So many perspectives on this one! As with many things ‘horse’, the benefits of blanketing is often hotly debated. There are many factors to consider including your local climate, facility, care schedule, and the specific horse’s needs. In the end it is entirely an individual decision. To give a balanced understanding, I hope to shed a light on some of the surrounding issues so it’s easier to evaluate your own situation.
No Blankets
The comment that I hear most from the “no blankets” side of the discussion is that, in the wild, horses don’t have blankets and they are “just fine”. There are some valid points in looking at the way a horse’s coat naturally works. Though the horse’s winter coat growth is stimulated by the shortened hours of sunlight in the fall, feeling cold does encourage more complete growth. The exact weight of coat a horse grows is largely dictated by genetics, but blanketing early in the cooler months does discourage them from growing quite as much.
Additionally, whatever amount of coat they grow will not be able to poof up and create the air pocket of trapped heat when sleeked down by a blanket. Horses’ bodies do naturally adjust and handle some surprisingly unpleasant conditions. Beyond the individual horse’s coping methods, in a wild setting herd horses will also seek some amount of shelter and will huddle up closely together, helping to shield each other from the elements during particularly difficult weather. They spend alternate days of better weather recovering and regaining their energies to withstand the next wintery blast. With a decent picture of how wild horses cope we can begin to compare the life of our own horses.
Why “All Natural” Doesn’t Work For Everyone
The argument that it’s unnatural for horses to wear blankets, though true, is nullified for our purposes by several factors:
- Firstly, we are commonly dealing with very domesticated, selectively-bred horses. Many of these breeds are fine boned and thin skinned – a far cry from the shaggy, sturdy horses of Iceland or the tough Mustangs of the American West.
- Secondly, even among these incredibly tough breeds some horses in the wild don’t survive the winter. This is the very process of natural selection. Weaker or more sensitive wild animals don’t live long enough to pass their genetics very far into the next generation.
- Thirdly, most horses living in a wild setting are not being asked to work for humans while in the depths of winter. Therefore, their resources and energies are reserved solely for survival.
- And lastly, those that do get through the winter alive are not necessarily in peak, prime condition come spring.
- Oh, AND we would prefer our horses to live and work well into their twenties, or even thirties. A wild Mustang’s expected lifespan is roughly 15-20 years. Whereas domestic horses, including captive Mustangs, live 25-30 years as the norm, and often much, much longer. Certainly, many factors impact lifespan, such as veterinary care of injuries, nutrition, and predators among them. Attentive care during winter months or other bad weather as a whole, surely can be counted as a factor.
All The Blankets – Always
Now let’s take a peek at the flip side. You will hear horse people talking (often complaining) about having to swap blankets twice a day to accommodate the shift in temperatures from day to night during the transitional months. Mostly the reasoning is, they are convinced their horse will colic if this is not done in such a regimented way. I commend the horse owners who care so much as to go through the hassle of changing their horses’ clothing as often as they change their own! It requires time and dedication to do so.
Why All The Blankets?
What would drive someone to think their animal needs SOOOO much attention? If you are working your horse hard year-round and are concerned about not getting him very sweaty when it’s cold outside, you might be inclined to clip him so he doesn’t heat up in exercise. Once you remove a horse’s coat, he needs all the help his owner can provide. Such horses and riders are often trying to be show ready first thing in the spring, or even continue competing through the winter. Some may not clip the horse but rather use blanketing and UV lights to prevent the horse from getting wooly at all. This is often the situation when you see the “blanket always/often/forever” viewpoint.
Finding A Balance
However, if you do not clip your horse, or have competitive goals through the winter, it is a disservice to both yourself and your horse to be quite so crazy with the blankets. To take a page out of nature’s book, horses get one winter coat for the season that remains that same heaviness regardless of the temperature fluctuations. So, I am suggesting that we look at the weather on more of an average across a day or two or three and blanket to suit longer periods of time. To be clear, I’m not suggesting putting a 300-gram fill blanket on and leaving it if temps spike into the 60’s for a few days; a horse’s own coat breathes much better than blankets for sudden warm spells.
Practical Blanket Use
What you most want to avoid is sweating in an overly heavy blanket during the day. The horse will not dry in the blanket by nightfall and will find themselves now wet and much colder than if they had been left natural to begin with. This negates the benefits of blanketing. We want to help our horses, not make their lives harder.
For my own horses, my rule is to blanket as best as I can for protection in the coldest temps predicted without making them sweat in the warmest temps predicted. It’s better for them to be chilly for a few hours than sweat for a few hours. When the weather conditions change enough to force a blanket swap, I again evaluate the next day or two or more based on the same logic. You still get a few days where you just can’t seem to get it right, but you aren’t doing much in the way of 12-hour blanket changes. Additionally, for those who want their horses to grow as much coat as possible, allow your horse to be chilly but not frozen for the first month or so of the cooler temperatures. Then add our man-made layer for the maximum benefits of blanketing.
Additional Considerations
I also account for stall time in my calculations. A horse in a field during nasty weather will likely need one level heavier blanket than one in a stall. The stalled horse is feeling only the temperature with no wind chill or wetness added. Keep in mind, a run-in shed is NOT equal to a stall. Stalls are typically enclosed and often inside a warmer barn. By comparison, a horse in a run-in shed chooses to be out of the worst of the wind and wet (you hope), but ultimately still feels a lot of air movement. For more information on what types of blankets are available and what their intended uses are see my post “Blanket Lingo“.
To address the colic concern, it is big shifts in temperatures that most-commonly instigates colic. In conjunction, a horse’s diet is comprised of primarily dry feed and hay during the winter. Horses get sweaty exercising during day, or in overly heavy blankets as earlier stated, then forget to drink enough when the temp drops off for the evening. It only takes a day or two like this to dehydrate a horse and impaction can quickly ensue. Tips for avoiding colic is a separate subject matter but blanketing correctly can be helpful.
Final Thoughts
Beyond these general guidelines, it is still very much up to your observations of your horse. You might genuinely have a horse that doesn’t need the assistance of blanketing – yay for you! But bear in mind that a horse’s needs may change over time. Regardless of past history, if he is shivering, he is cold and needs protection from whatever conditions got to him. A cold horse can drop in weight and condition very quickly. And older horses also tend to stiffen up from shivering which may limit their ability to work. Being observant of your horse is your best informational tool in deciding the least offensive scenario for both you and your horse as a team in conquering the winter months.
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