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| Nature no touchy! |
Summer brings not just sweat, but the War of the Flies (
sorry, William Golding).
You're attempting to make centerline approximate an actual line or ramble scenic trails or enjoy a sunset handgraze...only the tormented buzzing & biting around your horse's eyes & ears has you worried he might sprain his neck during the incessant attempts to shake the beasts off.
Bid Those Flies - And Sweat - Goodbye
It felt like my lucky day when our friends at
Horze.com sent us their -
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Fine, I'll nom-model (1)
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| I hatez dinner pauses (2) |
What Makes Them Different?
Y
ou know those days when it's so hot & sticky that the mere thought of anything touching you makes you shudder in aversion? Well, the horses agree. And fly spray can only do so much (
particularly in places where you can actually hear the deer flies snicker every time you squeeze the spray-bottle trigger).
So I really REALLY liked that
both of these combined a physical barrier with fabrics which maximized airflow. A horse's ears appear to be a very small body part, but, being thin-skinned & packed with blood vessels (
i.e. gnat nirvana), those twin radar dishes play a huge role in heat exchange, just like your head & feet.
The mask was made of a quality-feeling structured screening, much like the SuperMasks I use to screen eyes in the trailer. However, where I almost never use the latter in turnout as the heaviness of both the mesh & fleece seem to layer grit & sweat on Solo's face, the unique combination of the technical wicking material & much narrower jaw cut of the Horze mask means he's more comfortable.
What, Does He Nicker Twice For Yes?
Not quite, although I did learn this winter that he has an "
I want my blanket" nicker, LOL. But he freezes & sticks his head out when I approach with it now (
Solo must have tasty eyeball juice, the flies seem to prefer it to Encore's?) & when removed at night, there's only a small patch of sweat on his crown.
Yes, he also is a member of the
Pig Sweat club.
The veil struck a similar nice balance. The retro-hippie-rasta vibe was just a bonus!
I use
old-school browband veils while riding Solo every summer (
alas, Encore gets mad at his own bangs touching him & violently shook OFF a cotton bonnet, although I may have to try this once...), but his ears are unprotected unless I add a conventional fly bonnet. Bonnet fabric usually ends up soaked in sweat & the tight-fitting ears mean the deer & horse-flies bite through them anyway.
Adding the loose mesh to a veil was a novel idea. Airspace between ears & mesh creates a little wider "
DMZ" protection from bites. The super-light mesh kept things cool, although I wouldn't try to add it to a turnout halter, I'd be worried it would tear off during vigorous tree scratching.
And we still had the strings functioning as the perfect forelock (
vital for Solo The Follicularly Challenged), constantly moving to deter landings while not obstructing vision or trapping heat. And um, hi,
$7 is the kind of budget-friendly I'M talking about, thank you!
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| Who's got bangs now, dudez?? |
Be Prepared To Trim Or Size Down
Both items have a bit of an odd measurement. Lengthwise, they were fine for Solo & would be spot-on for Encore (
both are a normal 'horse' size, but Solo is short from ear to mouth; if I had money to burn, I'd buy cob cheekpieces for his bridles). But the jowl straps were ENORMOUS.
They may be purposefully designed that way, it's simple enough to trim off the velcro ends. There is certainly plenty if you do happen to have a horse with the cheeks of a Shire!
Or, if you are a just-in-case person, you can invent velcro patterns like I did:
You can check them out along with
Horze's other Fly Weapons here. Thanks once more to the great folks at Horze.com for diversifying our arsenal!!
Seriously – a thing!!! Ok, the word “jump” may be a tad strong:
