Where do you buy your flair strips?

Thread hi-jack straight away... How do they work?! Hoping a nice person will tell me and give me the research for it- proper science nerd here :D
 
Lolo said:
Thread hi-jack straight away... How do they work?! Hoping a nice person will tell me and give me the research for it- proper science nerd here :D
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TheMule would be the person to answer this ;) My short answer is they don't IMO.
 
hoggedmane said:
Feeling very thick - what are flair strips?
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The thing on the horses nose :)
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SpottedCat said:
TheMule would be the person to answer this ;) My short answer is they don't IMO.
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I know, on humans, if you push up on either side of the bridge of your nose you can increase airflow. But not massively... I'm intrigued as to how they'd do anything at all tbh. Unless when putting them on they physically increase the size of the nasal passages in some way?!
 
The way a horse is constructed and the way a human is constructed are pretty different. Having seen pictures of a dissected horse head, I'm dubious they can have any effect at all.
 
Sorry, could you tell me where you buy them please?!

In my experience they work, in my vets experience they work...
 
They increase the amount of space in the horses nasal passage-both increasing the air flow (slightly) and reducing the amount of pressure the horses lungs are under.

Clearly have some effect as many Olympic horses had them on yesterday!
 
Cedars said:
Sorry, could you tell me where you buy them please?!

In my experience they work, in my vets experience they work...
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Sorry, said it was a total hijack of a science nerd :D At least it's keeping this bumped for you :p I'm not disputing as such, more asking if anyone had the research backing their claims up :)
 
SpottedCat said:
The way a horse is constructed and the way a human is constructed are pretty different. Having seen pictures of a dissected horse head, I'm dubious they can have any effect at all.
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Don't you be bringing your science in to the conversation ;) What do the manufacturers claim they do? Who makes them?
 
SpottedCat said:
The way a horse is constructed and the way a human is constructed are pretty different. Having seen pictures of a dissected horse head, I'm dubious they can have any effect at all.
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It's a close run thing with some people though :D :D Sorry!

Cedars, it's also not so much 'they work' but the 'how' that I'm after :)
 
Cedars said:
Clearly have some effect as many Olympic horses had them on yesterday!
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Correlation is not the same as causation ;)

I think the most you can infer from Olympic horses wearing them is they don't have any discernible negative effect on performance. Or do we now think that all teams should be going for red, yellow and black binding on their fly-ears - after all the Germans had that on and they won team and individual Gold, and individual bronze, so clearly that must have an effect.... :) ;)
 
SpottedCat said:
Correlation is not the same as causation ;)

I think the most you can infer from Olympic horses wearing them is they don't have any discernible negative effect on performance. Or do we now think that all teams should be going for red, yellow and black binding on their fly-ears - after all the Germans had that on and they won team and individual Gold, and individual bronze, so clearly that must have an effect.... :) ;)
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Flair also provides sponsorship for a number of eventers ;)
 
ive posted this before, but if you want the techno babble, the process of gaseous exchange is limited by internal respiration ( the 02 exchange at a cellular ie muscular level) not external respiration ie breathing. so, pretty pointless really for most normal / average horses / humans.
save your money
they do work, for the manufacturers, as when you lot see the sponsored olympic horses wearing them, everyone rushes out to buy them :D ;)
 
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Can you all stop taking the pee please? We're doing everything in our power-supplements, the best vets, numerous other therapies, to ensure our horse recovers from his lung infection and returns to his normal successful self.

You can all take the pee - and maybe it is coincidence - but since we've started using flair strips in his high speed work, he's not had a single nose bleed.

Excuse me if I'm a fluffy bunny horse owner, after all he's 'only an event horse', but we want him to be as comfortable as possible, and if flair strips help that, even a little bit, that's what I'm going to do.

Now if anyone knows a cheap place to get them from, please reply to this thread, if not, please stop trying to make me feel stupid.
 
You can get the same effect using micropore across the bridge of the nose.
If they worked every racehorse in the country would have one and they dont.
you could go back to good old blue peter and another use for toilet rolls rammed in each nostril,sorry could not help myself.
 
Guys, don't be mean. They won't hurt the horse (and god knows there are enough fads that can . . .) so she might as well spend her money as she wants. To be fair, there does seem to be some anecdotal evidence for their use in "bleeders" but I haven't found a study.

Re the racehorses, as far as I know they are banned in racing here and in some jurisdictions in the US.

You might struggle to find them cheaply as they seem to have a very secure patent. You could always try regular micropore tape as suggested.

Edited to add this http://www.thehorse.com/ViewArticle.aspx?ID=20231&src=topic No record of who funded the study though.
 
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I think you can get big rolls of micropore which is a bit stickier as well... So sure I've seen it in A&E!

Found it :D It's called Mefix tape and it's used in dressings- surely that's worth a shot for a couple of quid?

http://www.sellesmedical.co.uk/store/product/2127-Mefix-Self-adhesive-Fabric-Tape

Hope your boy makes a decent recovery :)

Sorry if I came across piss-takey. I'm not a fan of pseudo-science and I think equestrianism falls foul of it quite a lot- that being said, if it's working for you then that's all that matters.
 
apologies if i offended, certainly wasnt my intention!
however, ill stand by my point that they are scientifically very unlikely to help the horse, and i feel suitably qualified to make that statement. OP id be spending my hardearned cash elsewhere to be honest.
good luck with your horse, i hope he comes right for you
 
I dont believe for second they have any effect, but its a harmless enough practise.
At least we dont go in for nostril slitting to 'enhance air intake' in this country...if people want to stick a bit of sticky tape on their horse's face fair do's to them.
 
Personally couldn't give two hoots what they look like-it's certainly a better look than me in tears holding a towel to him, mopping up the blood coming from his nostril!

It is a shame cos he's very black and they're very white! So it does look like a strange batman marking!! But never mind.

I will try Horses in Sport when we next get out. Was hoping someone would have a miraculously cheap website! £7.50 each is the best I've found :(
 
Cedars said:
Personally couldn't give two hoots what they look like-it's certainly a better look than me in tears holding a towel to him, mopping up the blood coming from his nostril!

It is a shame cos he's very black and they're very white! So it does look like a strange batman marking!! But never mind.

I will try Horses in Sport when we next get out. Was hoping someone would have a miraculously cheap website! £7.50 each is the best I've found :(
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You can buy them in black I believe. £7.50 is the best you will find in my experience. If they make a difference to your horse, like they do mine, don't worry about what everybody has to say about them. If they help prevent nosebleeds, use them. They are unfortunately fairly pricey if you buy them at each event. :)

http://www.flairstrips.com/in-the-news/flair-articles/

The small picture on the left at the start of the article shows a darker coloured one :)
 
If you want to do the same job cheaply a couple of plastic collar stiffeners and some wide Mepore/Micropore/Mefix works just as well. You could then save your £7.50 a time jobbies for competitions.
 
But if it works, does it actually matter? Why shout someone down for it, if it's working for their horse and their horse is happier AND HEATHIER, that's surely enough?

At worse, it does nothing. But if it means our horse can compete comfortably then they're worth it.
 
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