Situation- I own 4 horses on a 30-acre place; 2yr old, 2- 10yr old, and 25 yr old live forever mare.  They are probably stalled about 70% of the time that it rains.  The two 10 yr olds a mare and a gelding have both started losing their hair but in different ways.  The gelding "all of a sudden" lost hair in patches about the size of your hand in about 5-6 different locations on his body.  He is not really experiencing any "tufts of hair" being lost like you usually hear with rain rot.  The mare though is losing some by the "tufts" but she has also lost a large amount around her shoulder and chest area; more of a wide area than the gelding.

Called vet, oringally did not think rain rot, be a few more days until he comes out because it is normal time of year for coggins, yet he thinks it may jsut be allergies.  Not quite sure, he may say different when he gets here.

Wondering if anyone else has had any type of problem like this before....and treatment.....I've given penicillin, nu stock and anit fungal on gelding and he his growing his hair back after two weeks of treatment ...(he got it first but what caused it)...on the mare tried the antifungal and MTG (stuff to make hair grow) and really no success.   The older horse had a touch of it...but it has seemed to since go away...only thing that I have yet to do (tomorrow will hopefully be warm enough)...... iodine bath

Thanks for any other "what the heck" my horse's hair is falling out stories

Roper14, I'm having what sounds like the same problem.  I just got two horses (a TB and an QH).  The TB is losing hair in big patches.  This started right when he began shedding out (didn't have much of a winter coat as it was).  His skin looks healthy; no scaliness, sores, oozy spots, doesn't look dry.... nothing.  It has been driving me crazy because I've never had a horse do this that I can remember.  I did ask my friends and one of them said that one of her foals was doing this too.  Again, no noted visible skin problem.  Gee, keep us posted.  I'd be interested in what your vet has to say.

Start washing daily with iodine shampoo and CLEAN YOUR BARN!  From the brushes to the blankets to the stalls (I mean strip and scrub with disinfectant).  Any item that has touched either animal must be sterilized, soaked in a mild bleach solution and then dried in the sunshine.

When a similar thing happened to my show buddy's barn I put the place in quarantine and things cleared up ASAP.  He now is very careful about what touches each horse and cleans on a very regular basis.

Rainrot is fungal, like ringworm.

Iodine is great on fungal infections because it wards off secondary infections in compromised tissue.

I've been washing with iodine shampoo, seems to help a little... Might be allergies as this is one of the horse's first spring on the place....but the other has been here for over 6-7 years....I'll update when the vet takes a look-see later on this week

Thanks for the "achoo" info

never thought of a horse having allergies

For your horse with the no-see-um hypersensitivity there is a 'miracle cure'.  I only know this because I have a gelding that started showing severe reactions (almost complete hair loss, open wounds that oozed blood constantly, secondary infections, ...) at the age of 2 years.  I tried everything under the sun and then some.  He lived from ear to hoof with fly sheet/covers, in a stall with fan, fly sprayed and spot on's and tags in the hair that was left in is mane & tail.  We tried alergy med.'s.  At the age of 5 we thought the only hope for him was steroids.  A month before I we started the steroids I met Dr. Dan at an equine expo.  Dr. Dan is a vet with some very great information.  He also makes a product called Bug Check.  I will be forever greatful for him and is product.  My guy has been on it for a few years now.  The vet's jaw dropped when she saw him during the summer after we started him on Bug Check.  No fly spray, no covers, nothing! and he looks great.  I know of a few other severe horses (gotta love the south) that are now off of steroids and doing great on it as well.  If you would like any more information on the product go to thenaturalpetvet.com.