How many rugs can one horse wear?

OwnedbyChanter

OwnedbyChanter

With out my boys life would be bland
Apr 16, 2009
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Raininghamshire
There are around 60 horses on my yard and on a saturday I put 4 horses out for various people. My one and his field mate they are both TB and TBX both in full clips both turned out in a 200g with neck rugs. Thats it. My lad has breakfast a very small amout of chaff as he is worked hard every day other has nothing.

One has a heavy weight rug on plus a heavy stable rug underneath not clipped not in a lot of work.

Other TBX I remove a duvet (feather), a fleece, and a stable rug. I add two heavy weight turn out with neck.

Others on the yard have 4 stable rugs on, 3 out door rugs and various rugs in between. There are only about 3 competition horses on the yard the rest are pretty much hacks and the occasional summer show none are full clipped.

The temperature has not dropped below -6 degress and they are all in a large barn at night. Today I was asked if chanter had his thermals on under his rug and I just laughed and stated that if he is cold he will walk around to warm up and that is better for his arthrutis.


OH keeps taking the P&ss to the other owners faces asking how their horses move and when told well 'he stands at the gate waiting to come in' OH replies 'he does not move past the gate because he cant' I am so embrassed.

But who else refuses to put multiby rugs on their horses?
 
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Mine only have 1 rug on each but I am not against layering thin rugs, never found a need to put heavy weights over heavy weights though! Ellie has a heavy weight on and isn't clipped but only just a good weight, don't want her to drop any and Harvey has a grown out full clip but is fine coated anyway and has a 200 gram with neck. Both of mine get a fair bit of feed though but it is only chaff, speedi beet and balancer. Mine get ad lib hay when stabled at night though
 
No rugs here and friend shoves a hw on her arab and he winters out with flip in just the one rug. I don't think we have anyone who puts as many rugs on as that but I guess we all anthromorphise our horses and assume they will be cold like we are! I will admit to being a little worried the first year I had him, but seeing how unbothered he was by any weather helped me feel more comfortable. If he looked miserable, I guess I would be the same.
:bounce: at your oh though - good on him for his funny comments. Love it!
 
Ponies I help look after just have one rug each. Unclipped minature has a lightweight rug just for now when its really cold, and two others are trace clipped so have heavier rugs, 13hh grey has a neck on and 14.2 dales has just a rug.
 
it really depends on the horse. one of my exmoors is out in 2 rugs and a hood and has been for a while. she does not cope well with the cold and is underweight so i wont go judging anyone who multi-rugs ... they may have a good reason for it.
 
Mine has one rug at a time, heaviest he has is a mw and thats only if it's really cold, usually it's just a rain sheet. Some of the others have layered two thin ones but that's it. Can't understand the need to weight them down literally.
 
Sioned and Foal are both in Lightweights, however I have put fleeces under both when the weather turned really cold the other day as I know Sioned DOES feel the cold and I don't want Heathcliffe using any energy to keep warm.

I also put a lightweight on Bert the other day as it was so cold.......I SWEAR HE GRINNED:smile::bounce:

People do over rug, no doubt about that, I agree with your OH though tbh, they stand at the gate because they are probably unable to move:bounce:
 
notpoodle said:
it really depends on the horse. one of my exmoors is out in 2 rugs and a hood and has been for a while. she does not cope well with the cold and is underweight so i wont go judging anyone who multi-rugs ... they may have a good reason for it.
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At last, a sensible approach :smile:. I put on whatever they feel comfortable in, & I always check at least 45 min after putting rugs on that the horse is comfortable & happy. At my yard we've got horses out naked, horses in two heavyweights & every possible combination in between but no-one interferes with what other people do as long as the horses are happy.
 
Sham's out in a heavyweight with neck.

I thought I was being kind by adding a fleece the other day when we went subzero. She told me what she thought of THAT in no uncertain terms - I was putting her nightie on yesterday and suddenly realised the fleece was missing.

I guess it's somewhere under six inches of snow in the field.

How do they undress themselves? Kels often used to come in minus her rug, and I'd find it in the field inside out with all the straps still done up.
 
Last year Sonny wintered out in just a heavyweight (ok when it was -22 I did add a under rug). This year he is stabled (at night) and in full work so has a full clip. He has been fine in a m/w but when the temp dropped I changed to a h/w, last week I had to put a m/w over the top of his h/w as he was feeling the cold.
 
I have had some comments from someone very 'knowledgable' on my yard because I just turn Ben out with a 200g MW rug with a hood. He lives out for 18 hours a day including overnight and I have been told several times that he should at least have his stable rug underneth his turnout. I have been getting really stressed about it (first horse and all that) and been asking advice from everyone, but I know that he is warm enough. He is not dropping weight, he is never waiting by the gate and is always toasty warm when he comes in. On the whole I do think that people over rug.
 
Heaviest mine's been out in so far this winter is a 40g with neck.... he's a TB unclipped in light work at the moment and is FAT! up until last week he was in a rain sheet only on the dirty days, everyone else on my yard bar one is in 350gm day and night and have been since about October, they all get bucket loads of feed and very little or no work, I don't understand why all the well rugged horses are losing weight??? Maybe they are sweating it off?

Even the little Shetland on the yard is rugged :unsure:

I get told almost daily that my horse can't be warm enough, he is I've checked.

OwnedbyChanter my OH is just like yours, he always says what he thinks and he really doesn't care who hears him..... so embarrasing:redface:
 
Heavy or medium weight t/o with neck depending on weather. Not clipped, in at night and not doing any work to speak of (snow and freezing fog and riding anywhere out of the field - which is hard and cut up - means riding on the road - rather not for both our sakes,thanks!).
:cold:
 
My understanding is that the filling in rugs is like that in duvets... that you need a bit of air circulation for it to work properly so to me weighing down a HW with another rug stops it from working fully. And putting another rug under it ALSO stops the air circulating. I loaned a horse once in the winter that had been wearing 3 rugs. He was also wearing a shoulder vest thingy. I immediately swapped all 3 rugs (and the anti-rub vest!) for one of Roo's MW's with a neck and removed about 3-stone of weight of this poor boy's body. He immediately perked up and charged around the field and within a week the hair was re-growing on his shoulders. He was never cold and seemed much happier.

I've only rugged Jack this year because he's been clipped. And that's just ONE.... every time I check him he's toasty-warm under there....
 
June is clipped out an unless I know it's going to rain she is naked through the day and if it's below -2 on a night she has one on. This is a LW with no neck! She came in from the field yesterday after being out in the snow boiling under her rug!! She is technically classed as a show pony I suppose as ATM that's about all she does

The unclipped welsh b show pony down the row is in a full Lycra body suit, with 2x MW and a LW on top. Oh and keg wraps to keep his legs warm. They are roughly the same height, give or take a couple of inches.

I suppose the Shetland round the corner with 2x HW's and a stable rug and a hood on is worse thinking about it!
 
I'm going to buck the trend....

Louise is currently in a LW combo under rug and a 380g combo turnout rug. She is fully clipped.

Alfie is in a 300g combo stable rug under a 450g combo turnout rug. He is also fully clipped.

Stevie is unclipped and wearing a 350g standard neck stable rug under a 450g combo turnout rug.

Truffles is unclipped in a 150g standard neck stable rug under his 380g combo turnout.

Rocky is blanket clipped in a 450g combo turnout.

They are all out through the day and stabled overnight.



I rug as they need it - Rocky is toasty in his one rug and as soon as the temperatures are consistently above freezing then he will go into a lighter rug. I intended not to rug Truffles and Louise until late in the winter but when they're cold, what can you do? We didn't really have a summer last year so ming have been rugged in something (mainly a rainsheet) for most of the year.
 
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I did not mean to cause offence and to suggest that what others do is wrong. I merely pointed out in my opinion that these horses that I know well did not require that amount of rugs. One is overweight and the other is what I would call normal and neither are cold horses in fact when I change their rugs they are very hot.

As stated the modern rugs of today are breathable, waterproof and padded much like a duvet and they require the circulation in which to proform correctly. Once you start to layer breathable rugs you actually stop the circulation of air thus not allowing the horse to 'cool down' if hot and regulate it's own temputure. The old style rugs that are not made of this new techie stuff I use to layer on my arab as it did not have the filler and breathable posh stuff.

This was not a dig at anyone but a general observation when looking around a very large yard (50-60 horses) all in various states of dress
 
I, for one, didn't take offence :biggrin:

My horses are never too hot (or too cold) - and I think that over rugging and under rugging are just as bad as each other. Someone I know, on the advice of her RI, had her horse in TWO :eek: heavyweight stable rugs over the summer (when even mine were out nakey) to "get his coat right" for showing. He also told this girl "if he's not clammy when you check him, put another rug on".
Quite why anyone would take this advice is beyond me :frown: Poor horse! Thankfully the owner has since seen sense.
 
Having been the proud owner of the worlds ONLY good tb doer.....I refuse to put layer after layer on..lol, only JOe could keep weight like that.....I think a lot of people put layers on because they don't want a lot of weight loss? Our current pair are both good doers (again!) and needless to say very very rarely get a rug of any kind. I have gorgeous stable fleeces and stable rugs (what on earth I was thinking buying those I don't know!) but maybe one day they'll come in for an extremely poor-doer..that I might buy.......
On the yards we were on for a while, I couldn't believe all the trouble and effort people went to rugging up at night! Was amazing all these extra layers....I learned the hard way, and one evening when I caved in and put a fleece with a stable rug over the top on Storm, she had trashed the whole thing and probably had the most horrible night trying to get out of it.....all the straps burst and it was completely un-useable after.
Lesson learned!
I guess its horses for courses........
 
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