april showers bring may.... dirtballs

Even tho it's been a surprisingly dry spring so far, our horses are still finding new and creative ways to get absolutely filthy. Charlie's still pretty fuzzy too -- his coat is apparently clinging on until the grass is fully up... So yea every day is groundhog day with grooming this animal. 

it's hard to photograph brown mud on a brown horse, but charlie works hard to help me out lol
(also, yes omg the grass in his winter sacrifice paddock is so pitiful rn...)

And since Charlie's been off for the last few weeks and we haven't been up to literally anything else.... Let's carry on with the recent theme of chatting about products and processes relating to more general care. 

brosef... you, uh.... got something on your face lol

My favorite tool for the dirtball job remains, as always, an old school hard plastic curry comb. Probably 85% of my grooming time is spent using the curry, over every inch of Charlie's body. 

(Including lower limbs.... true story: I've literally never understood why people say you shouldn't use a curry on the lower limbs, am I the only one?? That's legit how I end up discovering most of Charlie's little dings and dents down there anyway....)

ah yes, that static dust that we all know and love....

The curry is great for loosening everything up, including shedding hair, chunks of mud, any sweat crusts, etc etc etc. Plus, in my experience, the curry comb is also the best tool against skin funk and fungus. 

this stuff tho, omg it's like $11 and is absolutely a game changer
i think charlie would rather just get the carrot tho, not gonna lie lol

I used to literally refer to Charlie as a 'veritable botanical garden' when it comes to rain rot etc, esp during periods of shedding or coat growth. But... Honestly aside from the occasional cannon crud, he's been funk-free for a long long time. Probably bc of all the obsessive currying lol...

i know the light is different but it's the same dusty horse, after getting spritzed down.
also... dear lord, that mane....

Only problem is.... ugh, the static dust haze that always seems to cling to winter coats. Sometimes I swear, the longer I curry, the dirtier the horse looks lol. My nice natural bristle body brush does a decent job of swiping off dust and dirt etc, but it can only do so much against static.

pic from back in the day when we were still riding lol. more riding = less grooming, apparently!

Which... Y'all already know about Charlie's struggles and suffering with static electricity. I bought this kid's hair detangler as a way to reduce the zaps (which it does!! tho hand lotion has proven the best weapon in that eternal war lol), but it's GREAT for the dust.

apparently you don't have to be clean to hack out while spring is springing!!!!

I actually use that spray after almost every time I curry the horse these days. It smells nice, makes him look smooth and silky, and seems to actually almost bond with the dust to make it easier to swipe off. Plus it's inexpensive (at least relative to most horse-specific products I see), and made from good safe ingredients being that it's intended for human kiddos.

omg cabbage!

Anything that makes it easier at this point is worth it in my book. Bc oh my god it's every day lol. And there are some days where.... ugh, who can really bother haha. The horse doesn't need to be all that clean for his busy life of eating and going to and from his field anyway, right?

and sheeepies!!!

But since grooming is the only thing we've been doing lately (these trail pics are from a few weeks ago before the hoof soreness, womp), might as well make the drive worth it!! 

ooooh i also chopped off his mane again.... 

Which also explains the motivation for Charlie's recent haircut LOL. Yep I'm still up on my bullshit of blunt cutting his mane with scissors haha.... hahaha. And yep, you can still definitely tell. 

sweet squishy-nosed pony <3

But hey, if you're gonna be lame buddy, you can be a little ugly too haha. Tho I like to think I've gotten kinda good (ish) at the bad way of mane management lol -- I'm trimming it more often now but taking off less length each time. Idk. It'll grow back LOL. 

is this the face of horse ready to make good choices???

Anywaysssss... last I checked, the horse had finally jogged sound. Tho obvi he followed that up with a bashed face and bloody nose, so we let him stay off for a little bit longer just to be safe. 

lolz obviously absolutely not!!

Hopefully tho.... The time is coming soooooon haha. Clearly the horse looks ready to go, right? Brushed and trimmed and apparently bursting with thoroughbred energy lol...