My 30 year old QH stays in the barn at night. Bedded stall, a couple of flakes of good hay, door closed, but there is some ventilation in the barn. He wears a blanket if the low temp is forecast to be 40 degrees or lower. His weight is good. He does not like being blanketed so I told him I’d ask others when they blanket their old guys. Thanks!
I blanket my old mare who’s 29 when it gets into 30s. I’am in minnesota so have much colder weather then the south. My mare love’s her blankets she’s currently in a medium weight one and a heavy weight one.
Trying to put weight on her, so don’t want her burning up calories trying to stay warm.
Blanketing my elders, is predicated upon what the weather is doing, more than the temps.
I’m in middle Tennessee. We can get some miserable cold/windy/rainy 40 degree weather, that I would put a blanket on my 29 yr old Arab, who sadly passed seven months ago.
I wouldn’t blanket him on a crisp/dry 32 F degree day when the air is quiet, skies are clear, and the sun is shining.
I have never blanketed anyone at night, as I bring my horses in at night. My barn is small with open panel stalls. The horses generate plenty of heat; even on nights we have gone into the teens.
Usually when it falls below freezing or if it damp or really windy. My old gelding with arthritis I would cover with sheet sooner than that as it made a big difference in his stiffness.
Once it hit 50 and below at night my now deceased TB (euth’d at age 31) would start wearing a blanket (usually September in my area). The colder it got the more layers he’d wear and was perfectly happy being bundled up. He was miserable if he was even slightly cold (& yes he had free-choice hay and shelter but he was happiest in lots of layers).
Does
Does he grow a fairly thick coat? How is his weight?
Does he have a boat load of hay in front of him?
My 29 year old unclipped gelding gets a sheet when it’s in the mid-low 30s and not damp, I also leave his window open If rainy and damp I put the 100 gram weight on him and keep his window partially open.
High twenty he gets his Rambo 100 gram turnout
Low 20s he gets bumped to 200 gram turnout.
I do give him 3 flakes as nite hay to help keep him warm.
I have a 23 Tb who does not grow a big winter coat. I have found a sheet at 50. Med weight at 40 or 35 and a heavy below 25. If it gets below 10 I start layering. However he take a lot of food anyways to maintain weight and if I do not do that, he will drop it very quickly in the winter. I can never catch up again until the spring.
If I was not boarding and could have hay in front of him 24/7 it would be a different story. He is on the extreme side of being cold. I do have him trace clipped, but nothing outside of a blanket.
My old man is 22 and in good weight. He grows a coat like a yak and hates blankets. As long as he holds his weight I don’t blanket him unless it gets below zero. He’s on pasture with free choice hay in the winter.
I am caring for a 32 year old Quarter Horse who lives out. He tolerates a blanket, but he’s made it clear to me he is not a fan.
When he first came, I was a little more aggressive about blanketing him, but over time I’ve come to respect his opinion. Now I only blanket him when I know something about the weather that he doesn’t - most typically, when it’s going to rain in the mid-thirties and then freeze, and most especially if that will be happening with a stiff wind. He lives out in a field.
But if it’s going to be mid 20’s and no wind I don’t blanket him any more. He’s happier.
Listen to the horse and use your judgement. I have another younger horse that is blanketed more often, because his shelter is a bit less good and he doesn’t mind when you put it on. I have another pony that is almost never blanketed because she has snug shelter, a winter coat, does not stand out in the rain, and doesn’t seem to need the blanket.
If your horse doesn’t like being blanketed, there’s a reason. It could be that the blanket is too warm or is uncomfortable in the cut. At 40 degrees in a snug barn, with a horse telling me he didn’t like it, I’d experiment with leaving it off. You could also try an unlined turnout sheet, which adds some warmth without a lot of weigh, like a windbreaker.
i try not to make things like it was when I was a kid, where grandma was cold, so I had to put on a sweater. Imagine how much worse that is when you don’t have opposable thumbs. 
I now have only one older horse, currently living outside because our latest rain storm turned the runs attached to the stalls into swamps and he hates being restricted to a closed stall.
He doesn’t grow much of a winter coat, so if it’s cold, windy and raining, he gets a midweight tunout. If it’s windy and between freezing and 40, he gets a rain sheet with a built-in neck cover. If it’s below freezing, raining and windy, he wears his midweight under the rain sheet.
Our retired QH gelding (26yo) gets a thick coat but needs a little extra help staying warm. His medium weight goes on when our younger horses wear theirs (in the 40s, my horse is clipped). I put his liner on underneath his medium weight yesterday because it’s WINDY and getting much colder. He doesn’t feel “cozy warm” when I check under his blanket like the younger horses without a little extra blanketing.
He’s free to come in and out of the barn as he pleases, so he can be completely sheltered from weather if he wants.
My almost 30 year old dude doesn’t see a blanket unless it is absolutely frigid. Like single digits or lower. Or if it’s icy. He lives out, has a nice shed, and gets plenty of hay. He’s never been one to run cold, and has always grown a substantial coat.
I don’t blanket my hairy 22 year old until she starts to look cold. She’ll stand sort of tensely, or even shiver. This doesn’t happen until it’s <20 degrees, or wet and cold. When I blanket her, I blanket the two younger horses, too. My last really old one, who went at 33, needed a little more help despite having a shaggy cushings coat.
I try to listen to the horse.
My OTTB got more and more wussy from 23 to 29. Each year she would come to the gate and beg for a blanket sooner and sooner. At the end, she was wearing 2 heavy blankets (a 300g and a 400g) on the worst days (single digits). She wore a sheet in the 50s, and a medium in the 30s and 40s.
Her buddy until the end, a QH that was a few years her junior, hated clothes. He was naked until it was 15 or so. Then he wore a medium, but never a neck cover. He’s rip it off with his teeth.
My mare is not old per se (she will be 18 in May), but she has significant arthritis, like a lot of older horses. She LOVES her blankies 
She doesn’t grow a lot of winter coat and can get chilled easily, especially in wet weather. She lives outside and has a nice shed. Her basic blanketing is:
below 50: no-fill turnout, neck cover if it’s raining
below 40: medium weight turnout, neck cover if it’s raining or sleeting
below 25: heavyweight turnout, neck cover with fill if heavy snow or ice, or very windy
below 10 to 15 degrees, layering might happen.
Like above, my 29 year old guy gets a mid-weight 200 gram at 40 or below and a heavy-weight at 20 or below. It’s been pretty frigid around here lately so he’s toasty warm.
[QUOTE=joiedevie99;8467310]
I try to listen to the horse. [/QUOTE]
Agreed. For my old guy (22 this year), who has never handled cold well and now loses weight rapidly in cold weather, I will put a sheet on if it is raining steadily and below 60. He wears a midweight with a nighttime low below 40 or a daytime high below 55. If the temperatures drop below 20, he gets a mid-weight stable blanket under his turnout blanket. He has NEVER (I’ve owned him since 2000) tolerated cold weather well, and he seems to become more sensitive every year. He will shiver if he gets rained on in 60 degree weather. My mare (9 this year), on the other hand, wears a sheet if it is raining steadily and below 55 but is otherwise “naked.” I don’t even own a blanket for her. She’s a tough, easy-keeping girl, and I don’t worry about her as much.
It all depends on the horse.
I live in Louisiana, so we don’t get much cold weather. My 25 yo mare has always been cold natured with little winter coat. She has had trouble keeping weight since the neighbors let their stallions get out and didn’t tell us, and then she foundered a year ago when that filly was a month old. She is sound now, but she just cannot eat enough alfalfa cubes and oil to fatten up. She gets blanketed if the days will be in the 50s because night will be low 40s. I cannot pull blankets at a reasonable time in the morning, so I try to make decisions on what keeps her warm without getting her too sweaty. She usually goes into a HW because she’s sedentary with tons of shade. If it’s going to be too warm for that, I will use the snow pony’s MW and leave him naked.
Lots of older horses don’t need blankets at all.
If I do blanket them (and I do blanket my retiree because he is a wimp and likes his clothes), I blanket like everyone else. Sheet at 50 and below, medium around 40, heavy in low 20s and teens, layers in single digits, double heavies in subzero conditions.
