Horses are kept for riding, breeding and racing. They are an expensive investment for their owners, who usually wish to provide proper housing and a good environment for their animals. That includes keeping flies to an absolute minimum.

Housing facilities for horses are dispersed and often have small capacity.

Housing basically consists of:

1. Tie stalls
2. Box stalls
or
3. Free choice open sheds.

Usually the system is too small to allow sophisticated cleaning and manure handling systems.

Large amounts of bedding are used. In tie and box stalls, flooring is packed clay, wood over concrete, or concrete (although concrete's hard surface makes it undesirable).

Stalls have stout partitions reaching to the floor to prevent accidental foot injury.

Other livestock, such as sheep and goats, present similar fly control problems, because housing is similar to that for horses (but usually cleaned much less often).

Sheep and goats are usually housed in open free choice sheds or indoor pens. Ample bedding, spilled feed and water, and accumulated urine and feces provides suitable media for fly production.

Manure

Stalls have many edges and corners. These, together with large amounts of urine- and feces-soaked bedding, provide an ideal fly breeding habitat.

Cleaning with hand tools is time-consuming and difficult to accomplish completely.

Water and feed (grain and hay) must be provided in the stalls or in free choice sheds. Feed and water spillage contributes to fly breeding in the bedding.

Each horse produces about 14–16kg of manure per day, which provides additional opportunities for fly breeding.

Frequent removal of contaminated bedding in horse stables presents a disposal problem. If the manure is piled, the piles can support large amounts of fly breeding (unless the piles are compacted and covered with plastic sheeting).

The problems of manure removal and disposal by hand for sheep and goats are similar to those for horses, although cleaning is much less frequent.

Sheep and goats spend more time sleeping and eating in open shed shelters than horses. They therefore create more of a problem with flies breeding in manure- and urine-contaminated bedding.