Touch - Up Grooming - Clipping Horses in Winter

Tidy Up in Winter by Clipping

• If your horse is in light work during the cold seasons, you may not need to worry about too much sweat. But horses in training or whose coats are too thick for the weather benefit from clipping. Another clip gives your horse faster drying times, is less likely to cause them to overheat, and can better match the time of year, weather, and your horse’s care and skin health.

• If your horse is prone to skin infections like rain rot in the saddle area or beyond and mud fever under leg hair, clipping helps fight the petri dish of hair, moisture, and bacteria that love to cultivate infections.

Clipping Horses in Winter – Where Do You Clip?

• You don’t have to do a full clip if your horse can benefit from more clipping in the coldest months. You can choose any number of trace clips, from a bib clip, a blanket clip, or a hunter clip.

• Or, you can focus your clipping efforts on areas that produce the most sweat. The hindquarters, underside of the neck, and along the flanks often get the sweatiest. The girth area, too, and the type of clip you choose may take care of all of those places.

• The second round of clipping gives your horses some sweat relief and keeps the rest of their body warm. Any clipped areas can have a blanket. For riding, you can cover the clipped areas with a quarter sheet or slinky hood for some added protection.

This horse lives in FL for the winter and can be body clipped throughout the “cold” weather.

Should you do a full body clip again?

• You could do another full body clip if the climate is so tropically warm that any extra hair is no good. It’s always a good idea to match your horse’s hair growth with the climate and how much they sweat.

The Girth Area

• Longer winter hair around the elbows and girth can lead to rubs and hairless patches. The tack can yank on those hairs, and the friction can make the longer hair act like an abrasive pad on your horse’s skin. This irritation can lead to girth galls.

• Clipping that area short can help with the sweat, and may prevent those galls by removing that hair to reduce friction in the area.

• Using friction-blocking sticks like runners do is another way to help prevent galls from forming in the girth area. 

Tools for Clipping a Horse in Winter

• Like any other time that you clip, starting with a clean horse is the best idea. Then, consider the clipper body and blades.

• The #10 blade is the “standard” blade for body clipping and trace clipping. These blades leave 1.8 mm of hair, which is perfect for most climates in late summer and fall. But when it’s really cold? That’s not much hair.

• You can switch to the #7F blade for touch-up. Clipping horses in winter with this blade leaves 4 mm of hair and looks cute and fuzzy.

Match the clipper and blade combo to your horse’s coat. 

• The #7F is best for body clippers and works with the detachable blade system.  For wildly thick coats that are usually clipped with shears, the covercote blades are similar to the #7F and leave 5 mm of hair.

Use clipper combs

• If you don’t have a #7F, you can add clipper combs to your blades. These clipper guards slide over the blade, creating more room between your horse and the cutting edge.

The #7F has more room for hair to slide into the blade for cutting, making this ideal for longer and thicker hair. 

Prep Your Horse for the Best Results

• Bathing in the cold is not always possible. The next best way to get a clean horse and prep for clipping is by hot toweling, or hot clothing as it’s sometimes called. This grooming technique combines hot water and elbow grease, and yes, it’s as labor-intensive as it sounds.

How to hot towel your horse in winter:

• Begin with a thorough grooming session, and use clean brushes. Curry and brush several times.

• If there is dust that is glued to your horse, never fear. Add some no-rinse spray to your routine.

• Lightly spritz your horse, a cloth, or a brush with no-rinse shampoo to bust up any static. Wipe or spray your horse to lift the dust.

• A vacuum is another option to get all the dust bits, but if the static is making popping noises and zapping your horse, spray the inside of the nozzle with water and then use the vacuum.

Now you’re ready to hot cloth

This process is like currying but with a steamy cloth instead. First, let’s make your concoction.  

• Add a few capfuls of no-rinse shampoo to about two gallons of HOT water.

• Toss in a few cloths and swirl things around.

• Grab one of the towels (kitchen gloves are helpful) and wring out the water until you pulverize any remaining drops of moisture.

• Use this cloth like a curry comb and rub it into your horse. It should be warm and not blazing hot by now. Curry the fabric against the direction of hair growth.

• As your cloth cools and gets dirty, toss it into a rinse bucket of clean water. Let it soak, wring it out there, and then it goes into the hot water bucket to cycle through.

• Use coolers if your horse gets too damp or wet during this process, which they shouldn’t.

Now, your horse is ready to touch up with clippers this winter. Grooming and clipping horses in winter is horse care, and it helps keep their skin and coat healthy and comfortable.

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