A jury awarded $1,007,500 to plaintiffs who alleged in a lawsuit that Farnam's Equitrol, a feed-through fly control product, was defectively designed and caused harm to their Thoroughbred and Warmblood sport horses. Farnam countered with a press release stating that it is appealing the decision and believes that the court decision is incorrect on legal and factual grounds.

The jury in the three-week trial in Santa Ana, Calif., over which U.S. District Court Judge James V. Selna presided, ruled in Farnam's favor on another point, which was an allegation that the company intentionally misrepresented the product.

Equitrol's active ingredient tetrachlorvinphos (TCVP) is widely used by several companies in feed-through larvicides for cattle and horses and in fly control products for several other species. Equitrol has been available since 1983 and has been reported as effective in killing fly larvae in the manure before they have a chance to mature. According to Anne Robertson, Public Relations Director for Farnam Companies, both TCVP and Equitrol itself were recently re-registered by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). This was because several years ago, the EPA began the process of requiring all older pesticides that were registered with the EPA to go through another in-depth assessment