04.07.08
Quitt Chew-Stop for horses put to test
Remember how our horses are part beavers in the winter time… chewing bark off trees and gnawing on wood rail fences? About two months ago I came across a Farnam product claiming to stop horses from chewing wood, on the premise of providing certain nutrients that they were lacking in their diet. There were several rave reviews by customers so we decided, skeptically, to try the product, which supposedly is “guaranteed” to work per Farnam’s advertising.
Adding the pellets to their grain at 2 ounces daily per horse, we fed this product for over a month. Reviews and Farnam’s advertising claimed it would become effective within 10-14 days. After about 3 weeks Hubby and I both noticed a marked slowdown in the horses’ wood chewing. Since this slowdown might have been attributable to other factors (such as no productive places left to chew anymore), we decided to put it to the acid test.
We have kept the horses shut out of our largest pasture all winter, because there are nice huge trees there which we did not want to get chewed on and killed. So I opened up that pasture to them and spent significant time observing what they were going to do. This was the equivalent of putting fresh candy in front of babies.
The horses were reluctant to wander very far into this pasture due to the density of the untracked snowpack, which made it very uncomfortable for them to walk. Nevertheless, they were motivated to wade into this pasture because it is their favorite. They tiptoed in a ways, and within ten minutes had turned aside to trees around the edges and Gilford started working on fresh tree bark. By the end of that day, at least 4 trees had been partially stripped of their bark, so we just shut them back out of that field again.
I would have to conclude that this product did not work for my three horses as advertised. I might try to get a refund, although there is no obvious information on how to go about that. Though the Quitt Chew-Stop seemed to help slow their chewing down when they were in pre-chewed areas, that advantage disappeared when they were allowed access to fresh trees. I hope someone else who has used this product can comment on their own results!! Has anyone else tried to get a refund??
Tina Y said,
April 8, 2008 at 8:55 pm
Our drafts go crazy for the poplar (popple) trees in the spring when the sap starts to run. Since we’re not a huge fan of poplar trees to begin with we don’t stop them. Once they’ve chewed the bark off of all of them, they quit…until next year!
On another note…my husband received a HoofJack and Jaime Jackson DVD and book for his birthday from his wonderful, fabulous wife. (That would be me!) He trimmed their hooves for the first time two weeks ago, and when he was done, he was wringing wet, but they looked good. We still have to get some length off of the toes, but we thought we’d do that gradually. We were surprised to really notice how “natural” their feet are, with good concavity and nice heel buttresses. He’s excited to keep doing them, and I’m happy not to have to pay a farrier! Fortunately they are extremely well behaved about it, which helps, with hubby being a newbie. We took them out for a trip around the block (about 6 miles) last weekend, and although the little fatties had some trouble with the two huge, 40 degree hills, their feet were fine on the gravel and tar.