Clipping feathers

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PStarfish

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I have a horrible feeling my Welsh Cob may have some feather mites. I've noticed the last couple of days she's been itching her hind legs and stamping which is exactly what my last cob did when she had them.
Theres no scabby bits but her front legs do have a bit of scurfy skin in the feather. Problem is her feathers are so thick that to treat her early I think they'll need to come off :(
I've never just clipped the feathers before. Do I need to do the full leg - as she's now in winter wollies I don't want her looking daft with a hairy top part and nothing on the bottom! How close to the skin do I need to take it?
Anybody got any pics of an unclipped cob with feathers removed to convince me she'll look OK? (obv I'll do it regardless of looks if it's what she needs - just scared lol)
 
My mare gets scurfy scabby legs if I leave her feahers, so I clip them off year round. I bought some Element trimmers, which have guards, so I can do up to her fetlocks on the shortest setting then graduate the hair up by swapping the guards a couple of times, getting longer until I reach her knees.
In the winter she has a low trace clip anyway, so I usually just run her legs off when I do that, or she does tend to look like she's wearing Breeks, lol
If you don't want to do the whole leg, and haven't got some trimmers to grade the hair in, you could use your big clippers to take off as much as you need to, then point them down, going with the direction of hair, and try to blend the line in that way. I always struggle with big clippers around fetlocks though, which is why I bought the trimmer, but that's just me, I'm not very dexterous. X
 
I leave the feathers on and got a prescription for Frontline from the vets, I've used it before for mites and it works well. The vet said that if it didn't work they could come and give a Dectomax injection.
 
Melly gets Malanders so has her legs clipped. If you dont want to take the whole leg out, just clip with the lie of coat instead of against it, then you wont have any lines.
I tend to clip against the lie of coat to the knee/hock and then go along the lie of coat to blend in. Pics -

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Close up -

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Sorry - overload!
 
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