charlie pattern baldness

It's that time of year, folks! Maybe even a little late - seems like basically everyone who was gonna clip their horse has already gone on and done it.

Personally, I've never clipped my own horse before. Bc HAHA trick question, I've never had my own horse before lol. But now I do and he's allllll mine to play with his hair as much as I want. So there. Muahaha. (Yup, still feelin like a 12 yr old over here).

i think it suits him!

All the same tho, I wasn't convinced that we'd be clipping this year anyway. But it turns out that Charlie pretty consistently soaks his neck in sweat, even when we're not working particularly hard. Sometimes it's clearly from tension (the white foamy flecky stuff) tho thankfully that's only happened very occasionally and not in a few weeks as we've gotten to better know each other.

Mostly tho, he just, ya know. Sweats.

clip doesn't make him look all that much skinnier either!

His chest and girth groove get pretty sweaty too. Even with only mild to moderate work. Not so much in the hind quarters, and the sweat marks from his saddle brush out easily...

And since the season is upon us of overnight temperatures dipping into sheet or blanket territory, I've been dealing with that all-too-familiar situation of trying to dry my horse off before blanketing him for turnout.

new (to him) medium weight blanket! a little long but fits better around than expected! charlie obviously equates blanketing with nap time haha

So I conceded finally that maybe a conservative clip would be for the best. Nothing crazy bc the last thing I want is Charlie shivering off any weight... And we honestly have not gotten into anything I would consider 'serious work' for the horse.

It's basically all mental at this point, with the physical stuff being purposeful enough to help him build the right muscles, but still light enough for him to let go of the undesired racing muscles.

charlie always draws a crowd bc he's so stinkin cuddly lol. the barn managers tell me that sometimes they just pop into his stall for snuggle and hug breaks lol

Conservative was therefore the name of this game (esp since we can always go back later and take more off if he needs it). And actually, my impression on this subject was influenced by my earliest learning experiences with horses.

The farm where I learned to ride was fairly aggressively utilitarian (see, I got it from somewhere!) and would strictly clip what amounted to a square on the chest, and a rectangle where the flank met the hind limb - just the most minimal area to clip while still achieving the purpose of helping quick-dry sweaty spots.

These were obviously not clips meant to be beautiful, lol. But it got the job done!

call me biased but i also think he's a nice color clipped too - not too ashy or gray looking

And so Charlie would be clipped too. Except let's be real, I did actually want him to look handsome too :)

Which..... may explain why I opted to consign the task to one of the barn mgrs haha. And she did a LOVELY job, plus had nothing but nice things to say about Charlie afterward. The staff already liked the guy, but they maybe haven't spent a lot of one-on-one time with him.

dapper derp is dapper

I think she had a newfound appreciation for Charlie tho after this. I had given her full leeway to do whatever it took to keep it a safe and positive experience for everyone (up to and including administering cocktails as needed) but she said he was a doll - didn't care about his ears or belly or anything. And even lowered his head for her.

This horse, guys. He's by nature just a good spirit. But you can also really tell that so much of his behavior is a testament to his race training program. Charlie's manners are close to flawless, and he trusts without reservation. He has clearly been both loved, and taught civility.

goober face

Anyway. I think the mgr had a lot of fun hanging out and clipping him. As he ended up with a little more clipped than I expected - his entire face got done too! I had kinda figured she would just start at the poll and go down, but nope. She got his whole face, whiskers and ears and all.

Personally I would have preferred the ears be left fuzzy. But whatever, I had basically just gestured and made noises and pointed when I tried to describe the clip pattern I wanted (bc I don't know what any of the patterns are called lol), and she turned it into a very exact reality. The ear hair will grow back soon enough!

For now I'm just gonna enjoy the perma-dry neck hair and his handsomely clean-cut face ;)

What about you? How do you decide what and when to clip? Is it mostly a matter of aesthetic preferences to you? Or do you have specific reasons for choosing particular patterns? Does it vary from horse to horse? And do you clip yourself or hire out the task?