Spring Body Clipping Underway

I have finally gotten my annual spring body clipping marathon underway. I usually start with Lily but she is shedding out so much better this year I am not anticipating our usual epic, all day long, go through at least two sets of blades clipping job. I started this year's round of clipping off with two of my other regular participants in the annual spring clip fest, Chili and Cuff Links the pony. 

Chili is 35 years old (our second oldest resident on the farm) and I have clipped him for the last several years in a row. Every year my clipping job on Chili is a little bit worse than the year before. Oh, you are wanting to know why? Because every year Chili is less interested in participating and finds new and creative ways to make this ten times harder on the person holding the clippers than it needs to be. He never does anything overtly mean like try to smash you into the wall or something. He just constantly moves a step or two forwards, backwards or sideways, twitches his skin, or lifts a leg every time you touch it with the clippers like he would if he had a fly on him, little things like that. Except they are constant. Since he is so elderly I am not going to sedate him since I can get the job done without sedation. He also had a lot of hair and it was a two sets of blades clipping job.

I will admit I am not looking for opportunities to show off my clipping job on Chili. I got the hair off which is the important part, but I definitely did not clean up the lines or in any way make this look like a finished job. After what felt like days of endless twitching, shifting, walking, and moving around I was so ready to just be finished. When I finally gave in to Chili's wishes to be done I stepped back to look at my clipping job. I told myself I would revisit this in a few days and clean him up and make it look a lot neater. However, being totally honest here it isn't going to happen.  I think Chili would be appalled if he saw me coming at him with the clippers again, and I am 100% with him on those feelings!

Chili's hair was spread from one end of the barn to the other when I took this picture at the halfway point

I also clipped Cuffie the pony, another one that makes the spring clipping list every year. Cuffie is generally good and he mostly stands still. However, as he does every year, Cuffie called constantly to his friends. He sucks in a big breath of air as he prepares to scream. He inhales so deeply I feel it with the clippers. Then he thinks about just what he wants to scream to his friends while holding his breath (Somebody come help me! Where are you?  Come and saaaave me! or some variation of those would be my guess.)  Then he lets out  a huge, extended whinny that makes his whole body shake for a few seconds and causes the clippers to kind of bounce, leaving a nice line.  

Cuff Links with his mouth wide open, screaming

Cuffie looking around for an escape route

I've got several horses to go on the clipping list and plan to work my way through them over the next couple of weeks. Every year I clip the usual suspects plus I always have a few that I've never clipped before and often never need to clip again. The latter part of the list is longer than usual this year. This spring has been something of an odd shedding year for whatever reason. Body clipping isn't my favorite thing, I don't hate it but nor do I eagerly anticipate it, so I prefer a shorter list rather than a longer one. 

Oh, and for anyone who wants to know I have a pair of Andis Progress clippers for body clipping and a smaller set of Andis AGC-2 clippers for doing faces and hard to get to areas on the legs. I also clip wet. I give the horse a good bath, scrape of the excess water with a sweat scraper, and get to work. It cuts WAY down on the amount of hair flying in your face.  

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Murphy and Renny

Toledo and Kennedy

Bergie and Stormy

Oskar and Donovan having a chat over Johnny's back

Tiny looking handsome

Clayton and Rocky

Tiny and Baby trotting through the pasture

Noble and Thor

Moe and Homer

Levendi, Hemi, Thomas, Apollo and Trigger

Horses standing in their shelter while it was raining. Who would've thunk it, miracles do happen!! Flyer, Donneur, Romeo, Lotus, Silver and Faune