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  Discussion on Diamataceous earth for parasite control
Author Message
New Member:
Xbroker

Posted on Sunday, Apr 11, 2004 - 9:27 pm:

I am curious about feeding diamataceous earth to my horses for parasite and feed thru fly control. I've also heard it is a good calcium supplement. Is this true? If so, how much to feed and how often?}
Moderator:
DrO

Posted on Monday, Apr 12, 2004 - 9:04 am:

Hello Patricia,
Run a search on diatomaceous earth as we have discussed this often. I always thought diatoms were made of silica and not calcium though there may be differences I am unaware of or perhaps those from some areas are in calcium rich dirt.
DrO
Member:
Aannk

Posted on Thursday, Aug 4, 2005 - 12:51 pm:

Dr. O.,
I ran a search, and only found 10 listings, none of which said whether you thought it was safe to feed. I ordered some for me and my dogs, but it seems the cup required to help horses might easily be blown up in the air while they eat and get into their lungs or eyes, which are no nos.
Alicia
Member:
Vickiann

Posted on Thursday, Aug 4, 2005 - 10:31 pm:

You are correct to be worried about this stuff getting into the horses lungs. There is some thought it could cause coughing, and eventually respiratory damage. I fed a supplement containing this some years back, and it is so fine (and I believe as Dr. O said, that it is silica) it caused me to have difficulties just when opening the container and measuring it out. Also, this is a totally unproven method of worming. Once it gets into the gut the properties than help it kill bugs out in the environment are eliminated. It is reportedly good for cleaning swimming pools, but there is no scientific basis to believe it will control parasites, and also doubt it would work as a feed through fly control. Depending on the source, it is often contaminated with toxins and not safe for ingestion.
Member:
Suzeb

Posted on Friday, Aug 5, 2005 - 12:06 am:

Well.....if anything you could go to this reference and see if this is something you might want to feed your horse. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diatomaceous_earth

Personally, I would just like to keep this in my garden on some prized plants and out of my horses tummy and lungs. You would do better following a good deworming program with known medications to control parasites in horses.

Susan B.
Moderator:
DrO

Posted on Friday, Aug 5, 2005 - 7:47 am:

Alicia, there are concerns about inhaling diatomaceous earth but I have no evidence it is not safe when used in this manner, I presume it should be wetted down to try to prevent inhalation.

However there is no evidence that it is of any benefit when used in this manner. Why would you risk feeding your horse a substance of uncertain safety that does not have any known benefit when used in this way?
DrO
New Member:
Loueez

Posted on Monday, Feb 13, 2006 - 4:59 pm:

I have used DE off and on with no apparent side effects on both my horses and goats. I've only purchased the "food" grade type which is used also as a binding agent in some of the foods we humans eat.

Some feed through bugs off supplements such as Jeffer's Get-A-Way has DE as the main ingredient. Extra care should be taken not to inhale the dust; it is very fine silica. When feeding to my horses and goats, I mix it in with their grain and use either corn or soy oil to prevent inhalation. You can also use water. The food grade is also safe for human consumption. Go to https://www.safesolutionsinc.com/de.htm for more information. Quite honestly though, I have not noticed a difference in either fly control or ant control by using this product.
Member:
Vickiann

Posted on Monday, Feb 13, 2006 - 8:12 pm:

The way DE works to kill bugs/worms is supposedly because of the abrasiveness, which in the gut or when wetted down would no longer be likely to be effective from what I can gather by studying about this. If you dumped it around in the bottom of your cabinets or stalls it might kill stuff there. Personally, I had a reaction to handling a supplement containing DE and think humans should wear good face masks when handling it to prevent inhalation to prevent possible breathing problems or lung damage from the silica.
Member:
Jojo15

Posted on Tuesday, Feb 14, 2006 - 12:08 am:

i have used it for fly control on the manure piles. and on the ground around the stalls, feed rooms etc. and i have found it to work and control them. I'd have to agree with Vicki in that it might not be as effective in their feed. And be careful using it on windy days, etc...
New Member:
Camper

Posted on Thursday, Aug 17, 2006 - 3:27 pm:

Hello, Has anyone used DE36. It has a clay in it so its not dusty? Also, can DE injure your horse inside? We've used it for a couple of years, and now one of our horses is an anemic with low WBC and low RBC. We do paste worm them twice a year, but use the DE36 to make worming less tramatic, however now Im wondering if this could be causing any bleeding inside. Any ideas..Thanks
Member:
Vickiann

Posted on Thursday, Aug 17, 2006 - 9:47 pm:

Donna, I have to believe parasites would be much more injurious to the interior of the horse than conventional wormers would be, and I do not believe DE is effective at eliminating parasites inside of the digestive tract. DE is effective for cleaning pool filters, but there is NO evidence it helps a horse in any way to ingest it. Once it gets wetted down in the digestive tract its properties are altered.
Moderator:
DrO

Posted on Friday, Aug 18, 2006 - 6:45 am:

Vicki is correct in that there is no medical or scientific support for the use of this product as a anthelmintic in any specie, much less horses,and the safety of feeding it remains unknown. On the other hand the safety and efficacy of equine paste dewormers are well established and discussed in our article on Deworming Overview.
DrO
Member:
Jgordo03

Posted on Friday, Aug 18, 2006 - 4:00 pm:

I agree with DrO on this one. The quality of ordinary DE is in question. It is a very inexpensive way to control worms and flies on the ground. Most of the DE available is not for human consumption and therefore I won't use it on my horses. I have seen DE for human consumption, but it is very expensive compared to the garden DE.
Member:
Frances

Posted on Sunday, Aug 20, 2006 - 5:07 am:

I would think that DE could certainly cause internal bleeding, as I seem to remember that it consists of very sharp-edged micro-pieces which work by slicing through the parasites external protection. Am I right in thinking this DrO?
Member:
Christos

Posted on Sunday, Aug 20, 2006 - 5:55 am:

Lynn, as you see in Suzan's link above, DE kills worms and bugs by rapid dehydration.

It is the dehydrating potency of DE that should worry you, not the light abrasiveness.

Fed or inhaled, it can very well dehydrate mucous membranes and cause lord knows what.
Moderator:
DrO

Posted on Sunday, Aug 20, 2006 - 8:06 am:

I think the best explanation of the effects of DE on beetles, really the only pest I can find well conducted studies of, are in this article:

quote:

Effect of diatomaceous earths Fossil Shield and Silico-Sec on the egg laying behaviour of Callosobruchus maculatus (F.) (Coleoptera: Bruchidae).
Prasantha BD, Reichmuth Ch, Buttner C.
Institute for Stored Product Protection, Federal Biological Research Centre for Agriculture and Forestry, Department of Phytomedicine, Institute of Horticultural Sciences, Faculty of Agricultural and Horticultural, Humboldt-University Berlin, Germany.

The pulse beetle, Callosobruchus maculatus (F.) is a destructive pest of pulses in both storage and field. It is well known that diatomaceous earth (DE) kill the insects by locally absorbing the epicuticular lipid layers leading to high rate of water loss through the cuticle. However, the effectiveness of DE depends on its ability to kill the adults before copulation and egg-laying. Newly emerged virgin males and females of Callosobruchus maculatus (F.) were exposed to the DEs, Fossil-Shield and Silico-Sec on 30 treated mungbeans (Vigna radita (L)). Fecundity, number of beans used for egg-laying and beans without eggs were evaluated after four days; the number of unhatched eggs was evaluated after ten days. It was determined, that the fecundity of female insects decreased sigmoidely with increasing rate of DE content. Percentages of unhatched eggs and seeds without eggs increased with increasing DE dosages. However, the maximum egg densities (eggs per used secd) occurred at 1200 mg DE/kg for Fossil-Shield and Silico-Sec. The reason for such DE-stimulated behaviour of egg laying expressed as a number of seeds with eggs of C. maculatus is not known, but it may be related to the stress caused by the inert dusts or to the reduction of both chemical and physical (tactile) stimuli. Treatment with DEs altered the surface texture of the beans and caused less cohesion between eggs and the seed surface. Only few larvae managed to penetrate into the grains, possibly due to increased grain roughness and repellent effect of DE. A relatively high number of eggs were laid on the surface of those beans where the amount of dust had been locally reduced by adults' movement and their pick up of DE. Therefore, several larvae tried to penetrate into these treated beans, causing a high larval density per partially cleaned bean. All these reasons lead to a progeny decline.


DrO
Member:
Jojo15

Posted on Sunday, Aug 20, 2006 - 10:35 am:

What does that mean in plain english? grin.

I was under the impression DE is useless as it gets wet. and therefore ingesting it would be useless too.
Member:
Jojo15

Posted on Sunday, Aug 20, 2006 - 10:44 am:

taken from the permaguard site.
https://www.permaguard.com/faq.html
-----------------

Is DE Hazardous ?
Excerpt from The IPM Practitioner, Monitoring the Field of Pest Management, William Quarles, Volume XIV, Number 5/6, May/June 1992.

"Both swimming pool grade and natural diatomaceous earth come from the same fossil sources, but they are processed differently. The natural grades are mined, dried, ground, sifted and bagged. The pool grade is chemically treated and partially melted and consequently contains crystalline silica which can be a respiratory hazard. Thus, it is imperative that only natural diatomaceous earth be used for insect control. This non-crystalline silica is not a hazard as the human body apparently can dissolve it."

"Ingestion of diatomaceous earth is not toxic to mammals. Rats fed a daily diet containing 5% freshwater diatomaceous earth show no abnormalities after 90 days (Bertke 1964). Dairy farms sometimes feed their animals food containing 1 to 2% diatomaceous earth to control worms and other internal parasites (Allen 1972). Impoverished humans add "fossil flour" to their baked goods in order to stretch their flour supply (Cummins 1975). It is so safe for use on food that the FDA has exempted diatomaceous earth from requirements of fixed residue levels when added to stored grain (Fed. Reg. 1961). The U.S. EPA also allows its use in food storage and processing areas (Fed. Reg. 1981)."

The Food and Drug Administration, Department of Health, Education and Welfare, sets "tolerances" on poisonous chemical insecticides because residues of these insecticides are known to cause cancer and other alarming physiological effects when introduced into the bodies of test animals.
-------------------

Also on that site is a link to the analysis of permaguard fossil shell flour. Calcium does have the highest ppm of all the minerals, but have no idea the amount necessary for a horse to be worthwhile in feeding it. Seems there are so many other calcium supplements on the market better suited.
Moderator:
DrO

Posted on Sunday, Aug 20, 2006 - 11:52 am:

In plain english the DE works on beetles by absorbing oils which make them susceptible to drying out so your point about moisture , as a beetle-cide, is correct. Unfortunately this is only one side of the toxic story, run a search on the discussions on "silicosis" for another side.
DrO
Member:
Jgordo03

Posted on Monday, Aug 21, 2006 - 10:09 am:

I use DE for Tomato Hornworms in my vegetable garden. I have to use a face mask if I'm using the powder. I have noticed that there is one product on the market that uses DE in their formulation. It's called Bug Check from The Natural Horse Vet. I think I will just stay with my Solitude IGR and paste worming every other month.
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