Anyone have any suggestions for a tail braid type that is less intense than the hunters but still looks nice? I’m a “natural tail” person but would love something pretty to do for FEIs, jogs, etc that was tidy but achievable by a decent (non-hunter pro) braider.
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I’ve always just done a simple French braid, rubber band the end, and comb the end into the rest of the tail, no pinwheel.
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Honestly, with a bit of practice a decently braided tail can be done in a few minutes … maybe not quite to AA show hunter standards, but enough that it’ll look nice and professional. While it takes longer than just brushing the tail out, it doesn’t take nearly as long as braiding a mane, for me a least.
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There are a lot of great YouTube braiding things. From my time as a braider, I think the biggest mistake people make is using too much hair, and once you get the right thickness, you need to drop the same amount of hair as you add each time to keep a consistent look. If you don’t, the braid will get too chunky.
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Or we put in the many hours of practice to get quick and are good at our jobs 
especially Coleman’s grooms - their horses are always immaculate no matter what event. I had 5 horses for me and a girl riding at Kentucky last year. My 5* horse wasn’t even braided 30 minutes before the 4* trot up started on Sunday at Kentucky this year. And I still sewed in 28 braids. Maybe even my best ones ever!
Grooming is all about presenting the picture you want the judges to see. I don’t find pulled or clipped tails to be out of fashion at all at the top of the sport. Almost all the horses have them. A handful do braid, but I personally would never do that with my horses for tension reasons. I also find those long tail braids to make the horse appear to be downhill to my eye. As someone mentioned above, the space between the tail and body created by removing the hair shows off that the horse is carrying its tail loose and away from its body. I also think it makes for a tidier picture.
I’m a bit of a tail freak though. My horses’ tails are always clipped or pulled, banged, and dyed black (if they have a black tail) if you see them at any point throughout the season. It’s important to me to make a nice impression for lessons etc as well as the show ring. It’s technically my “business card.” 
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What do you do about a gray tail on a horse whose bottom is tan colored (not dirty, just a black tail turning gray and looking brown) - can you bleach it?
I don’t bleach as I’ve found doing anything to compromise the structure of the hair (including heavy washing) actually makes the tail less white over time since the hair follicles get more porous. Depending on how “dirty” of a gray the horse is, I try to wash it as sparingly as possible between events with the exception of poo stains which get washed and conditioned immediately. I rinse every horse’s tail really well whenever I hose them and then spray their bodies and tails liberally with the orange conditioning spray. I may wash a gray tail once a week, and I would not let it get to the point of brown - only tan. Leading up to a competition, I’ll wash two to three times (last wash being the morning they compete) and always condition afterwards and then spray with a silicone based product to help keep any stains from sticking. I put purple shampoo (I like knock off Clairol Shimmer Lites from Sally’s the best) in the tail dry and let it sit up to 10-15 min. If it gets dyed slightly purple, that’s the goal as it will then look white when it’s dry. Then wash well and condition. Grays always get their tails bagged or bandaged all the way down in the trailer since poop stains are the enemy.
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Just for fun:
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Pulled/shaved tails are vulnerable to biting insects.
I’m curious how this plaiting works. It’s not a traditional braid.
It is a regular braid, just the hairs are crossed under instead of over. It has been allowed to get fatter toward the bottom bc they haven’t dropped hair as they went down.
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After reading this I really zoomed in and now I see the braid. It’s the coloring of the tail that made it look more like weave than a regular braid.
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