Tips for Trace Clipping Your Horse

Trace Clipping Made Easy

• When do you need to clip your horse? When the weather and your horse’s coat and exercise routine don’t match, you can clip to help your horse be more comfortable in sweaty areas.

• Trace clipping can also be part of your overall plan during the winter. You can do a full body clip early on, and as the hair grows, touch it up with a trace clip. This adjusted second clip allows the legs to grow fuzzy for the truly cold weather.

• Horses in light work often do well with a trace clip variation. Horses in heavy work or a warmer climate may benefit from complete body clipping.

• If you need to clip a thick coat with long hair, such as that of a horse with Cushing’s disease, you may need to body clip to remove the excess hair in warm weather. Some show horses get a full clip of their summer coat for show season. In winter months, choose a trace lip or full clip as needed.

• Consider the level of work, your horse’s winter coat length, and the typical winter weather for your area when deciding on a type of clip.

How does trace clipping differ from other clipping techniques?

• The premise behind this selective haircutting is that you remove the hair that gets overly sweaty. This improves comfort and prevents the hair from trapping moisture and microbes, the two most significant contributors to mud fever, rain rot, and other skin infections.

Clip Patterns for Horses

• When you are selectively clipping, you can choose a traditional pattern or make up your own. Sure, your horse may look silly and more like a toddler’s doodle on your fridge, but it doesn’t matter if it helps them.

• There are many traditional clipping options, one of which is called the trace clip. I call anything other than a body clip a “trace clip” to keep things simple. But technically, there are more styles. 

Horse clipping pattern options

The bib clip

• Clip away a stripe of hair from the throat latch to the area between the front legs. It’s up to you how far up the sides of the neck you want to go. 

The strip clip

• The strip clip is the souped-up bib clip. The stripe of clipped hair goes from the jaw to the sheath or udders. 

• This clip doesn’t make much sense if you blanket, as the underside is buzzed and uncovered while the fuzzy parts are blanketed.

Irish clips

• Irish clips are usually a half-face clip plus a little more. A diagonal line goes from the poll to the stifle, and all hair below is removed from this line except the horse’s legs. 

Trace clips

• A trace clip turns the bib clip into a racing stripe. There’s a horizontal line of clipped hair from the point of the shoulder to the gaskin area. You may see an upswing of clipped hair around the flank as the hair growth changes direction, and the legs stay fuzzy. The belly can be clipped or not, usually not.

Blanket clip

• Make your trace clip larger for a blanket clip. Here, you’ll clip a half-face, all of the neck, and most of the body. The legs remain, as does a big patch of hair over the loins and rump, shaped like a quarter sheet.

This is like a trace clip and a blanket clip. 

Chaser clip

• This unique style clips the face, neck, and flank but leaves a large swath of hair from the poll to the tail. It’s like a trace clip PLUS.

The hunter clip

• The hunter clip is your horse’s entire body being clipped, except for a saddle pad-shaped area and the legs.

This article has excellent diagrams showing the different types of clips.

Or, remove more hair to suit your horse’s needs

• A favorite is the “Swiss cheese” clip, where you remove the hair that gets wet from sweat. You don’t have to follow a pattern – clip for your horse’s needs.  

• All these styles mean you will make some lines and boundaries on your horse.

• Many styles of trace clips require blanketing, and you can consider using a neckpiece on your horse’s blankets to help cover a clipped neck.

• You can also leave the belly fuzzy if you are worried about insufficient blanket coverage.

This horse has a half-face and saddle patch remaining. 

Tips for creating borders on trace clips

• If you are skilled and can freestyle edges, please teach us how! Or, use these horse-clipping hacks to create tidy lines. Here are some simple steps to take

1. 1. Use something as a guide
   2. Trace the guide to create an edge
   3. Clip up to that edge

Using a guideline

Use what you have around the barn to create guidelines for your trace clipping pattern. You could use:

Saddle pads

• Large square pads can help you create lines for a blanket clip or the outline of a fuzzy saddle patch over the withers.

Numnahs or half-pads

• These smaller pads are super for creating a smaller fuzzy saddle pad area.

Baling twine

• Twine is the BEST TOOL for creating straight lines on your horse. Have a friend hold the line taut as your guide.

• Baling twine can also help you measure side-to-side for equal racing stripes.

Halter or bridle

• Placement will show you where to clip for a bridle path or half-face design.

Stencil

• A stencil is your friend when you are creating a cute rump design. They easily stick to your horse with some tape and remove painlessly.

You can see a little bit of sweat near the saddle area, but the rest of him is nice and dry. 

Cut a guiding line 

• Once you have something to clip up against, grab a pair of trimmers with the blade set to #40.

• Hold these trimmers like a pencil and carve out a line. This line is your border, giving you a visual place to stop clipping the big swaths of hair.

Practice first and leave room for error

• If this is your first time clipping lines and borders on your horse, practice in an area you know will be clipping away.

• For example, if you are doing a traditional trace clip and want a clipped area that is 12 inches high, practice clipping a guideline in the middle of this area. If you mess up, you still have room to create another line.

Trace Clipping a Horse: Tips and Tricks

• If there was ever a time to use fresh blades on a ridiculously clean horse, this is it. Clips are best with sharp blades and a spotless horse.

• Remember to brush off your blades every five minutes while clipping and apply some clipper oil. 

• Work on a small area and then back up to see the big picture. This also helps you see uneven areas that need another pass with the clippers.

Make the sides match on a trace clip

• Making your horse’s right and left sides match is tricky. Luckily, most people can’t see both sides of your horse simultaneously.

Use your horse’s anatomy as markers 

• Align your baling twine or template with distinct parts of your horse’s anatomy – points of shoulder, stifle, parallel to the jugular groove, etc.  

• Your horse’s front legs have a prominent upside-down V that shows you the perfect place to create an edge.

• Your horse should be standing square when you create guidelines.

Measure each side – the spine is your marker 

• Using twine or string, have a friend hold it on the withers. After clipping one side, measure down to the line from the withers.

• Transfer that measurement to the other side, and mark with a pen or even a little notch with your clippers. 

• Do this several times down your horse’s spine, transferring measurements from side to side.

• You’ll then have a dotted line as a guide. If you trust yourself freestyle, go for it! Otherwise, align your twine with these marks and lay your twine down.

If your horse’s long coat needs some attention, grab your body clippers and choose the best clip for their needs. It doesn’t have to be perfect; only functional and beneficial to your horse.

Videos

Tips for making borders for your trace clip

General horse clipping tips for the best results