Every fall as the temperature drops and daylight shrinks, you have a decision to make about horse care. Whether you’re a new horse owner or a seasoned pro and whether your horses live outside or you tuck them in every night inside a cozy barn, you must choose to blanket or not to blanket.
And if you do blanket, what blanket(s) and when to change them comes into play. It’s never a case of throwing a single type of blanket on your horse and assuming the animal is good to go. Blanketing is an important horse welfare issue; it can be complicated and can cause harm if done incorrectly.
Let’s start with the most basic question: do horses need blankets at all?
Simple answer is, probably not. But it depends. We said it gets complicated, didn’t we?