Horseflies..

Do you have horseflies where you keep your horse/ at the barn you go to? I certainly never had them at home. We had bot flies, those wasp looking things that hovered around your horse’s legs trying to lay their tiny yellow eggs. Nasty! I once had to get off of a horse and walk him back to the barn because he was being bombarded by one and kind of going nuts. Not fun.

I really haven’t seen any bot flies here, which is a relief. We do, however, have these massive horse flies. They’re at least the size of a large bumblebee. The horses hate them and I know I would too, if their size is any indication of their bite. Of course I’d never dealt with them before, so I had to learn the protocol.

It starts off with being observant. You’ve got to know when one is stalking you and your horse. And believe me, your horse will let you know. Some are more dramatic than others. Sometimes you’ll get just an annoyed look and a quiver of skin. Or you might get a head turn and the horse will try to bite or kick it and whip their tail back and forth. You just might even have a horse who will attempt to buck it off and when that doesn’t work, go down and roll to squish it. It’s always a little tricky riding those in the latter group. That is why it is important that you get the horse to be on your side, to understand what it is that you want to accomplish. The death of the horsefly!

Okay so now that you know the little monster is after you, wait for it to land on your horse. Practically dare it. This is where your training of the horse comes in. You must tell the horse to stand still, because a moving target is harder to hit. When the bugger lands on your horse, hit it with your hand. Whammo. Double check to make it is dead by smashing it with your boot once it has fallen to the ground. Then rub the area that it had previously occupied on your horse. This probably feels good to your horse and will help them catch on to you master plan of killing all horseflies that bother it. With young horses, you have to edit the plan a little. By young, I mean still green and impressionable. If you hit them, they might at first think that they are in deep trouble and get frightened, which means that they will most likely not stand still and then you have a much greater chance of missing and the horsefly getting away scot free. NEVER!

There is also a slightly more gross approach. Crazy horse people, though, do anything for their horse. This is way more practical than putting hoof glitter on, okay? So listen carefully. With your young horse, you put your hand over the horsefly and squish it to its death. The trick is to not be too quick so as to alarm the horse or scare the horsefly, but to be very very stealthy. Like a ninja. No spooking so just grin and bear it!

The only reason that killing a horsefly is ick in the first place is because if they’ve already made a few successful landings on your horse by the time you smash them, the blood they have been slurping will gush out all over your hand. And it can be a large amount if the bug size is huge. But hey, wipe it off on your horse’s neck or on your already filthy shirt and carry on! Now the rest of your time with your horse won’t be spent frantically running away from a horsefly! Unless another one finds you, which in that case, you must hunt it down and slap to kill.

I hope this equipped you so that you will be able to keep yourself and your horse comfortable, safe, and fly-free at all times! You can even employ this swatting method while riding your horse. I know someone who rode down the centerline, halted at X, saluted the judge, killed a horsefly on their horse’s shoulder and went on to do their test. You can bet that their test went much better than if they’d had a horsefly following them around the ring!