Ideas for tail protection for pony out 24/7?

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Crazydancer

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Help! I'm looking for some suggestions with a problem I have, with my old gelding. I have a younger mare, and they live out, 24/7 in the same field. She is very active, and plays a lot. So much so, their pecking order changed recently and suddenly. Since she arrived last April the gelding had been boss (very food orientated) until 3 weeks ago, and suddenly one night, she is boss. She has been playing rough, and sometimes I feel he really doesn't want to join in.

Anyway, I noticed that he has a chunk of hair missing from the top of his tail, presumably a bite. It's definately not a rub, the hair has been snapped off about 1cm from the skin, and is quite bare in a patch. There was a area of broken skin, but I cleaned it, and it scabbed over and dried up, but again tonight it looks like she's bitten him again, and it looks so sore.

So any ideas what I can do to protect this area while it heals?

I could rug him with one with a tail flap - He is unrugged at the mo as he's a good doer, and right now I'm happy chucking piles of haylage in for them, I worry he will put on too much weight if I rug.

Or I could seperate them, but I only have the option of one very small area (schooling arena sized) which doesn't have a blade of grass left, and a larger area which has been churned up but not so muddy.

Any other ideas?? :confused:
 
Thanks - I do have an elasticated tail guard I used when travelling, not quite as nice as these, but worth a shot. I did wonder if they are ok to leave on 24/7..... I have heard horror stories of horses travelled with tail bandages that have cut-off the circulation, but as these are elasticated I'd hope they wouldn't be so potentially dangerous.
I'll give it a try, but think she will pull it off him fairly quickly!!
 
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