how to butcher your horse's mane in 5 easy steps!

I once read on a blog (maybe Jen at Cob Jockey?) that the "difference between a good clip and a bad clip was about two weeks."

For whatever reason, that oh-too-true quip really stuck with me. And, I've adopted / adapted it into my own approach to mane care: The difference between a good clip cut and a bad one is about two weeks one month.

you too can achieve this polished refined hairstyle on your own horse --- follow me for tips!

Because, you see. I cut Charlie's mane with scissors. Roughly twice a year, I Go To Town on this poor sweet gelding's mane -- in exactly the way any professional groom will explicitly say not to do. 

And. Ya know. It works for us haha. So here's how I do it. 

for best results, make sure your horse is basically feral

1) Obviously you start by collecting your materials, including the horse. Timing is clearly important when you set out to absolutely destroy your horse's mane, so it's best to do it a couple months out from whenever you might actually wish to be presentable! 

Thus, it's recommended for mid-winter. Bonus if it's too cold for your fingers to operate properly.

and also filthy <3

Definitely don't clean the horse either. Like, ok, brush the mud out of the mane if you must.... but seriously, no amount of prep work is gonna make this method any smoother so just... have at it! 

try not to die leading said feral beastie around on the ice!

Other materials include..... a mane comb and some scissors. Ideally the scissors should be very sharp and not too too large. Tho, if a barn rat lost your good scissors off the back of a kubota a couple months ago, that rusty pair of pruning shears is probably fine too. 

always a good idea to have the barn manager on hand shoulder

A metal pulling comb is my preferred tool for this method. But, again, if that comb requires literally any effort whatsoever to dig out of your grooming tote, the Tail Tamer paddle brush that's right on top is 100% fine instead. 

much better angle to view all the gnarly cowlicks in your horse's mane

2. Prepare your workspace. Or... Don't? Like, sure, tying your horse in a way to prevent him from moving up and down and all around might help. Or like, having a step stool or ladder or even literally an overturned bucket might conceivably be helpful when you're trying to trim the mane on an actual literal brontosaurus. 

definitely don't bother to tie your horse.... it'll be fiiiiiiine

But, eh. Loose in a stall noshing off various haynets or even hay on the floor is fine too. Probably. Lol....

repeat after me: this is basically even

3. Decide on a length, and stick with it. In this instance, the paddle brush was actually pretty nice bc I just cut to the width of the paddle. Brush and snip, brush and snip, forever and ever and ever down the full friggin five feet of your horse's neck. 

For real tho, my goal with this method is short. Like, mohawk short. And I start from the ears and work my way down. Theoretically this means I get the fussiest section done before my horse loses patience.

yep, just cut straight across. blunt cuts are best cuts!

4. Cut straight across - not vertically or up-and-down. For real, I mean this. A lot of folks like to cut up and down as a way to soften the edges and make it a little less obvious that we used scissors instead of pulling.... But, F that. For real. 

At some point probably in around 3+ months, I'll want to be able to braid this mane. And when I braid, I *do not* want lots of varying length hairs poking out of the bottom half of each braid. I want the whole mane the same length, more or less. So. We blunt cut this bitch, and we like it. 

then flip the whole thing over onto the other side and repeat! or, don't!

5. Flip the mane over to the other side, and repeat the process. Sorta-ish. Having not pulled the mane at all during this iteration, or literally ever at all in like the ~4+ years I've owned this horse, we've got a pretttty thick mane on our hands here haha. 

If you only snip from one side of the mane, you end up with hairs that will be wildly different lengths depending on which side of the neck they originate. Flipping the whole thing over and trimming to the same length helps to address that. But like, eh, don't kill yourself doing it. Maybe dedicate like 1/5th the time you spent on the other side. It'll be fiiine. 

admire your craft <3

You'll also note --- Charlie's mane falls on the "wrong" side. And, ya know, I braid on the "wrong" side too. Bc dear lord, does literally anybody actually give a fuck??? Real questions, here, folks, LOL!

*I SAID ADMIRE IT!!*

And ya know, that's basically it haha! The mane does, indeed, look janky AF. And 100% looks like it was done bluntly with scissors in about 20min. Which, ahem, it clearly was. 

lol, yes, everybody can tell you used scissors

It's always a good idea to brush it forward and backward and straight down (again the metal pulling comb is best, but also again --- sometimes we too lazy for that) just to catch any hairs that got out of alignment. 

but ya know. the fluffy mohawk look is prettty cool

And obvi you can always go back and clean it up after your first major pass down the neck. Or not. You do you, ya know?

definitely make sure you choose the absolute busiest time to ride so ALL your friends can see your handiwork!

I usually end up doing this twice a year --- once in mid winter, and then again maybe in July when it's crazy gross out. Basically, I try to time the butchery to coincide with months when we're not really out and about. 

Charlie has pretty epic hair that grows fast, tho, so you might need different lead times to ensure your monstrosity has time to grow out a little bit lol. 

watch out, Mikey cat --- you're next!

Or ya know. Perhaps you're one of those who actually takes a bit of pride in your mane grooming skillz. In which case, more power to ya -- really, I mean that! 

I just never really learned how to pull a mane in a way that got it to my desired length without taking me literally hours on end. And, I swear, I've tried. So instead, I've been doing this blunt-cut method for a couple years now and, ya know, it works for us haha. 

Curious what everybody else does. Do you pull? Use scissors? Some combination thereof? Do you cut vertically or horizontally? Or maybe you use thinning shears?? I've had bad luck with those bc of the bristly-braid situation, but maybe there's a better way? I'm all ears!