Grey horse cleaning problems - HELP!

C

CharlieGal

Well-Known Member
Joined
11 June 2011
Messages
90
Visit site
Hey, I have a grey mare that seems to attract dirt and dung (but seriously I think she wanted to be born bay :S). Is there any tips you can give me to get her sparkling (clean will do ;) )? I can't afford to spend much money though...

Please help!
 
Well I have a lemon and white mare aka Bog Pony! Last year I tried lots of different things to get her clean then someone who has coloureds told me to try Head and Shoulders Sensitive shampoo. It's great, lifts the dirt off the skin (she sweats dirt!!), wouldn't use anything else now :)
 
Head and shoulders is great, I get 5litre tubs of hand wash - the type you get in those dispensers in public toilets / factories etc, which is fabulous for cleaning grey neds. I also used daz washes on my boys tail and hocks to whiten them up

Other than that - lots of scrubbing and lots of rugs lol :)
 
I have found prevention is better than cure!
Funnily enough I NEVER fully bath my grey's body! I have found that leaving the natural grease in his coat means the mud slides off nicely. In summer he gets a wash down with plain water to remove the sweat, that's all I need to do. He hates having a bath anyway, so i try and avoid it - his last owners used to scrub him up regularly and I think he just got fed up!
Mine has a shiny-lined lightweight turnout on all the time through winter (he's a good doer) and a light fleece stable rug at night. His mane is kept long to keep the mud off his neck. The mud brushes out of the mane nicely because the mane has plenty of (my old) leave-in conditioner in it. When I plait him up (spanish plait) you can't see the mucky bits and his neck is clean underneath. I sometimes use a neck rug if it's really muddy.
His tail is trimmed to 'normal' length for winter and sprayed every other day with 'seven day mud away' - mud and poo just brushes out. Then washed with Wahl Diamond White for an outing. I use the same shampoo for his legs, it's the best one I have found. Not tried head and shoulders though!
I only brush mud off his coat when totally dry.
Poo stains come out with Cowboy Magic spray, but then you have to rinse it out afterwards or it just spreads the stain.

Okay if I were to show him I would probably be laughed out of the ring, but he scrubs up fine for dressage and I always get comments on how clean he looks! I have a rule where I will never put anything on him that I wouldn't use on myself, and so I don't ever use things like Daz - can you imagine having your skin scrubbed with that? Ouch!!!!!
 
To avoid stable stains use an outdoor rug as a stable rug. Keeps them much cleaner as the wet doesn't seep through to the coat (don't spend as much money on rug cleaning also).

Once you have cleaned your horse, put a show sheen type product on them (avoiding saddle area of course). This stops stains sticking
 
Pig oil/sulpher on manes tails and white legs will help stop dirt clinging and stop yellow tails. Looks dreadful for 48 hrs after applying it but thereafter you will have clean soft and silky manes tails and socks. Use very little it goes a very long way.

For general use on the body I used tesco 99p human shampoo, far cheaper than equine shampoo. After a good bath and almost dry I then very lightly spray a body brush with pig oil and give the horse a good groom (don't put pig oil on saddle area), end result is a clean white horse. Good deep rugs and hoods and as clean a box as possible will also help.

All greys are part hippo and a huge amount of work but they look stunning in the show ring, plus you can find them in the dark !!

My old hunter was snow white from top to tail and the main problem was yellow stains, but after being shown how to use the pig oil by a old heavy horseman I managed to keep the horse sparkling. It is also very useful in the battle against mud fever. You probably won't find it in saddlers but it is findable on the internet.
 
My routine before a show (i show jump and have OCD about my grey being grey, not yellow, not brown but proper grey like she's supposed to be)
1. Wet the horse with hose
2. Wash with fairy liquid and wash off
3. wash again with dimond white shampoo, leave that for 2min and then wash off
4. brush tail, wash with fairy liquid and wash off
5. wash tail again with dimond white shampoo, leave it for a few min, wash off
6. Spray tail with vanish, make sure you avoid the legs, dock and bum (i tend to cover her bend end with either a towel or old bed sheets. leave vanish on the tail for a few min but hold the tail so ponio doesn't swish it and cover itself with vanish) then wash if off
7. brush tail again and rub chalk into it, same with hock and sometimes face if she doesn't let me wash it properly.

Yes, its time consuming but at least i have a clean pony :) and the vanish also help prevent the dirt staining the tail too :)
this pic is before i washed her in summer when im out pretty much every weekend so she gets a scrub weekly, so you can see that it has prevented a lot of dirt sticking to her.
10042011355.jpg
 
After you've washed the tail and it's still not beautifully white, chuck a load of max strength steradent tablets in hot water and soak the tail in that. (not the dock though and only the minimum amount of water you need so it's a strong solution).
Rinse and it should be white!
 
One of the American forums recommends Goop. They sell Groomers Goop here and supposed to be excellent for making manes and tails blinding white!
 
My Gelding in grey and very "White" bless

Hes a dirty monkey - but I find Gallops extra strenght gets him sparkly.

I used to have a grey mare and getting her tail white was a real challenege -I would wash it in conventional shampoo then I used to dip her tail into a glowhite solution - mix it with warm water and dip the tail in for 1min but be careful not to let the solution touch the dock or drip onto the legs (u need two buckets at the ready - one with solution in and then one to rinse straight after) I then used to heavily condition the tail as the glowhite can dry the hair a little but conditoner soons sorts that out.

Her tail used to look loads better after - I did this twice a month leading up to the show season and by April she was Sparkly and bright in her tail instead of yellow!

Cowboy magic shine in yellow out is also good but expensive :( Glowhite far cheaper £2 odd from superstores
 
Def go for prevention! My boy has his tail in a bag, snuggyhood hood and full neck rugs.

The bits that do get dirty get washed regularly with diamond White when the weather is warm enough, in winter I spray with red rum whitener and wipe off with a warm damp microfibre cloth.

Yesterday I tried cowboy magic green spot remover with great success!
 
Another one endorsing prevention :). Kal used to be very dapply and is now mostly white/flea-bitten and is a real mudlark so is hard to keep clean.

He wears a rug with a neck cover for as long as it's cold enough/we can get away with it - the downside to this is that it does rub his mane. Mud is left to be brushed out when dry, but I do hose his feet/legs most evenings in the winter (he has no feathers and has never suffered from mud fever). Even with a rug, though, he manages to get mud in the most amazing places . . . he's a very bendy boy and when he rolls he likes to rub his whole face on the ground - came in yesterday with mud all down his forehead and nose (and on either side of his face). I left that for this morning - he will either have rubbed it off on his straw, or it will be dry enough for me to brush out.

Poo stains are a different matter, although I have found that now that Kal is bedded on straw we don't get as many of those. In the summer he gets fairly regular baths, but in the winter I just spot clean those - Cowboy Magic is fab for this.

Keeping a tail white - well brushing it regularly is a good first step . . . mud will usually brush out really well and if the tail is kept nice and silky with fairly regular brushing then I do find the dirt doesn't seem to stick and stain as much. Kal's tail gets washed once a week unless it's below freezing - I have a thing about yellow tails. I use washing up liquid - any brand will do - wash it a couple of times and rinse in cold water and then do a final wash with one of the blue shampoos (Gallop is good) and use warm water.

To be honest, keeping a grey clean is a little like painting the Forth Railway Bridge - never ending. But as one wise friend (and fellow grey owner) once said to me - at least with a grey, when they're clean you KNOW they're clean . . . and they always look so beautiful when they are clean ;).

P
 
Jack has turned me in to an OCD obsessed cleaning freak. I keep him as clean as he is in my signiture, daily... A great challenge at the moment, as he is on box rest! :D

Great suggestions so far :D I will be borrowing a few!

Buy a groomers stone! they literally obliterate poo stains, and the murky colour left over from mud.

If your horse is stabled, plait tails in a long braid to avoid poo splatterings..

You can do the same with manes, however then as someone else said, they help keep necks clean!

Lincoln muddy buddy leg wash when left on tails and legs for five minutes or so gets rid of the yellow colour.

To avoid the yellow, brush the areas daily and get rid of all poo stains!

Coconut oil manes and tails after washing (use as little as possible as it will actually attract dirt) to condition. Unlike baby oil or showsheen, that just coat the outside of the hair and stop moisture from gettng in, it actually conditions the hair.

If you thoroughly groom every day, you will avoid staining, and get a shiny horse as a bonus ;)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top