I hate this time of year

[goldhorse]

Maybe this belongs in grooming. But I'm sure we've all been here. A single day gap in the rain so I free lunged him and he dropped and rolled. I took it as an opportunity to bathe him and do a second clip. Ugh, he is such a Pig.

IMG_5569.jpeg (155.52 KiB) Viewed 4242 times

[Chisamba]

Too cold to bathe here

[exvet]

I don't bathe if it's below 80. My pony is just too cranky if I do. I do plan to body clip again in one week. His winter clothes are starting to take hold despite having been body clipped barely 2 months ago. I invested in a vacuum cleaner a few years back. Best purchase eva.

[Tanga]

This is one of the reasons I blanket mine. There is no way I could even approach getting them decently cleared of mud this time of year. Quilla especially LOVES to roll. We have these plants from hell that have needle spikes and spiky balls from hell, and I swear Quilla finds them and rolls her forelock and mane all over them to see how many she can get in them. I ended up doing tail bags last year it was so bad.

[mari]

Don't hate me, but never have I ever had to groom mud off a horse

[blob]

we have hot water and heaters in the wash racks, which does make bathing a possibility in the cooler temps. But I still save it for days above 60.

I have found that waterless dog shampoo is a nice grooming hack in winter when baths are few and far between. After using a stiff brush to knock mud off, it does a nice job of making the coat look, smell, and feel nice particularly on woolies that aren't clipped.

[exvet]

we have hot water and heaters in the wash racks, which does make bathing a possibility in the cooler temps. But I still save it for days above 60.

I have found that waterless dog shampoo is a nice grooming hack in winter when baths are few and far between. After using a stiff brush to knock mud off, it does a nice job of making the coat look, smell, and feel nice particularly on woolies that aren't clipped.

Agreed but there are woolies and then there are the WOOLY woolies, ie, British Native ponies. Here in the Southwest they still grow a double layer coat with all the feathers. I'm lucky that Junior just has hind white coronary bands/pasterns but Troy? On more of a health/stamina issue a minimum of a trace/bib clip is a must or you'll rarely see a medium of any gait unless there's a bear on their heels.

[StraightForward]

I think I am going to have to get into hot toweling this year. Tesla is trace clipped, but is still sweating like a pig every ride and is already building up some nasty gunky spots despite trying to break it up and brush it off. Need to clip again this weekend.

The BO added this shredded fiber stuff (not really sure what material it is) to the runs, and T seems to enjoy rolling in that, and it doesn't cake on the way sand and dirt would, and so far it's preventing the runs turning to muck.

[Moutaineer]

My original plan was to give Potters a trace clip on Friday, but then I looked at the temperatures... it might have to wait a week until things are out of the single digits for lows!

[heddylamar]

Maia needs to be clipped, but unless I somehow grow time between now and Friday, it's going to have to wait for the next warm spell.

[Moutaineer]

We were joking at the show that we'd paid an awful lot of money to go to CA to get our horses a bath in November.

[heddylamar]

I seriously contemplated doing it this weekend anyway — Maia will stand for a blow drier

But that would put a serious kink in her willingness to stand for the clippers! She's got a very short timer on how long she'll cooperate.

[blob]

we have hot water and heaters in the wash racks, which does make bathing a possibility in the cooler temps. But I still save it for days above 60.

I have found that waterless dog shampoo is a nice grooming hack in winter when baths are few and far between. After using a stiff brush to knock mud off, it does a nice job of making the coat look, smell, and feel nice particularly on woolies that aren't clipped.

Agreed but there are woolies and then there are the WOOLY woolies, ie, British Native ponies. Here in the Southwest they still grow a double layer coat with all the feathers. I'm lucky that Junior just has hind white coronary bands/pasterns but Troy? On more of a health/stamina issue a minimum of a trace/bib clip is a must or you'll rarely see a medium of any gait unless there's a bear on their heels.

Mine are pretty extreme WOOLY woolies! Welsh and mustang--full hairballs. But interesting that their coats vary a lot. MM's winter coat is pretty long and the outside hairs are coarse. RP gets a very very dense coat, but not as long. His takes FOREVER to dry.

[StraightForward]

But that would put a serious kink in her willingness to stand for the clippers! She's got a very short timer on how long she'll cooperate.

Sometimes adding more quarters doesn't work.

I need to get T reacquainted with the vacuum, but it seems like whenever I think of it, there are people crawling all over the barn aisle and I don't want to cause a riot. I'm trying to get in the mindset of having a fancy show horse with a pretty tail and all. I'm fairly lazy about grooming these days. She has some cannon crud I need to get after, and she has the gnarliest chestnuts I've ever seen. I have to go after them with the hoof nippers, but maybe if I was more diligent about greasing them up they would grow in nicer?

[khall]

I am so freaking lucky that Joplin has no winter coat to speak of. Just none. And she’s so slick she rarely gets nasty stains even with her lighter coat. What she gets the purple waterless spray stuff does the job. Even when she gets sweated up she dries off quickly.

Now Rip is a wooly mammoth. I don’t bother clipping anymore since he’s retired and I don’t even blanket him. He has always been hot natured anyway.

Gaila is in between. Hairy and will need a bit of a trace clip when she goes back to work. She got drug down pretty heavy by Lani and has taken some time to recover.

Right now here in Georgia it’s short sleeve weather during the day and jacket at night.

[exvet]

Oh let's not talk of chestnuts or ergots. I'm convinced that the evolution of the Welsh Cob (as a breed of it's own in Wales) included keeping them hairy so that you couldn't see the dinosaur parts. My farrier ends up nipping all that off when he comes, shaking his head at me the whole time LOL.

Blob, speaking of the evolution of the Welsh sections....if I'm not mistaken it's most likely that RP has mostly section B blood? The section B has the least amount of hair than the 4 sections. My mustang grows a long coat of guard hair but it's not the thick wooly mass that the Welsh Cobs (section C and Ds in my herd) possess. My only way of being able to deal with the hair in this climate is clipping or lights. Blanketing does nothing to prevent hair growth in my guys. Of course once nude, they're blanketed so they don't get too cold/lose weight/get sick.

[Ponichiwa]

Goldhorse, I cringed so hard it hurt a little. Some days it's best to spray them down anyway and then go for a trot to warm them up again.

I'm lucky that Queso is a little short haired greasy guy, but he too loves a good wallow. Any chance to turn his tail back to his preferred dinge, he'll jump right on. The only winter coat he grows consistently is a fringe down his lower buttocks (why??) and a tiny whirl of long hairs low on his belly.

We're oscillating between highs in the 80s/lows in the 60s and highs in the 60s/lows in the low 40s, sometimes on sequential days. There's no good coat for this weather.

[goldhorse]

Normally, he wears a sheet or blanket but I took it off to lunge him. While I was closing the gate, the stinker dropped and rolled. He rolled again after his clip. In my defense, it was in the mid 60's. It was sunny. I had about 5 hours before sunset. He needed a second clip anyway although I was hoping to get a few more weeks out of this one. Exvet, I think Piggy, the Morgan, must be related to your Welsh Cobs. Coat enough for 3 horses. Ergots that look like unicorn horns sticking out the back of his legs. Furry hobbit legs.

[exvet]

Yup goldhorse that definitely sounds like a Welsh Cob. We have to remember though, my family is decades/actually centuries embedded into Morgan breeding.................old style (foundation) Morgan isn't that far removed from Welsh Cobs.

[blob]

MM also has massive chestnuts, it's a bit alarming.

Exvet, yes, although I don't have RP's bloodlines, I'm fairly certain he's section B or at least mostly section B. He's built much finer than any of the C's or D's I've seen. He also has a very type face and the higher tail carriage. I'm not sure if those are also more common in B's.You know the breed much better than I do, of course!

Because of the wild swings in temps in GA (often 30 degrees over the course of a day), I've taken the no-clip route. Since I board my horses, if they are wooly, I don't have to worry about them getting too hot or cold with the wrong weight of blanket. Instead, I feel comfortable knowing they will fluff and unfluff as needed.

[exvet]

As an aside and I apologize for digressing from the topic at hand..........................

The pictures of RP really remind me of two specific breeders who focused on the As and Bs on the East coast. In Wales before the books were closed, the section As were bred to a couple of Arabians (decades ago) to develop the Welsh pony of riding type otherwise known as the section B. It is most likely where the higher tail carriage and dish to the face developed (in addition to the increased height). I find it 'funny' in a way because the focus of keeping the 'pony type' in all the sections is all about not having a course (more horse) head and maintaining the small pony ears; but, once you breed a cob to a section A or B, the get becomes a cob (C or D depending on height) no matter what. It doesn't make any difference if it's 1/8 cob blood and the beast is dainty as a willow. It shall always be a [Welsh] cob, kind of like the cob component taints the welsh pony so-to-speak. It's a really 'hot inflammatory' issue among the Welsh Cob people - breeding As to Cs or Ds is considered acceptable. It's how you keep the 'pony' character but it's not considered the best of practices to breed a B to a C or D because there's too much chance of losing the bone. It truly gets to be a quagmire of alphabet soup when those not keeping to the code try to develop a 'sport' pony by using solely Welsh blood.