How to Decorate Your Horse
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Play days, costume classes, gymkhanas and parades are all great occasions to decorate your horse! You don’t really need an occasion of course. Decorating your horse can be a great activity for non-riders. So when those city cousins are visiting, and you’re tired of giving pony rides, this is a great way to spend time with you horse and have fun too.
You can add color to your horse’s coat with non-toxic water paint, bingo dabbers or drink mix (non-sweetened) crystals. All of these are quite safe and will come out easily, either by washing them out, or leaving your horse in the rain. Make your own designs or research the symbols used by Native North Americans.
Stock markers can be used too, although these don’t wear off quite as easily. One time, for a costume class, we drew black stripes on my daughter’s white pony to turn him into a zebra. The stripes lasted for a very long time, but it was fun when we were trail riding to have hikers ask if he was really a zebra. Just be sure you don’t have a show coming up. A dressage judge might not think pink hand prints or polka dots on your gray horse is appropriate during a test.
Braiding elastics come in all colors and are an easy way to add some brightness. Try different types of braids, such as curtain braids (continental or diamond braids) and French braids with the elastics worked in. Inexpensive hair extensions can add some head-turning color as well.
Coban tape or bandage (Vetwrap) is inexpensive and can be wrapped around braids, tack, legs and tails. Just be sure when you are applying this to your horse it isn’t too tight, or it could cause circulation and soft-tissue damage. Remove it as soon as you are done decorating.
If you’ve seen patterns brushed into a horse’s coat, like the maple leaf on the rumps of Royal Canadian Mounted Police musical ride horses, you might wonder how this is done. It’s actually very easy. Get a simple stencil—you can buy them or cut your own. Brush the area you want to stencil so there is no dust or grit. Dampen the area with water. Place the stencil against the horse, and with a fine-toothed comb, comb the hair in a ninety degree angle to how it naturally lays. Once all the hair within the stencil is combed, lift the stencil away. Allow the area to dry and fix the pattern with a light coat of hair spray.
For a checkerboard pattern, cut a fine-tooth comb down so it’s about two inches long. Prepare the horse’s coat as you would for a stencil. Brush the horse’s coat in small squares, the width of the comb, to make a checkerboard pattern. You can make geometric shapes like shark’s teeth this way too. Traditionally, checkerboards were put on horse’s rumps and shark’s teeth on shoulders to distract the eye from less than ideal conformation.
Finish off by decorating hooves with hoof polish or hoof conditioner and glitter. Hoof conditioner, like neatsfoot oil will not harm your horse’s hooves, and will hold the glitter on at least long enough to take some photos. Just brush on the polish or conditioner, sprinkle on some glitter to turn your horse into twinkle toes! |
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Copper711
Wow!! Thanks for the ideas and I cant believe Iam the first one to comment on this I thought it would off sky rocketed, lol:)
Wow!! Thanks for the ideas and I cant believe Iam the first one to comment on this I thought it would off sky rocketed, lol:)
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Jun 4, 2013
• 11,053 views
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no longer need barn
Yer it's cool just remember to look for signs of stress
Yer it's cool just remember to look for signs of stress
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Oct 23, 2016
• 3,944 views
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