All things Horse Vacuuming

[mvp]

I need a full treatment of the subject.

Best shop vac for the job, since I’m not going to spend the $600+ for the double-engine old skool light blue thing.

What do you love about vacuuming horses rather than grooming?

Do you think horses vacuumed rather than curried and brushed look worse?

The circumstances: I have a horse who lives in a weird indoor paddock in the winter, rather than a stall. Part of it is sand, so the brute is deep-down dusty 24/7. And it’s tough doing blanketing with an always-dusty horse.

[Jane_Honda]

I just use a canister vacuum for my horses. I utilize it after I’ve done a thorough grooming as it doesn’t replace good old fashioned elbow grease. I use it in lieu of bathing.

On a grey horse, I used rubbing alcohol to remove green stains (it’s like a magic eraser for horses!) and then groom thoroughly with rubber curries to remove the loose dirt, hair, and small woodland creatures (joking!) to then vacuum up.

My mare is kind of funny about the vacuum though. She’s ok with it as long as I don’t tug on any of its appendages to move it. She freaks. But, if I pick it up to move, no biggie. :lol:

Any small canister vaccum can do the trick.

[morganmare]

Maybe consider something besides a vacuum?
I don’t use a vacuum on my mare. I use a forced air blower. I bought a small one from pet edge. I believe its called b-air bear dryer. I got it for about $100. Much more affordable than a vacuum. And no container to empty. Gets all of the sand out of her coat. I do curry her first to try to loosen up everything.

[joiedevie99]

I use the big heavy light blue one that never dies. It’s not a substitute for grooming though if you want them to look their best… we curry up the dirt, then vacuum, then body brush. Most of the horses are pretty happy about it.

[tangledweb]

I inherited one of those old school ones with my old school barn. I don’t use it often but it’s great for the right situation.

Currying and brushing definitely looks better, but for a horse with a lot of dry mud on them it takes three times as long and ten times as much effort. You can get the big flat areas of a horse clean to the skin in 5 minutes without breaking a sweat with a vacuum. It does not much matter how dirty they were to begin with. Brushing can take much longer than that if the horse is muddy.

You don’t get the sheen from skin oil being brushed through the coat though with vacuuming, so I don’t think it’s a straight swap. It’s a low effort way of doing an 80% job and getting to ride your horse on time.

[demidq]

I have a lovely rubber curry attachment for any vacuum- I think it is made by Dr Smith? I use it with a smaller canister vacuum I got at Walmart , about $60. I use it as a curry first when grooming, especially in dried mud and shedding season. It doesn’t completely replace regular currying and brushing but it certainly speeds things up, and incidentally reduces the amount of dust and hair for me to breathe in!

[pony_baloney]

I have the same attachment as demidq on a the smallest canister Shop Vac. What I do if the horse is extra dirty or has a longer coat is curry like crazy, use the blower end of the vacuum against the coat to blow the dirt off, then use the attachment like a regular brush following the hair. Using it as a curry in summer damp weather is OK, but in the winter or dry weather there’s just too much static electricity.

Also, if you use the smaller canister vac and hold the blower end near the horse, if you tip it the little floating ball thing gets out of place, the motor gets really loud and you lose suction. You have to then shut it off, listen for the ball to fall, then start it up again. No big deal really–you just have to figure out how much of an angle you can hold it at before this happens.

I love my little vac and can’t imagine grooming without it, but it doesn’t replace lots of currying.

[CDE_Driver]

I have one of the big blue ones, I think we’ve had it for 30 years. I love it.

BUT, for the really wooly ones blowing really does a better job of cleaning them to the skin. I have friends that just use a regular leaf blower and say it works great.

[mvp]

[QUOTE=CDE Driver;7243749]
I have one of the big blue ones, I think we’ve had it for 30 years. I love it.

BUT, for the really wooly ones blowing really does a better job of cleaning them to the skin. I have friends that just use a regular leaf blower and say it works great.[/QUOTE]

On the Old Skool Blue Ones: If I could get one, I would. Also, I’d hope that I’d be willing to pack it around and not get in a snit one time and ditch it. The one belonging to a trainer friend of mine that I used 20 years ago when I worked for her is still alive. It’s still bad-a$$ and heavy.

But what up with this blowing rather than sucking technique? And the toys one buys for that alternate kind of pleasure? So you get a leaf blower that’s short?

For my application-- dusty way down in a wooly coat, what do you guys recommend?

[Trixie]

Love my old school blue one. Thing is probably 20 years old. Works better than any shop vac I’ve ever had. Paid $50 for it.

Then I paid another $100 ordering a new hose attachment and bag.

I LOVE craigslist. Definitely check craigslist.

That said, if I didn’t find that steal, then take off work to go CLAIM IT AS MINE BEFORE ANYONE ELSE POSSIBLY COULD (including the hour + drive), I would go with the best shop vac you can find. IMO, it’s not worth the $600 difference between the shopvac and the electro groom, but I would definitely have spent a few hundred on the electro groom if you can find a used one somewhere.

[Fillabeana]

Livestock blower.

Gets the horse clean CLEAN clean of dust and dirt in the coat, a zillion times faster than the vacuums ever will.

You will have to use a currycomb to deal with crusty things or anything sticky on the haircoat.

But for $400 you can get a new sullivan blower. These things last years, no bags to change. My sensitive horses that do NOT like grooming have no problems once they learn about the blower.
They are hard to find used, like a good Pony-Club saint beginner pony is hard to find, unless you are in the loop and in the right place for it to be passed down. They do show up on Craigslist, but I’ve only seen one in like three years. But they do last forever.

You can’t use it if it’s really, really cold. But if it were that cold, you’d be taking a blanket off a clean horse, right?

And it will get plenty of dust and dirt blowing this way and that, so you wouldn’t do it where the dirt would blow, say, all over the tack in the tack room.

I got a Sullivan’s Air Express II for Christmas two years ago. I LOVE it. And I hate horse vacuums.

[CDE_Driver]

Regarding blowing the dirt out of fuzzy coats…

We have an old blower of the type that dog groomers use. Sort of like this one, http://www.ebay.com/itm/Metro-Air-Force-Powerful-2-Speed-Dog-Blow-Dryer-professional-Grooming-/140810608921?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item20c8f76119

It really is amazing the amount of grime it blows out of their coats and gets them clean to the skin.

My friends that use leaf blowers said they just use regular ones. Those seem to work for their Welsh ponies very well.

[Fillabeana]

Oh, and if there are no crusty things in the coat, I never have to currycomb first.

[BeeHoney]

Ok, I’ll blow out other livestock, but I’d never consider using a blower on a horse. Noisy, scary, messy, all the dust flying everywhere, worrying about the horses getting stuff in their eyes, etc. I really wouldn’t want any of my clients kicking up a dust storm in the barn doing this. Plus, if there is anyone else using the barn at the same time as you they (and their horse) probably would NOT appreciate this grooming technique.

I am a huge vacuum fan. My horses LOVE to be vacuumed. And since we started using the vac the horses’ coats have never looked better. The secret is to curry, vacuum, and then a quick brushing. The vacuum is a lifesaver particularly on days when horses come in coated with dirt. Also, I love being able to clean a dirty horse and not get covered with dust and grime because it all has gone inside the vacuum.

Now, I do like the fancy vacuums, much quieter than shop vacs. Some of the fancy vacs come in smaller, portable sizes, perhaps that would fit within your budget? I do think that the cost of a decent vacuum is offset by the tremendous savings in grooming time and the pleasure of not being covered with dust and dirt after grooming your horse.

[hosspuller]

We use a Sear’s shop vac with an extra long hose. The trick is to accustom the horses to the noise, suction, hose, and movement. Static is cured with dryer sheets rubbed on the horse before vacuuming.

[shakeytails]

The only time I ever needed to use a vacuum was on a young horse I wanted to send out on trial to a trainer, but he was hairy like a yak, disgustingly dusty, and it was too cold for a bath. I used my $40 standard shop vac-no special attachments. Horse gave it the hairy eyeball for about 2 minutes, then settled down and liked it. It worked great sucking all the dust and dirt out of his coat. I keep thinking about buying one of those curry comb attachments and using it more…

[horsepoor]

I have the big blue one, which was my steal of a deal craigslist find (but I paid more than the 50 bucks Trixie stole hers for!). I use it nearly every single day and LOVE it. Most times, I curry, vac, then brush, but if they are especially crusty with mud, I’ll do a first vac to get that off, then go on with regular routine. I can’t imagine blowing, unless I was outside…I’d hate all that dust everywhere, in eyes, in barn, etc. Part of why I vacuum is so I don’t have all that dirt released all over, and I particularly enjoy shedding season now as I’m not covered in hair after grooming! When I clipped one of mine last month, I did get covered in hair, so I just turned on the big blue wonder and vac’d myself off.

Mine rarely moves, and resides in my cross tie area. I wouldn’t have bought it if I was in a boarding situation where I had to pack it away every night or such. I did have the portable Rapid Groom then, which was smaller, still pretty powerful, and easy to fit in a tack locker. I’d found it on eBay, used it for years, then sold it for more than I paid when I bought the big one. Pretty sure when I finally part with the big one, I’ll not lose any money on it either. Those things truly last forever.

[Plainandtall]

I don’t have a vac or a specialty blower- but I do have an air compressor in the garage and there is a certain time of year (late winter to spring) when it’s too cold to bathe and the coats are too think to even penetrate with a good hard brush- that I will use an air attachment and blow coats with compressed air. You could not do this inside as it’s really dirty (yeah- no bags to clean… but POOF- what a dust cloud!) It takes the horses just a little while to get used to it- and I use an attachment that diffuses the air from three spouts- I think it was designed to blow floors. Anyway- what I love most about it is that it parts the hair and allows you to visualise the skin in a way that no other grooming other than shaving would allow. I can see little things that I can’t even feel with my fingers.

[Fillabeana]

Ok, I’ll blow out other livestock, but I’d never consider using a blower on a horse. Noisy, scary, messy, all the dust flying everywhere, worrying about the horses getting stuff in their eyes, etc. I really wouldn’t want any of my clients kicking up a dust storm in the barn doing this. Plus, if there is anyone else using the barn at the same time as you they (and their horse) probably would NOT appreciate this grooming technique.

I thought it would take about two weeks for my horses to be truly OK with being blown off, having never been near a vacuum or a blower before. Took two days with the most skittish one.
No, I wouldn’t do it right next to the open tack room, or next to someone else trying to groom a horse or tack up.
But my horses come RIGHT up to the fence, hoping for a horse cookie, while I blow my horse off on the other side.
And I never blow off the horse’s face, ever.
I have never had a weepy eye, coughing, or other evidence that I was putting too much dust in the air, but of course I blow them off outside.
I can see other PEOPLE not wanting to get caught in your dust storm, but even with two or three of us saddling horses, and taking turns with the blower, it isn’t all that hard to stay out of the ick. And it is SO much faster than a vacuum. Even the giant blue ones.

[Bluey]

In my tack room, there is an utility closet that will have the furnace, water heater and “whole house vacuum” there, then pipe run to the tackroom to connect the hose there to vacuum the room and blankets, etc. and a second outlet where we can hang the hose to above the horses if we want to.

I think that will work fine, the motor noise not right by the horses, other than the suction on the hose.
Will tell you how that works.

We had something similar in some barns in Europe, a vacuum hanging on the side of the aisle high and the hose stretched to groom the horse on both sides.
We never had a horse scared of that, they went to sleep being vacuumed.