Questions about Flexible Filly grazing muzzle

[OzarksRider]

Those of you with Flexible Filly muzzles . . . where did you buy yours? How large is the hole?

I noticed that Thin Line’s website offers holes in two sizes (2.5 cm and 3.5 cm), but other vendors don’t offer a choice of sizes and also don’t say what size hole they stock.

I’ve always been a GreenGuard fan, but one of my horses destroyed 3 GGs last year so I want to try the FF.

[NaturallyHappy]

I have horses in both sizes. I buy them from ThinLine. Big Dee’s says their version is the 2.5” style. Hope this helps. You can make the small hole larger, if need be.

[OzarksRider]

@NaturallyHappy

Hope this helps.

Yes, thank you!!

[seabreeze]

I bought mine at Riding Warehouse. I believe it has the smaller hole. Best muzzle I’ve ever used. I also bought the accompanying halter and found it quite helpful for avoiding rubs on a sensitive chestnut that always got rubs from muzzles.

[CoffeeLover]

I got the 2.5" from Big Dee’s and my trainer said the 3.5" is preferable so horses don’t get so frustrated they try to remove the muzzle. Pony didn’t care - he wore away the hole while grazing and over time enough plastic broke off that it’s closer to 3.5".

He did get some rubs - gorilla tape helped fix any rough edges.

[luvmyhackney]

I purchased mine from Big D’s. Its fine and super airy and my pony tolerates it. It did rub around the nose a bit, but I added a fleece with slits for a week and his nose got used to it with zero rubs anymore.

The hole on mine is around 2.5" and hasn’t been worn down, but make sure the sides are tight enough pony can’t shift and eat out the sides.

[OzarksRider]

Thanks all for your responses. But, I have a nit to pick . . . everyone keeps referring to the holes as being either 2.5" (inches) or 3.5" (inches). But the Thin Line website lists the hole sizes as either 2.5 or 3.5 centimeters, which is a huge difference. Converted to inches, the hole sizes are about 1 inch and not quite 1.5 inches. I wonder why ThinLine uses centimeters instead of inches, since they are located in the United States???

[luvmyhackney]

I’m guesstimating on mine since I cut the hole bigger and it’s not a perfect circle. It’s between 2”-3”.

[prunebey]

I believe I also got mine from Big Dee’s, and I have the one with the smaller hole. Thought my mare would throw a fit over it, but she figured it out right away.

I did end up buying the halter that’s made by ThinLine specifically for this muzzle, and I would absolutely recommend doing so even though they’re pricy. It really does make fitting the muzzle easier, and my girl got rubs when I tried to just use a regular breakaway halter.

[fourfillies]

I have them for donkeys after trying lots of other options. They rub less (when fitted well) and have been durable for pretty busy donkey dudes. The holes are definitely in cm, not inches. My pony sized ones have 2.5cm and my guys don’t seem frustrated from the start. I would recommend you spring for the halter and foam pad protectors. I have one with the proprietary halter and it does seem to fit better than the one I created (which is fine too). I had one issue and called the company (I did buy directly) and they were super responsive and helpful.

[Knubbsy]

I bought once directly from thinline and once from ebay. I tried the smaller hole and my mare started eating out of the side even with zip ties between fins. We switched to the large hole and I sent photos to thinline for advice and it works well. It does discolor over the summer but I get multiple seasons out of them. I bought the pads but not the halter and it’s worked well.

[GoodTimes]

Probably because 2.5 cm and 3.5 cm sounds better than 0.98 inches and 1.38 inches. And while ThinLine is an American company, they sell globally. Most of the world use the metric system.

I bought two of the FF muzzles, thinking that two of my horses could benefit from them. I ended up only ever using them on one mare. I cut the hole bigger, it probably has a diameter of 2.5". She wore that one season. I hand grazed her with it on for a few days until she figured it out and the frustration wore off. I imagine if I had of just put the small hole on and threw her out that she may have gotten it off.
Last summer she was on stall rest and small turnout for nearly six months. When she finally did get to go back out on grass she was fat and it was autumn, perfect recipe for laminitis. So I put her out with the uncut 2.5cm FF and had no issues.