Woman paints stripes on horse to get rid of flies

Nobody likes horse flies, least of all the horses themselves. So how do you get rid of them?

One method that has actually been proven to work is by painting white stripes onto a black horse (or vice versa).

Claudia of Germany used cattle paint to apply thin lines over her dark-coated horse – and it worked.

Flies prefer the flat kind of light reflected of simple, single-coloured coats. They are slightly deterred by bright white coats, but absolutely despise striped coats.

Scientists used sticky oil-covered cardboard cutouts to see which patterns attracted flies the most and the least.

As it turns out, thin stripes deter horse flies.

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