Another numpty! Why oh why oh why won't people...

[CatPussRoastingByAnOpenFire]

Wear bloody fluorescent gear when hacking! I have just narrowly avoided another person out hacking on a bay horse, wearing dark clothing, up an overgrown country lane! I drive sensibly, and am very attuned to seeing horses about, but this isn't the first time this has happened. They are almost invisible. All it takes is one bit of yellow to make the difference. Between life and death!

Because it looks silly and they can't be arsed? To which I say not as silly as you'd look in intensive care or as much of an arse as arranging slaughter and removal of your horses mutilated body from the carriageway.

It drives me dappy! It's such a no brainer! Dd DOES NOT leave the yard withou several items of fluorescent on. On pain of never being allowed out again!

Couldn't agree more. We want drivers to be considerate to us, we could at least do them a favour and let them know we're there! Even if riding off road we always wear fluorescent on riders and horses in case we need to be found!

I complete agree with you, OP.

When Dhorse and I go out, we are lit up like xmas trees with florescent gear. Dhorse is also a very light, almost white grey (when he's not plastered in mud!), which helps, but it's been proven that wearing florescent gear in the right conditions means you can been seen 3-4x further away than without it.

If you are really "bright", you can been seen miles away - proven when DH saw exactly what I was doing on top of a hill (galloping across his stubble field on Dhorse when I thought he wouldn't notice ) which we know is 1.5 miles from our farm buildings. And as Olderyetwilder says, it is very useful for when you have an accident - I rarely go on the road (because I am fortunate not to have to) but the one time I fell off and really hurt myself, I was found quickly because I could be seen from a distance.

What drives me mad, is the people who make comments about how silly you look in the gear and then complain about drivers on the roads. We have a livery yard near us and the number of riders coming past the house without safety gear on is unbelievable.

I just want to open the car window and shout at them!!

Catpuss - why don't you. If I'm driving and come across someone who doesn't say thank you I always open the window and say they should. I'd do the same re hi-vis, but haven't yet seen anyone not wearing it.

I ride out with a bloke who has 5 horseball horses. Quite often I lead one and ride one, he rides one and leads 2! They are not especially valuable horses (mostly TBs that didn't make the grade to race), but are all highly strung and various shades of bay, and we do a lot of road work. We only ride in broad daylight, and I always wear high viz. But he doesn't, so on a grey winter morning, the rest of them are basically invisible. I stay at the back, hoping that we'll see oncoming traffic anyway.

I never go out with at least one piece of hi-viz on both me and the dhorse (in case we part company!)

I never got the 'hi-viz is so uncool' argument - I just answer back sarcastically as possible that caring about my horses safety and not wanting her to come to harm is obviously epically unhip

I worked on a yard where a livery use to hack out with no hi-viz even in the fog or fading light. I nearly hit her one foggy day when I finsihed work and the abuse I got of her the next day was unbelievable. She couldn't see what was wrong. She said she didnt want to look like an over dressed christmas tree. Some people hey