created equal. It is important HOW the garlic was processed.
I have read here on other garlic threads that folks were buying the stuff in bulk at WalMart because it was cheaper that way. I WOULD be concerned that the WalMart garlic intended for human kitchen use had been freeze dried.

There is also the issue that most of the studies done on horses eating the stuff were given fresh onion grass in HUUGE volumes.

[veebug22]

I've used it late spring through the fall and had success. Actually worked at a boarding barn in CT where some were on it, some not, and the ones that weren't had a definite increased number of ticks. I don't think 2 tsps a day is going to cut it. I think I feed 1 or 2 tbsps a day (1/2 a scoop am and 1/2 scoop pm). I think it's important to start it before the tick season kicks in so that it builds up in their system. Just be careful that you don't OD them -- in other words follow the feed directions on the container. My vet told me that while it's uncommon in horses, she has a high number of dogs that come into the clinic with garlic toxicity.