Post by Tamara on Mar 20, 2017 22:26:34 GMT -5
Hey everyone! Just seeing if anybody else's cow suffers from this problem... Every summer, without fail, Tallulah has the worst reaction to flies. I spray her daily with fly spray (Repel X, I had no success with natural homemade mixes) and I wouldn't say there are ever tons of flies on her as a result, but it seems as soon as there's one little bugger around she gets these little bumps all over her shoulders and neck. Each one must be the reaction from a fly bite. They can be smooth bumps or sometimes they get scabs. I have never had the same problem with any of my other cows, including Tallulah's daughter - they get the occasional bump or scab from a particularly nasty bite (probably from the larger horse flies) but nothing like poor Tallulah. I have concluded that she must be allergic in some way, hence her worse reaction.
Even worse are these spots underneath and around her neck which she consistently scratches open every summer. They appeared a few summers ago when we had a particularly bad fly season and the flies chewed on these spots until they were sores. Now they heal into scars during winter and look fine - just like bare patches of skin - but because they never grow hair, and because the flies make her itchy in summer, when she scratches herself on trees they get broken open again There are about 7 of these spots and nothing I have tried has healed them... the best I can do is put a thick lather of cream (currently I use Sudocrem, a zinc cream) to keep her from scratching them open more and fly spray to keep the flies off.
Even worse are these spots underneath and around her neck which she consistently scratches open every summer. They appeared a few summers ago when we had a particularly bad fly season and the flies chewed on these spots until they were sores. Now they heal into scars during winter and look fine - just like bare patches of skin - but because they never grow hair, and because the flies make her itchy in summer, when she scratches herself on trees they get broken open again There are about 7 of these spots and nothing I have tried has healed them... the best I can do is put a thick lather of cream (currently I use Sudocrem, a zinc cream) to keep her from scratching them open more and fly spray to keep the flies off.