[Wallaby]

Basically the title says it all. I'm trying to decide if I want to stop blanketing Lacey now that the winter is basically over and she's shedding...

The only pros of not blanketing her that I can think of are that she could possibly shed faster and that she might be getting too warm under there right now (she's not sweaty at all when I take the blanket off, it's just warm under there and with it being consistently in the 50's to 60's lately...).

However, the negatives are that she's rather skinny right now and while I'm trying to get more food into her there's only so much I can do without going out there everyday which I just can't do, therefore she doesn't have much fat to keep her warm. I've been feeding her 2 little scoops (the scoop that comes with it) of Cool Calories each time I go out but that's only three/four times a week so so far it hasn't made a huge difference in her body mass. Another negative is that her field has not shelter so there isn't any way for her to get out of the rain if it starts raining, and then with her current skinniness, I really do not want her standing in the rain, cold and soaked through...

I would just get her a turnout sheet but I don't have the money right now. However, that is on my list for as soon as I get money. I have a little old lady that I do chores for and make $30 per time, but she doesn't want me to come unless it's sunny so I haven't gotten to yet. But that first $90 that I make is gonna buy Miss Lacey a turnout sheet, no doubt.

So basically, what makes you say "it's time to stop blanketing the horses"? How do you decide?
If it were you, would you take Lacey's blanket off and leave it off?

 

[Vidaloco]

Can you take it off and if the weather turns bad put it back on? I have always hated to see a horse standing in a blanket when I'm in a T shirt.
There is one in our area that we keep threatening to pull to the side of the road, jump the fence and pull the blanket off of :shock:

 

[Wallaby]

Can you take it off and if the weather turns bad put it back on? I have always hated to see a horse standing in a blanket when I'm in a T shirt.
There is one in our area that we keep threatening to pull to the side of the road, jump the fence and pull the blanket off of :shock:

I totally know what you mean! It's one of my major pet peeves as well.

I wish I could just run out there when the weather gets nasty and put her blanket back on but my car gets 14 mpg when it's feeling good and it's 14 miles to her house, round trip, being a poor college student I just can't justify that with how expensive gas is. =(

I was thinking about this more though and maybe I can get my BO lady to let me move Lacey into a vacant little paddock thing that does have shelter. Lacey would be by herself but she doesn't care about the other horses and she'd share a fence line with some of them so she would have equine contact if she wanted it...
I just called my BO and she said that that would be fine so maybe the problem is solved! Hopefully that'll work (and no one will be all smarty-pants-ed and move Lacey because "she doesn't need shelter! She's a horse!") because Lacey loves that little paddock and she loves having shelter.

 

[My Beau]

I take them off as soon as the air isn't bitter cold on a regular basis. My guys haven't been in blankets since the middle of Feb. I would leave her blanket off, as long as she has hay she should be able to keep herself warm

 

[Vidaloco]

I totally know what you mean! It's one of my major pet peeves as well.

I wish I could just run out there when the weather gets nasty and put her blanket back on but my car gets 14 mpg when it's feeling good and it's 14 miles to her house, round trip, being a poor college student I just can't justify that with how expensive gas is. =(

I was thinking about this more though and maybe I can get my BO lady to let me move Lacey into a vacant little paddock thing that does have shelter. Lacey would be by herself but she doesn't care about the other horses and she'd share a fence line with some of them so she would have equine contact if she wanted it...
I just called my BO and she said that that would be fine so maybe the problem is solved! Hopefully that'll work (and no one will be all smarty-pants-ed and move Lacey because "she doesn't need shelter! She's a horse!") because Lacey loves that little paddock and she loves having shelter.

Great! Its good she will use a shelter too. My 4 goof balls don't know when to come in out of the storm :roll:
At her age she may need a little more somethin to keep her warm and dry. At least till she gets more weight on.

 

[kathryn]

Yeah, we have stopped blanketing at my barn already. Poor Bailey was always drenched under his sheet.

 

[riccil0ve]

I would keep it on her if you were still keeping her in the shelter-less pasture. Better her be a little extra warm than her freezing her tush off if it gets super cold at 3am.

Even now, though, being older and on the thin side, I'd be concerned about pulling her blanket just yet, so I'm not sure I'd be any more decisive than you are, lol. Just pay a lot of attention to the weather channel, and pull it when you have a string of good weather, as well as making sure she has it on if it's going to get pretty cold. You know that no clouds = cold nights, right? The clouds act as in insulator, so if there are no clouds, it gets a lot colder. Just so you know. =]

I see my horses in the am and the pm, so it's really easy for me to fiddle with blankets, and I live close enough that I can run to the barn if it randomly starts pouring. So I don't have much of a plan for it, sometimes I'll change Ricci's blanket three times a day.

 

[Wallaby]

I think what I'm gonna do is take her blanket off tomorrow (and move her to the paddock) and then watch her the next few days since I always go out on Wednesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays so if she's acting sluggish and uncomfortable (she's distinctly a baby about being too cold, heehee) I can just put the blanket back on. It's supposed to be pretty ok weather this week, cloudy but warming up, it's supposed to be 70 degrees on Saturday! And it's been cloudy too, thanks for that tip Ricci! I had heard that before but I hadn't really thought about it, yknow? Haha

She has a REALLY thick LONG coat too. It's a little crazy, most of her hair is 2.5 to 3 inches long so as long as she has shelter and access to food, I'm not too worried about her getting cold. But she'll let me know!

It's so irritating, she's at the bottom of the herd, dominance-wise, and all the other horses are fatties, why do I have to be the one to take charge of keeping her chubby(I've never had any say in where she was kept before...I've tried but it's never worked/stuck)? I mean, she is not a hard-keeper at all! I could also understand that if she was officially MY horse but she isn't! She's only half my horse. Gah, people are dumb. If I was running a boarding facility, or whatever, it would not matter whether I owned the horse, I'd be all up in the horse owner's beeswax if I felt their horse was too skinny, not just waiting for someone, anyone, to ask if they could make changes to help their horse be fatter. But then again, these same people think that all old horses should be skinny because "they're old and dying".

I can't wait to be able to move Lacey to a real barn where she'll have a stall at night and old friends to frolic with during the day. Cannot wait.

End rant. Haha

 

[PaintHorseMares]

I've always been told that you should take them off when it gets to 60F because you don't want them to start sweating under the blanket.

 

[ilovesonya]

i took sonya's off in feb because she was starting to shed already and was sweating underneath the blanket... Although she is pregnant sooooo, the baby was probably giving her a little more heat than usual! lol.

 

[ShannonSevenfold]

Well, my new old lady poneh doesn't need a blanket in the winter so she just has a turnout sheet. But my gelding who I recently sold stopped getting blanketed a couple weeks before he left (last week of February). I live in Wisconsin and we had a very short and rather mild winter this year. I decided it was time when it quit hitting freezing at night. I picked a particularly mild week to pull it off so that his fuzzy hairs had time to fluff back up before it got a tad colder (if that makes sense. haha) so he could stay warm if it got too chilly. After that, he just had a turnout sheet for rainy/windy/icky days. I never saw him shivering or looking chilly or uncomfortable in any way, so I'm pretty certain he was just fine without it after that.

Hope that babble helped even a tiny bit. haha

 

[Rule of Reason]

What is the temp getting up to and how heavy is her blanket. On the one hand, I'd be concerned about her thinness, but if her coat is that long, you don't want her sweating because she could get chilly at night. I think moving her to another paddock is a good idea, and can she get free choice hay? Do you think she might have Cushing's?

 

[JustLeaveIt2Mya]

it depands on what your horse is comfortable with, some horses can be cold in weather like 40's and the 50's it depands on your horse and if you think they'll becomfortable in this weather without a blanket and especially if they have shedded they will have a lighter coat and could possibly become colder than they were with there winter blankey

 

[Hoofprints in the Sand]

My mare's blanket is off already The temps have been in the 40-60 degree range daily for the last week or so, 20-30 at night. But in the barn it's warmer than that, prob 30-40 so she hasn't needed one. Although I think my horse is the only one NOT shedding out yet LOL...maybe I should have left that blanket on a little longer ;-)

 

[Wallaby]

What is the temp getting up to and how heavy is her blanket. On the one hand, I'd be concerned about her thinness, but if her coat is that long, you don't want her sweating because she could get chilly at night. I think moving her to another paddock is a good idea, and can she get free choice hay? Do you think she might have Cushing's?

The warmest it's been so far is around 65 degrees. But at night it's been getting down to 36 degrees. It's also pretty windy at her house... :-| Her blanket is a medium weight.

Yeah, she isn't ever sweaty when I take the blanket off. She gets a little sweaty when I work her but she's perfectly dry and fluffy beforehand.

She can't get free choice hay, sadly. Like I said, the people who do most of the feeding just think she's thin because she's old and "dying" and therefore don't want to "waste hay" on her. :evil:

I'm pretty sure she doesn't have Cushings. She doesn't have any of the other symptoms and she sheds out fully, to a very short coat, in the summer. She had really long hair last winter too. And, her hair is significantly longer on her neck which wasn't covered by a blanket so I think it's just the way she is.



I wasn't able to put her in the little paddock with shelter yesterday because someone took down one whole side of the fence. "Why?", you ask? Good question, I have no idea. Hopefully it'll be back up today or tomorrow and I can stick her in there. I did take off her blanket yesterday because it wasn't very windy, she was very warm under her blanket, and it's not supposed to rain until later next week. I'm gonna go see her in about 2 hours, hopefully she'll be happy.
Once she's by herself, my plan is to give her a few flakes of hay, in a sneaky place (so that no one figures "oh, she's already eating, she doesn't need lunch!"), when I leave so that hopefully she'll be able to start packing on the pounds. She really isn't a hard keeper, she's about the furthest thing from a hard keeper. Grr.

Thanks Shannon, that's what I wanted to know! =)

Mya- She hasn't shed hardly at all so once her hair gets fluffy, she should be ok, as long as she has shelter when it rains. I'm not really sure what kind of temps she stops getting too cold in. She's not very obvious with her needs so I have a hard time knowing when she's too hot/cold. The one thing I know for certain about her is that she hates rain. There is nothing on this planet that she likes less than rain. She hates standing in it, she hates working in it, she just hates it. If she has shelter and it's raining, she will be in that shelter unless you feed her outside the shelter or something. Heehee So as long as I can get her into the little paddock before it rains again, she might be fine, hopefully.

 

[Hoofprints in the Sand]

She can't get free choice hay, sadly. Like I said, the people who do most of the feeding just think she's thin because she's old and "dying" and therefore don't want to "waste hay" on her. :evil:

That's terrible! :evil:

 

[Wallaby]

That's terrible! :evil:

I know! It kinda makes me want to punch them in the face. But at the same time, I can kind of understand where they're coming from since I basically board her there for free and if she's getting as much hay as she can eat, I can see how that could get expensive. But still, what jerks.

I didn't see your other reply, we must have posted at the same time. :lol: If Lacey was in a barn, I wouldn't be worried! Heehee She's a horse that's meant for a stall. Silly girl. I wanna see fluffy Sandy pictures! =P

 

[my2geldings]

I don't know that there is a time to stop blanketing. Look at your local weather. I know here, you have to take it day by day. You can be fine not blanketing for weeks then suddenly get a dumb of snow and have to go back to blanketing.
Take a look at your local weather and decide from there. If you don't have the experience to decide if it's warm enough to take the blanket off(in which case I misunderstood your question), then I would ask someone local to you who has more experience help you make a good decision.

Every horse is different, and every coat is different. What a horse might need for blanketing might be completely different than that of another horse.

 

[Wallaby]

That's exactly it M2G, I don't have enough experience to know when it's the right time. Maybe I'll go to the feed store tomorrow and ask them, they should know, right?

Well, good news! I went out to feed today (I feed the horses on Thursday at lunch) and Lacey seemed extremely happy! She was bright eyed and bushy tailed. Her hair is already all sticking up and she was warm under it, so I'm thinking she's good to go until it rains again. She also appeared way less skinny, so even though I know she shouldn't be skinny at all, it's not like I can see her ribs through her coat when it's not flattened (which is what I was really worried about since that would mean she's REALLY skinny instead of just kinda skinny).

 

[Mickey4793]

My boy is no longer wearing his blanket, if it gets chilly again I'll put on his light weight but for now it's just to warm.
I just stick my hand under his blanket and if he feels to toasty I leave it off [given it's not gonna drop to 0 degrees that night]