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Shout-out to Dog Groomers on CoTH

I’ve read past threads in which some of the professional dog groomers who post on CoTH have recommended blowing dirt (or hair) off coats. I own a Metro Vac N Blow, which I’ve pretty much used only for horse vacuuming, with once-in-a-blue-moon attempts to employ it in its blower capacity.

But today, as I was preparing my horses for their annual fall pre-clipping baths, I decided to try the recommended-by-dog-groomers method in place of my usual vacuum. This time, however, I utilized the crevice tool. Lo and behold! The results on my densely-coated, furry horses were amazing:yes:. I’d already curried to the best of my ability, followed with two types of brushes, but the amount of dust liberated by air blowing, in place of vacuuming, was phenomenal.

Then, when I bathed the horses, there was relatively little dirt left to remove – only had to soap them up once, and saw very little soil in the rinse, as so much had already been removed by the air blowing through their coats.

So, thank you very much to those who have suggested this on various past threads. It really worked; I attribute part of this to the choice of tool, which concentrated the air flow and separated the hair (I’d never tried the crevice tool before). This is going to be part of my new pre-bath/pre-clip routine from now on.

The crevice tool is also good for drying dogs and horses, though you have to let the vac blow thru it a bit before it heats up. Friction of the air moving with force thru the hose, then pushed harder into narrow crevice tool, will warm the air up quite well. I did this “blow drying” when we had winter parades, to get my horse dried off quicker.

The blowing is also helpful to aid horse to dry faster if he is wet from sleet or after any bath. Blowing him off removes the loose volume of water, leaving much less for him to dry with body in summer or heat to dry out under a cooler or blanket. I blow off my dogs with vac on blower to get the extra water off, shortens drying time in winter a great deal after a bath.

I have not tried to blow-dry them with the vacuum today - just squeegeed them with a rubber scraper, then toweled them off. They are confined to a small gravel corral to eat hay while they dry in the sun and today’s light breeze. They have such dense fall/winter coats (think plush stuffed animal) that they can take hours to dry.

Fortunately, we have mild winters, so having to dry them quickly in cold weather is not an issue.

But, I will certainly try the crevice tool blow-dry idea sometime, thanks!

Just to dry horses, when we had a horse fall thru the ice in our pond, the vet suggested we dry him with our human hair dryer and it worked very well.

My horse is staring at you all in horror.

Just saying.

[QUOTE=TheJenners;8868599]
My horse is staring at you all in horror.

Just saying.[/QUOTE]

Sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do. Ha Ha

My old horse I used in parades with the Drill Team was not enthused when I started blow drying her either. But I killed two human hair dryiers, only had half of one side done. Husband got the vac out, changed it to blower. It worked like a charm on her deep, plushy fur for the Chicago Christmas Parade, in getting her dry soon and sparkly for her appearance. No dampness deep in the hair to give her a chill while traveling.

Add the idea of using vac as a blower with the crevice tool to your “bag of tricks” for use if you ever need it. Has been a great tool for our many uses of hairy horses in Spring and Fall to Winter.

[QUOTE=TheJenners;8868599]
My horse is staring at you all in horror.

Just saying.[/QUOTE]

All I need is a pocketful of treats and the mere thought of receiving one puts my boys on their best behavior, halos firmly in place.

There is something to be said for a bribe-able horse.:smiley: