Welcome to this week’s edition of the a-z of plants that are dangerous to your horse, as you can see we are almost to the end of the alphabet. Today’s plant is quite obviously bad news, it just looks like trouble. Yellow Star Thistles are savagely beautiful, & luckily easy to recognize as a threat.
A Little About Yellow Star Thistle
Centaurea solstitalis is also called Russian Knapweed, Barnaby’s Thistle & Yellow Star Thistle. This is an annual weed that can grow up to three feet tall on stems covered in gray hairs. Flowers are yellow, purple or white, round & surrounded by stiff spines.
How Dangerous Is It?
This plant is just problematic all around. Fresh it’s obviously not palatable, but it can be incorporated into hay & a large % of poisonings in horses is from fresh hay. Horses can develop a taste for this plant in hay & will eat it even when better forage is available to them. An unknown toxic component can cause permanent neural damage. While the toxin in the plant itself isn’t fatal to equines, they can die from related problems.
All parts of this plant (both fresh & dried) are toxic & can be fatal to equines. Barbs can also cause mechanical damage to mouth & digestive tract.
What To Look For
You know your animal the best, so you should know when something is amiss. Yellow Star Thistle toxicity symptoms include grinning appearance, open mouth, protruding tongue, yawning, depression of central nervous system, loss of appetite & difficulty breathing.
Learn More
Be sure to check out the Yellow Star Thistle page to learn more about the plant & while you are at it why not check out more toxic plants?
*It should be noted that we’re not veterinarians. This information is written specifically for horses & should be used for reference purposes only. If you think your horse has eaten something toxic call your vet right away.