Grooming
On a daily basis and before and after you ride you should groom your horse. Along with getting dirt off, you can check for wounds and sores. If you neglect to groom your horse before you ride, it may get saddle sores. Saddle sores are when the saddle rubs aganist dirt in the horses coat. After your horse gets a saddle sore, they are unridable for a short amount of time. There are 4 tools that you should use daily. I am will list them in the order to use them and tell purpose.
Curry Comb: To get all the hair, dirt, and dust to the top. Use in circlular motions.
Hard Brush: To get the hair and dirt off the horses coat. Use in short flicking motions.
Soft Brush: To get the finer dust and dirt off the horses coat. Use in short flicking motions.
Hoof Pick: To get the dirt out of the horses hoove. Be careful not to pick the frog because its an artery.
The women in the picture is hard brushing the horse.
Bathing
Every so often and before a show, you should bathe your horse. First, you start hosing off the horse. Always start at the legs and go up so the horse can get used to it. Next, after the horse is totally wet, take a wet sponge and squirt some horse shampoo onto it. Scrub the shampoo into its coat with your fingers. When its all scubed in, start rinsing the horse off. But instead of hosing from the legs up, hose from the neck down. If you hosed up, all your shampoo would be going where you already hosed. After the shampoo is a gome, use a sweat scraper to get rid of the exess water. When you are finished walk the horse until its dry, or put on a blanket and turn them out to the pasture. The picture is of a sweat scraper.
Images:
Duren, Stephen. "Horse." World Book Online Reference Center. 2007. [Place of access.] 25 July 2007 <http://www.worldbookonline.com/wb/Article?id=ar263040>.
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