We believe that Brewers Yeast fed to your horse as a supplement every day really helps to improve their overall health, condition and general well-being. It is a must for horses who suffer from Sweet Itch and should also be given to pregnant or lactating mares. It can be used to help to calm nervous or lively horses or ponies and can also be fed before a stressful experience i.e. travelling or vets visit. For some really interesting information which we think will help to convince you that brewers yeast is a must.
We have been using yeast for nearly a year as a supplement for our horses and we also give it to 6 underfed almost feral horses who live in fields down the road from us. There seems to be a difference in all of them. i.e. shiney coats, less rainscold, no mud fever... the ones down the road could get very lively when we arrived with buckets for them in the winter but they seemed much quieter and more laid back.(is that the brewers yeast?) I am beginning to think that it is a supplement that all horses would benefit from. The reason we started using it was to help our Cob Molly with her sweet itch. So far there is no sign of it this year. Although we are still using the Itch stop (just in case). Molly has never needed a rug in the summer although we might have bought one if we hadn't discovered itch stop and now the Brewers Yeast
It comes in powder form and you feed 25 grams a day for every 450Kilograms body weight.
3 kilos costs £17.45 delivered or for every further 3 kilos it costs £7.20 (that works out at 21p a day if you buy 3k or 10p a day if you buy 6k) the postage remains the same upto 25kilos.
I am using Brewers Yeast for Sweet Itch. I have been using homeopathy (1M Sulphur) for the past year with good results (although needs backed up with Itch Stop and a rug). I find that nothing works on its own, so I thought of trying the Brewers Yeast. We're now nearly in May and I haven't had to up her Sulphur dosage to as much as last year yet, so am hoping I'm onto a good thing with the yeast and could then reduce the Sulphur amount. I am also trying the Yeast on another mare of mine. She was bought as a cruelty case 4 years ago, and much as she is no longer ribby, we are finding it impossible to get her dungs improved and get weight onto her hindquarters. We were worried it was becuase her intestines are badly wormed damaged and that she needs a bit more help to absorb fibre. On my Brewers Yeast searches, I found one company saying that it helped with Fibre digestion, so I thought I'd give it a go.(Gemma Murdoch Equine Dentist - Ballyclare N Ireland)
I've heard good reports of the rugs, but when we bought our 14.2 Connemara X with sweet itch, I had just read about the midge proofing research done by a respectable university which found eating Marmite reduces midge attacks. And a couple of days later I was talking to Chris Cook of Penzance, a serious horse trainer and Saddlechariot test driver, and he mentioned as a kid in Bermuda being forced to eat Brewers yeast to keep fleas away.
On a totally unscientific basis I decided the common factors were yeast and insect bites, and started feeding brewers yeast to Molly (not our Molly). She doesn't have sweet itch any more and did the whole summer unrugged. No proof, not a vet so can't recommend, but it might be worth a try. I get it from the health food shops as tablets. I tend to feed based on horses weight against adult human, ie pretty much guess work but my 14.2 connemara X gets 10 to 12 tablets a day. This works out at about 2 to 3 quid a month.