Who has used the shot....

[cowgurl_up]

Hi all!

My mare has never shown any heat and she foaled in March! I talked to my vet about it yesterday and he mentioned using a Prostaglandon shot to make her come into heat? So I wanted to hear everyones' thoughts/opionions/experiences with the shot. Did you like it? How did your mare react to it? Would you use it again? What are the pro's and con's? My vet talked like it was a very easy process and didn't cause problems at all, but I feel better safe then sorry. My mare's well being is way more important to me then having a foal on the ground next year.

Thanks everyone for you advice!

 

[PaintNminis]

Well I only used it once to get rid of a cyst it Worked wonders

The Cyst has been Gone well over a Year (ultrasound Confirmed)

But she never did settle last year -

We did a culture and she needed to be Flushed (Pretty sure that was the reason why she didn't settle

)

She didn't act sickly or anything

- Right now I am trying out Regumate but I won't know if it works until after she is bred

 

[Nathan Luszcz]

Injectable prostoglandin f2-alpha is a very common drug used routinely in breeding work. There are two brands, Estramate (synthetic) and Lutalyse ("natural"). Lutalyse has more severe reactions than Estramate, but Estramate is more expensive. Most mares will react to the drug, this is normal. Cramping, sweating, and general discomfort is normal for an hour or two after giving the shot. Like I said, this is a very routine injection, used several times daily by big breeding farms.

This drug regresses the Corpus Luteum, a structure which forms from an ovulated oocyte. Once the CL is gone, a new follicle will grow and bring the mare in heat. Lutalyse does not bring a mare into heat, it brings her out of out-of-heat.

 

[bingo]

I recently used Estromate and it did work and was pretty darn cheap I paid less then 10 bucks a shot. But that is for a rather small dose I think if I remember it was only 1 or 2 cc

 

[cjmm10]

My mare foaled in April & by July she hadn't shown any heat. The Vet gave me the shot to give her,

she foaled a beautiful filly the following year. My mares' reaction wasn't too bad. CJMM

 

[SuzE]

I have used Estrumate a few times now and always had good luck with it.

My mares don't act crampy and never sweat after using it. My vet has always given me only .3cc and that little amount worked on a big 34" mare.

It is cheap, I think it was around $6 a shot.

I have used it on a mares that didn't come back in after foaling and mares that I wanted to short cycle after flushing. Works great and highly recommend it.

Good luck.

 

[eagles ring farm]

We have used Regumate and prostaglandin 3 times over the past 3 years and each time it worked great and got a healthy foal. This was for a mare that does not normally show a heat cycle

Mares only reaction was the sweating and hour or so after the shot. She did not seem to have any dicomfort or reaction at all

Worked very well for us and the mares were bred the first cycle with it

We will use it again next year . No adverse reactions here

 

[Boinky]

we used lutylase a bit on the breeding farm i used to work for i've never personally used it on mini's though. the mares would sweat and some might seem uncomfy a bit but it always seemed to work and seemed to have no lasting side effects. Almost every mare we used it on got in foal too. I wouldn't hesitate to use it if i needed it.

 

[minimule]

I haven't used it personally but someone else used it on a couple of my mares. It did cause the mares to be crampy and sweaty. I lost one mare because of all the stress she was put through at the other farm. She was an easily stressed mare and they did everything wrong.

I have 2 mares here now that are not showing heat at all. They are both 6 years old and have never been bred. I've been considering using it on one of them at least.

 

[cowgurl_up]

Thank you so much everyone for the advice!!! I certainly feel better about it now and may have to go on ahead and give it a try.

I have one final question though. If your mare has never shown heat (the vet mentioned that she is still probably having her heat just doing it silently) will it make this heat more pronounced or will it just give me a more exact window to try to get the job done?

Thanks again!

 

[Nathan Luszcz]

As I mentioned earlier, the shot does not bring the mare in heat, it clears a structure from the mare's overy which produces progesterone. This hormone is the one responsible for keeping her out of heat, making her think she's pregnant. By removing this hormone from circulation you allow the mare to start another cycle.

Because this shot only removes the CL, it will not do anything other than make the mare sweat if:

she is not cycling

she has already killed the CL herself

the CL is too immature to respond to the PGF2a (less than 5 days since she ovulated)

If the mare is pregnant already, this shot will abort her.

If her heats are silent this shot will not make them more pronounced, remember, it does not bring them in heat.

If you know that she is cycling, and randomly give her a shot, you have a 50% chance of bringing her into a new cycle/new heat. If you follow that shot with a second 14 days later, you will have a 95% chance of starting a new cycle. This is because of how the mare's cycle works, and the timing of when the structures which respond to the shot are present.

 

[cowgurl_up]

Thanks Nathan! Wonderful information!

So it actually just gets rid of the hormone that is keeping her out of heat which there in turn should bring her in? Very interesting! I used to know so much more about this stuff when I was competing in horse bowl (like Jepordy only with horse questions) and hippology. Maybe I need to break my practice cards on breeding back out as it seems I have forgotten some of exactly how a horses cycle works!

]

Thanks again!