Conference noted::equitation

    PLANTS ARE NOT THE ONLY TOXIN THAT HORSES CAN ACCIDENTLY BE EXPOSED
    TO.  CAUTION SHOULD BE USED WHEN PURCHASING BEDDING THAT IT IS NOT
    DERIVED FROM THESE POISONOUS PLANTS.  WE RECENTLY HAD A TRAGIC INCIDENT
    AT THE BARN WHERE I BOARD.  THE OWNER HAD A DELIVERY OF SHAVINGS
    DELIVERED THAT WERE MADE FROM CHERRY WOOD.  NOT KNOWING THAT THE
    SHAVINGS WERE SHAVINGS DEALER HAD MADE THE CHANGE, THE OWNER PUT
    THE BEDDING INTO SOME STALLS.  FOUR HORSES CAME DOWN WITH FOUNDER
    WITHIN AN HOUR OF BEING PLACED IN THEIR STALLS.  FORTUNATELY ALL
    ARE OK NOW DUE TO THE QUICK ACTION OF SOME CARING BOARDERS.  
    
    ANOTHER THING THAT OTEN CAUSES PROBLEMS IS LAUNDRY DETERGENT.  I'VE
    SEEN MANY HORSES HAVE ALLERGIC REACTIONS TO DETERGENT.  IF YOU SUDDENLY
    SEE A RASH OR HIVES ON YOUR HORSE, AND HAVE JUST LAUNDERED HIS BLANKET,
    SADDLE PAD, HALTER FUZZIES, ETC., LEAVE THEM OFF FOR A FEW DAYS
    AND REWASH IT IN MILD SOAP.
    
    ANN

    What about cedar shavings? What effect if any does that have on
    horses both externallly and internally if eaten?

    
    We (out western Canada) use cedar shavings all the time, unless
    your horse is allergic to the cedar oil (very few are) in the shavings,
    it makes a very satisfactory bedding material, especially as it
    its relatively cheap out here.  Other types of wood shavings are
    also used.  Most horses won't touch cedar (or any other wood) voluntarily
    and the amount ingested when "snuffling" around is minimal,
    but .... put it this way my horses have colicked more on straw than 
    shavings.                                                    

    If there is already a note, please point me in the right direction...
    
    I'm putting up another corrall and the area is wooded, therefore I need
    to know if a flower growing there is poisonous.  I know lily of the
    valley are, but this is a small plant, with two leave and the flower
    stem is single, with a grouping of little (tiny)star shapped flowers.
    
    Like             X|X
                     X|X
                     X|X
                     X|X
                      |    X
                      |  XXX  Leaves
                  XXXX|XXXXX
                   xxx|
    
    I would say this flower does not grow much higher than 4".
    
    I have a book that list poisonous plants, but don't know what this 
    plant is!!  Any help will be appreciated.
    
    Thanks,
    
    Caryl

    Your best bet at determining what the plant is (and therefore, whether
    or not it's toxic) is to go to your local library(bookstore) and
    borrow(buy) a book on your regions wildflowers. Such books usually have
    photographs or paintings of  the plants and should be able to help you
    identify it easily.
    
    Other than that, you can try taking one of the plants to somebody who's
    good at such things(like a county agent, botany teacher, amateur
    botanist, somebody's old country granny, or ecologist) and have them 
    identify it for you.
    
    Good luck

or dig one of them up and take it to the nearest nursery and ask them...

    There is a book that Gordon DeWolf wrote on plants poisonous to horses.
    It should be in the library.  It might be worth reading.
    
    Good luck.
    
    Kathie
    

    I suspect they're the same wild flowers we have all over our area in
    Merrimack - Mom calls them Quaker Ladies, but I'm not sure she's got
    it right.  The neighborhood horses aren't affected by them at all.
    

    
    
    
    If you live in or around the Basingstoke and Reading areas and graze
    horses there you may have noticed the incredible amount of ragwort
    that is growing everywhere, especially on roundabouts and sides of
    roads, completely unchecked. The Town and Country Planning Act states
    that it is illegal to allow poisonous weeds to grow in or around
    agricultural grazing land. Land that has horses grazing on it is no
    longer considered agricultural, unless you graze sheep on it now and
    again. (hint hint!) I have contacted Basingstoke Council and Hampshire 
    County Council and no one will accept responsibility. However, the 
    Ministry of Agriculture says it is down to the Country Council. You are 
    entitled to complain if you feel the law is being flouted in this case 
    and you can make a formal complaint by contacting Jackie Barratt on 
    0734 581222. She will advise you of your next step. The Ministry can
    then take action. I will be complaining, I have already seen fields
    full of the stuff and it will be seeding at any time, posing a real
    threat to horses and it could end up costing a lot of money to clear it
    from your paddock next year!
    
     

	
Ragwort, I *hate* the stuff... I live next to a large equestrian centre in
a region that is totally overgrown with ragwort. Each year I spend days
pulling the damn stuff up, more grows the next year. The local district
coucil who own the surrounding heathland won't do anything about it growing
on the heath, understandably perhaps, as it would be an impossible task to
clear many hundreds of acres. The ministry won't take any action unless they
can actually see some growing *on* grazing land. I've heard rumours of a
spray that affects ragwort and ragwort alone, anyone else heard of this?

JJ.

    ANyone out there know the facts about red maple being poisonous to
    horses.  I've always heard that Red Maple and Crimson Maple (i.e.
    maples that have red leaves instead of green) were the only toxic
    varieties of maple trees, and that casual ingestion of a few leaves
    would not cause a reaction.  But yeaterdayd, when I was buying horse
    feed, a woman who was also buying feed told me that one of her friends
    just lost a pony to poising from eating leaves of swamp maple, and that
    the vet told her that every type of maple is poisonous, to the extent
    that one leaf can kill a horse.  I'm guessing the truth is somewhat
    less extreme....  Anyone know?
    
    -ellie

I find it hard to believe that one maple leaf would kill a horse.  Our
horses eat all kinds of leaves - right off the tree.

I have heard that you can't give them the leaves off the ground.  I am
not sure why, though.

Ed..

    Just curious....how does one *avoid* giving turned-out horses leaves
    off the ground this time of year? Cant quite picture myself raking my
    whole field several times a day! :-)
    

    Yes, this is why I take this woman's report with some skepticism.  The
    clerk at the store asked these same questions, though, and the woman
    with the story said that she had heard that other horses in the area
    who had been in their pastures for years were suddenly eating maple
    leaves and dying.  My skepticism increased a bit at this.  I think
    there's something in it, but less than what met the ear...  
    
    -ellie

    
    From my own personal experience (when I lived in Maine, and we had all
    kinds of maple trees and wild cherry - also consider potentially
    toxic)....  I had a wonderful young mare who had grown up on our farm
    and eaten whatever was around (including leaves).  In the fall of her
    3rd year she contracted "Something" (here's the hard part - no final
    diagnosis w/assurity)... she acted as tho her neurological system had
    been tranquilized, she could hardly walk, was a bit colicy, had an
    extremely LOW body temperature.  We got her to the clinic where they
    did extensive testing, including fluid which was building up under her
    belly (I don't know why).. blood, urine, hair, skin etc... she was
    treated with antihystimenes (sp) and given lots of fluids.. she was
    dehydrating and glassy eyed for the first 24 hours there.  The kept her
    in the intensive unit, watched her constantly..  she finally started to
    come out of it, and ended up being fine.
    
    Prior to noticing her not eating and acting strange (@ 3:pm) she had
    gone out to pasture in the morning, been brought in, clipped, washed
    for a show, dried, blanketed and given a hay bag in her stall.... when
    we realized she was not ok she was shaking/shivering/cold to touch and
    could harldy walk on her own....
    
    The vets determined that she must have had an alergic/toxic reaction, 
    and the 
    ONLY thing she could have ingested were maple leaves from the pasture.
    The kicker here is that we had a HARD frost the night before.. and they
    felt (And I read later...  there is some kind of enzyme change that
    happens once the leaves are frosted (on the tree or off - I believe
    that fallen/frozen are the worst offenders)
    
    I dont' know if this is any help.. since it was not a totally validated
    case.. but she came very close to dying.. the fact that we were in the
    barn getting another horse ready and were right with her and caught
    her early probably made a difference.. (And we just put her on the
    trailer and got her to the clinic - about 45 minutes away).  But the
    best sence was that it was from the leaves.  I had a friend loan me a
    book that had a great deal to say about toxcidity from frozen maple
    leaves.. and most of her symptoms indicated that was it.  The test
    results did not .... (but who knows how good the tests were?)
    
    Anyway - that's for what it is worth...
    
    And... I don't know what you can do especially when your pastures are
    right against a tree line (like mine were) or have the trees right in
    them...   I tried to make sure my horses had enoough other stuff to eat
    that they didn't feel like they had to go scrounging around the corners
    of the pasture.. in the fall that's hard cuz the grass is going and
    they get bored.
    
    				anyway.... maple trees wont be a problem 
    				here in New Mexico (but there's probably 
    				something else!)
    
    						smiles - holly   

    Yes, red maple leaves are poisonous. BTW, swamp maple is just another name 
    for red maple. The symptoms that Holly described in .15 are very like those
    that a friend's horse had. She was positively diagnosed as having had a
    toxic reaction and she had actually been seen eating red maple leaves
    off a downed tree. These folks didn't make too much of the incident
    because their vet told them that it took quite a lot of maple leaves to
    cause a problem. They said that this mare was pretty greedy and
    probably just "pigged out" on the leaves....
    
    So there you have it.. somewhere between 1 and "A whole lot" of maple
    leaves can make your horse pretty sick :-(
    
    The wild cherry trees so common in New England are also toxic. Both the
    bark and the leaves. Again the amount is variable depending on the
    horse and the condition of the bark/leaves. 
    
    Yew trees and shrubs are also toxic but not too many people have them
    in their pastures!

    Red Maple causes hemolytic anemia in horses, which is usually fatal.
      Equus magazine, one of the first ones they ever put
    out (1978?) did a whole article on this.  A horse stabled with Red
    Maple died after a large branch came down and it ate all the leaves
    off.  The urine turns a funny color, brown I think, but I can't
    be sure.  Anyway, the trees are posionous to horses.  I imagine that up
    to a certain point when all the leaves are poisonous to all horses,
    that horses in the gray zone exhibit greater or lesser tolerances to
    different amounts of these leaves.

    re .-1
    
    Thanks.  I will check my old issues of Equus to see if I have this one. 
    The question still remains as to what defines a "red" maple.  Maybe the
    answer will be in there....
    
    -ellie

    ellie,
    
    Are you thinking that the "red" maple are those ornamental varieties
    that have red leaves all season? You know , the ones people use in 
    landscaping. Those are NOT red maples. In fact, I think some of those
    trees aren't even maples. I forget all the formal Latin names but I can
    look them up if anybody cares.
    
    The red maple is so-called because it's twigs and leaves have a reddish
    tinge in early stages of growth and the leaves turn red or reddish
    orange in the Fall. It is a close relative of the sugar maple which has 
    leaves that turn yellow/gold in the Fall.
    
    The red maple is also known as the swamp maple because it likes/tolerates 
    wet ground. The red maple grows quickly but is used mostly for firewood 
    because it's core frequently rots on the stump before the tree is large
    enough to cut for timber. 
    
    I learned a lot about red maple when Jan's brother was doing his
    graduate work in forest products. He wrote papers on ways to use the
    red maple commercially in chipboard products, etc...
    
    John

    Yes, I was thinking of the Maples that stay red all year.  I have two
    of them, each about 30' from a horse paddock.  These are maples trees
    (acer something-or-other) and I always thought that these were the
    "dangerous" ones.  I don't have any swamp maples near the paddocks. 
    Gee, I never realized that *those* were the ones referred to as "red
    maples".  Yes, there is good reason for gardeners to use botanical
    names to avoid just this sort of confusion!
    
    -ellie

    I did a little rummaging over the weekend to see if I could find the
    EQUUS article that Tina(I think it was Tina) mentioned. I too vaguely
    remembered the article and wanted to see if they gave the Latin name of
    what they meant by Red Maple. I couldn't find it through their annual 
    index or by reading the table of contents in the first 24 issues...It's 
    probably there somewhere but I haven't found it yet.
    
    I did however find the Latin name for Red Maple(Acer Rubrum) which is
    also known as Swamp Maple, Water Maple and Scarlet Maple. 
    
    When I was a kid, my parents had some of those red leaved trees that
    we always referred to as Japanese Red Maples. I tried to find such a 
    critter in my tree and gardening books. There were 2 possibilities Acer 
    Japonicum(aka Full Moon Maple) and Acer Palmatum(Japanese Maple)...Don't 
    ask me why the common name Japanese Maple doesn't go with the Latin name 
    Acer Japonicum! But that's what the book said....
    
    The trees my parents had were probably Acer Palmatum because the leaves
    and shape matched my memory more closely than the other. The book also
    said that the Acer Palmatum has been bred for a variety of leave colors
    even though the basic original color was green leaves turning red in fall
    under just the right conditions.
    
    I also found a nursery catalog which sold maple trees with year-round
    red leaves but they didn't give a Latin name. The tree did not look
    like the Acer Rubrum and it's size and shape did not match those of the
    Acer Rubrum. It didn't match the Acer Palmatum or Acer Japonicum
    either! Unfortunately, the catalog DID call it a Red Maple. The tree looked
    like a young Sugar Maple with a Henna Rinse! So who knows what that one
    is...Without calling the nursery I mean.

    
    	According to Dr. Lori Tumpowski at Tufts, they
    	are seeing a lot of colics lately due to horses
    	eating a lot of oak and maple leaves, but no
    	poisoning (altho she did agree that it can happen).
    
    	Sherry
    

    I have Red Maples (the bad kind) all over my property. I asked the vet
    how much of a danger they were when I moved my horses home. She said
    they are most dangerous after a storm when the green leaves have blown
    off and are wilted. Wilted leaves are *most* toxic. I know of a horse
    who died from Red Maple poisoning in Acton because a neighbor had left
    a trimmed Red Maple branch within reach of the horse. It was the only
    interesting, accessible thing for the horse to chew on... The wilted
    leaves did the horse in.
    
    -Andrea-

I lost a horse this way, some seventeen years ago. back then i don't think 
they knew for sure about red maple leaf poisoning, or at least the vets
we used didn't. Back then they weren't sure what it was. Harry Gill 
suggested RMLP many years later, from the symptoms i described.

anyway, to reiterate/reinforce what others have said: wilted leaves are the
culprit. a red maple branch that is cut down or broken off by a storm is 
potentially lethal in very small amounts. although this is my own speculation
only, i wonder if a hard frost with a still-living tree might produce the same
effect by bringing down still-living leaves or branch parts. these might be
able to wilt. my own experience happened just after the first hard frost of
the season.

symptoms: urine will be dark brown from all the dead RBCs being excreted in
the urine. the horse will initally appear a little lethargic and uncomfortable,
looking a darn sight like a mild colic. they lose interest in food and drink.
the destruction of the red blood cells eventually overloads the liver and 
kidneys. you see kidney failure, liver failure, soon after comes brain 
damage of course. 

two horses in my area died of this at the same time. my horse was in very
good shape at the time. she lived for a week after first diagnosis. (we 
called the vet as soon as we suspected something wrong). the second horse
was thin and not fit (had been on pasture for several years), although young 
(i think 4), but she was dead in just over a day. 

this was just after a hard frost.  

hope this helps someone.

-cjs-

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    My Morgan not only eats the red and yellow leaves that blow in...
    he actually PREFERS the yellow ones!
    
    There aren't any trees directly in or next to the corral but they do
    blow in from the rest of the yard...
    
    Maybe (I'm lucky!?) and these leaves that turned red due to the change
    in the season wern't red maples?  Or those yellow ones were something
    else too?  
    
    He's as FAT as a pig (we nick named him the "pigga pony").
    Our quarter horse also eats them...
    
    they *must* be another type of leaf???

the standard "fallen leaves" that are part of a trees normal cycle are fine.
it is only leaves on branches "stuck down in the prime of life" that can
be a problem - this is what is meant by "wilted". don't worry about fallen 
autumn leaves. 

    I heard that a friend of mine lost a pony she had had for years
    just last week because of red maple leaf poisioning.  Everyone
    makes fun of me because I rake my paddock every year, now I'm 
    glad I do!! 

    In looking for info on acorns being poisonous, I stumbled across the
    EQUUS article on red maples being poisonous.  The tree they were
    talking about is in fact the common tree native to the eastern US
    called the red maple, swamp maple, or scarlet maple. The Latin name is
    Acer Rubrum, Linnaeus. This is *NOT* the decorative yard tree called
    Japanese Red Maple....
    
    If anybody knows how to get in touch with Ellie Roberts who got laid
    off 2 purges ago, please pass this information along to her. I've lost
    her address.
    
    EQUUS 44(June 1981) page 64 says:
    "...red maple poisoning poses a hazard to horses in many parts of the
    country. Native to the easter United States, the tree(Acer rubrum L.)
    is one of the most common and generally distributed trees in North
    America, found as far north as Nova Scotia and as far west as Texas.
    The tree's leaves harbor a poison that can kill a horse in as few as 15
    hours; however, as the Georgia researchers point out, the toxin is elusive
    and unpredictable.
    
    The leaves can be deadliest when they are wilted or dried, the
    researchers found in both laboratory-induced and field cases of red
    maple poisoning. Freshly harvested leaves administered immediatley
    after collection did not produce the disease in laboratory ponies, but
    when they were dried, the leaves became toxic and remained so for at
    least 30 days. Overnight freezing did not destroy the leaves toxicity.
    ...Because the specific cause of red maple poisoning has yet to be
    pinpointed, there is no sure antidote. Treatment with oxygen,
    intravenous fluids, blood transfusions and corticosteroids does not
    appear to decrease the mortality rate or lessen the severity of the
    clinical signs. ..."
    
    That was written over 12 years ago so there may be an antidote now. I
    don't know.

    Sorry if this seems like it should be obvious... but it just
    dosen't make sense to me since we had a tree in the corral that
    I *thought* was a red maple and I know at least one of our two
    horses ate the leaves for about two years before we cut the tree down
    in order to complete the dressage arena...
    
    
    Is the red maple tree the ones that turn scarlet red in the fall
    here in New Hampshire?  
    
    
    Thanks,
    Cheryl
    

    Red maples are the ones with red buds after the leaves drop.  I don't
    believe that their leaves are necessarily red in the fall, but they
    may be red, yellow, or gold.

    Hmmm, ok that helps.  These tress were not the kind that have
    the red buds in the spring - just red leave in the fall.
    
    Probably sugar maples...(?)

    Probably not sugar maples. Sugar maples turn yellow to light orange.
    Red maples turn red, scarlet or dark orange in the fall. Their leaves
    are substantially redder in the fall than sugar maples. I knew one
    forester in NH who defined the extent of swamps by flying over an area
    in the fall...the colors are that distinct between red and sugar
    maples.