Are hoods inportant for night time cosyness?

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Starbucks

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My horse has a lovely (but quite old) HW Master stable rug but it doesn't have a hood... He's always warm (in cold times not now!!). but I'm just wondering if hoods help a lot in keeping warm or are more just for keeping clean!?

Thoughts?
 
If your horse has managed fine in it, then theres no problem. Some horses need more warmth than others. Some owners do it to keep them clean. Yours is a lovely irish type isn't he? Should keep warm fine.

I find my mare grows back her final clip (Feb) really quickly if I don't put a neck on her, and then sweats while I fitten her for the event season. The downside is that she rubs her mane then!
 
He's inbetween! 16.3 (proper) ISH, about 1/2 TB, 1/2 ID. He's pretty heavily rugged atm (liner + said HW at night and liner + HW Amigo TO with hood in day). I'm thinking when it gets cold he can just have all 3 on 24/7.. or is that silly?
 
Hoods are a new invention, no horse died from not having a hood before they came out ;)

And 2 x HO rugs is pointless IMO, if a rug is flattened by another then it is rendered useless.
 
I layer rugs on pretty much everything! The only ones without layers on are the hairy yaks who live out all year with one heavyweight with hood each...

Layering traps air between each rug, making the horse warmer. I find my big lad (the biggest wimp in the world) is warmer if he has three or fours rugs on that if he has a super thick duvet and one stable rug on...

Plus it means ruggins is more versatile - I can adjust my rabble's rugs depending on the weather, their weight, the way they feel etc etc etc...
 
Starbucks said:
Why do people wear lots of layers to keep warm then?
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Cos people arent horses and have to rely on a far less efficient system of keeping warm:Expending valuable energy!. A horse ,being the sensible forward thinking beast we know and love,delegates his heating to a large extent,to the microbes in his gut.They slave away breaking down cellulose to products that the horse can utilise,and produce large amounts of heat in the process.Rug him up too much and it is arguable that you affect this digestive process.
 
Well he's not too hot, and I've clipped all his hair off so I'm going to put rugs on him. He also has to work hard (hunter) and is difficult to keep weight on in winter so I don't want him wasting any energy keeping warm! My mum has kept hunters for years well, safe and sound "over" rugged... so I'll stick to what I know I think.. but will manage without the hood. :)
 
Starbucks said:
Why do people wear lots of layers to keep warm then?
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People are advised to wear lots of light layers so they can adjust them as the outside temperature or their workload changes.

Putting two heavyweight rugs on an animal that can't adjust them himself doesn't work the same way at all.
 
Mike007 said:
Rug him up too much and it is arguable that you affect this digestive process.
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I have been trying to explain this to an owner on my yard. Every winter the horse stops eating so well...I have tried and tried to point out it is because the horse is too hot, explaining how a horse functions, etc.

SB - if you flatten a HW rug then the filling is not *fluffy* so cannot trap the warm air in the way it was designed to do, simple :) We did an experiment last year with this, just to prove it, and one HW rug with a made-for-the-job rug liner had the horse at the same temp as two HW rugs. People over rug for themselves really, a horse is capable of keeping itself warm with not so much help from us.

Also, too many rugs equal weight, which is always going to be uncomfortable.
 
IMHO neck covers were only invented by rug companies to give them another product to sell

I don't own one but can imagine they would be useful for keeping the neck clean :)

EDITED to say actually that's not true, I just remembered, one of my horses came with a rug with a neck cover and I used it one winter for a while and he lost a large section of mane. Its been cleaned and stored in a box for the last 8 years :D
 
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Weezy said:
Hoods are a new invention, no horse died from not having a hood before they came out ;)

And 2 x HO rugs is pointless IMO, if a rug is flattened by another then it is rendered useless.
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My boss thought this, she has only just started using them. At the point to point yard obviously everything is a fully clipped TB, and as long as they had warm enough rugs we have never had any problems. Also a lot of neck rugs rub out manes.
 
I think the best way to describe over rugging - or layering rugs - is think of the difference between a duvet and a sheet with blankets on top.

A duvet moves around more easily, it is lighter but it still keeps you really warm. It is easy to move about in because its light.

A sheet with lots of blankets on feels very heavy. If its really cold, you also need a few blankets to keep warm.

Or another way to describe it is wearing a puffa jacket on a winter's day. Will keep you really nice and warm. Wearing a Barbour and lots of layers just makes you feel constricted, too hot and like you've got too many layers on.

I think if I were a horse, I would prefer a warm duvet to a sheet with blankets any day.

So therefore get a really good heavyweight rug and leave it at that. Or put a fleece under it but no more.

That's just the way I feel!!
 
0ldmare said:
IMHO neck covers were only invented by rug companies to give them another product to sell

I don't own one but can imagine they would be useful for keeping the neck clean :)
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Totally agree, biggest waste of money every thought up.

I have never ever used one and have owned hairy cobs, warmbloods and skinny TBs. Even in the borders where we'd get -10C in the winter none of them ever had anymore than a rug with a duvet under it and we never ever had a cold horse right up to their ears.

I believe in keeping as little on a horse as possible, so why use a neck cover or hood if not needed? Plus, the hoods just give me nightmares - too many tales of them twisting around and horses panicking and doing themselves serious injury.
 
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