Tack and fashions

[VillyCazalet]

I've had a thread (help - slipping saddle') where string girths were recommend and it's been a pain to get hold of one.

I was just thinking, what else has gone out of fashion for no apparent reason? There must be lots of tack and equipment which used to be commonplace and is no longer used.

Also when everyone used to wear a hairnet (eyes female show jumpers).
Stuffing straw under a string vest to wick a hot pony after hunting on a freezing night.
When everyone used to wear either a rat catcher or blue or black jacket depending on level (eyes female show jumpers again).
When Olympia was fun but professional (mini and major sj, top level dressage) - I went a few years ago and John Terry's WIFE did a (shit) dressage demo on her very expensive and well trained, gold glitter covered horse that she couldn't ride one side of. Also, when did gold glitter become acceptable in anything other than fancy dress or charity show jumping?!

Ps I'm only 28... (Young fogey)...

Those lists are really taking me back...

I've started riding again after a break of about five years at a fantastic riding school that does loads of hacking. Prior to that I rode for just over thirty years, keeping my ponies on private yards.

I keep getting asked by the yard apprentices about the "old days". They don't believe me about jute rugs, blankets from salvation army, making your own haynets, either no hat or one with elastic... I feel old!

Oh, a horsey retro thread.

My DH had jute rug, string vest and canvas NZs in the 80s. NZ had neck no cover to it (unlike the combo rugs of today). I can also remember rollers, elasticacted surcingles, anti cast rollers. If horse was cold we just added more blankets under the jute, and secured with a roller. I can remember re-proofing the NZ with some stuff in a tin that you had to paint on with a brush in the vain hope it would make it waterproof. Never had a horse dentist or back person - the vet dealt with these.

Fast forward to 2014 and DH has full compliment of various indoor and outdoor wear, full neck, half neck, no neck. Light weight, middle weight and height weight rugs. All sent off to be cleaned and reproofed as and when required. No tin and brush required! I have some colourful jods these days , but still can't bring myself to convert to buying bling encrusted tack and accessories thou! I suppose the blingiest thing back in my younger days was a brass browband.

Can also recall the over reach boots that you had to pull over the hoof - available in black or white only. These eerie later replaced by the petal over reach boots. The rubber bit guards. Plaited reins. Cream jods. Feeding was nuts, chaff and bran. Oats, barley and maize were also about. No 'mix' type feeds back then.

I was a huge fan of the petal over reach boots back in the day, we believed them to be safer than the traditional pull over the hoof type but how my mare concentrated with that noise following her xc I don't know

Oh yes the stuff in the tin, it was wax wasn't it? It was much easier to brush on if you remembered to do the job in the summer when it wasn't solid . The empty round tins were good for nailing to the tack room wall to hang bridles on.

I have a pair of petal over reach boots in a box somewhere.....

I think BonkeyTB may have a fit at them though.
I remember someone riding a pony with them on and being able to hear those bloody boots a mile slight exaggeration away!!

Pixel - it certainly was! I may well have the remains of a VERY old tin in my garage, along with a pair if draw reins! Neither of which will see the light of day again.

Hob & Bonkey - yep, the constant flapping of those boots is still with me. At one stage I had alternate coloured petals, and thought it was soooooooo cool. They were all the rage at the time.

The other thing that was around at the time of petal boots was the coloured piped bridles. The brow band and nose band had a red, blue, yellow, white etc backing and matching rubber reins. This was the start of bling!

I still use duvets to add extra warmth. Much cheaper (and lighter) than a thicker rug!

Oh I remember all of these !

I used to love tucking pony up for the night in her tartan blanket , then her lightweight duvet up to her ears , then folding the two sides back to her withers so it made a point , then throwing her jute rung so that it landed perfectly just at the withers , then folding the point back and putting her stripy roller on . She looked so snug . Mind you I was the first on the yard to get a Lavenham stable rug in 1985 . How swanky we thought ourselves !

Now , I am the Imelda Marcos of horse rugs .

Still can't bring myself to wear anything but black or blue jodhs though . And had a pair of Hunters that actually lasted for years , with my original red Puffa jacket .

I've still got my very first quilted stable rug knocking about somewhere. It was chocolate brown with beige edging and looked the business on my liver spotted appaloosa.
Does anyone remember Stylo Matchmaker long rubber boots? They were lovely soft rubber that didn't cut off the circulation in your ankles and behind your knees and you could get a proper shine on them, unlike the glorified wellies that were available before. I wouldn't mind a pair now actually.

Yes ! I had a pair that used to polish up really well ! Wore them to pieces as I recall .

Remember when every horse on our yard was matchy matchy - but only in red , navy , yellow , or green ! Purple was considered very edgy , and as for pink ! The pony club DC would have gone spare .

It's a funny thing that while we have an endless choice of colours for numnahs, headcollars, even stirrup irons, we now have less choices for girths than we used to? We had string girths in various colours (think our pony came with a bright yellow one) and even the Cottage Craft padded ones had navy/red/white etc, but now most girths will come in black or brown and that's it. There are a few coloured ones around but they are in the minority and a good thing too if you ask me.

I must live in the old days because the majority of these things are very much alive and kicking where I am

Not the rugs though - do you remember trying to hang a wet new Zealand to dry? It took 3 people if there had been a proper down pour! I remember thinking I was dead posh because I had a jute rug which was only something people in books or with competition ponies had! (I never used it, my pony lived out, it was a hand me down from someone with competition ponies and was too small anyway! )

Is the string girth working op? It is the stubben ones you want, if you notice the material is totally different to the old nippy ones, they used to go hard and horrible which, I think, is why they went out of fashion. I use them on everything now, much nicer than elastic and much safer than humane girths (which are going out of fashion finally thank goodness! )

Yes, got the Stuben one. It's so soft and floppy, lovely :-) it is definitely helping and she seems very happy in it too!

I remember having black and red (alternate) petal boots, haha! It was supposed to stop them turning Inside out in mud wasn't it? I also had fringed half chaps, yee-hah!

Oh yes the click clack boots

I've just received my stubben girth for our pony, he doesn't really need it but I like them

leather saddles where the underneath was tartan fabric.
Brow bands covered with velvet ribbons.
Jodhpurs made of non-stretch 100% nylon.
Body protectors with a strap that went through your legs.
String backed gloves.
Bridles with no nose band at all.
Dropped nose bands.
Letting ponies get long and shaggy in the winter.
plaits with a needle and thread.

Loved those stylo matchmaker long boots. Someone I ride with still wears them, or something very similar.

Kind of off topic but not. I was looking at old photos of show jumpers, and noticed that they are all in really simple tack. Flat cavesson nosebands, snaffles, the occasional double bridle, and sometimes a running martingale. How comes now when I watch on the telly they are in loads of complicated nosebands, complicated rein systems, weird girths?

Kind of off topic but not. I was looking at old photos of show jumpers, and noticed that they are all in really simple tack. Flat cavesson nosebands, snaffles, the occasional double bridle, and sometimes a running martingale. How comes now when I watch on the telly they are in loads of complicated nosebands, complicated rein systems, weird girths?
Yes whenever they show old photos in magazines that's always the first thing that strikes me. Half the time they had a grotty old flat hunting saddle too, not some padded contraption like an armchair (am first to admit that even my Wintec is a vast improvement on the saddle that came with our first pony so I'm not complaining!).

As it happens I've still got a rather nice velvet browband, a pair of string gloves and always used to plait with needle and thread so probably still could if I didn't have a hairy cob. Talking of which, some of us do still let them get shaggy and hairy .

I've been struck recently by showjumping tack but oddly for the opposite reason! I'd thought there seemed to be a rise in "old" tack, lots of drop nosebands, standing martingales, double bridles/reins. It surprised the last few times I wrestled the remote from the dc

Off off topic, does anyone else still do the counting strides into the fence bob as they're watching? I thought I only did it in my head now but the dc teased me mercilessly suggested I may still have the habit!

sparky05 my daughter's pony is ridden in a drop noseband. She can get strong.

bonzo77 my sister & I had the Stylo Matchmaker boots! We bloody loved 'em! All jodhs (or riding trousers as they were called) were buff coloured. We went to get our 1st pair from Thomas & Taylor at the bottom of the Moor in Shefifeld (1970) & nearly burst into tears when we were handed the old fashioned jodhpurs with the sticky out 'elephant ears' tops. The assistant said you want riding trousers.
Happy days.......

I even have nostalgia for old style showjumps (heavy wooden poles, paint peeling and slintery, and those heavy old wooden stands with the metal bolted pole-holder things... Do they still exist?)
And building courses using stuff like oil drums and tyres. Does anyone do that any more?
And cavaletti? What happened to cavaletti?

Were they deemed unsafe so no longer used, or did I dream that? Is it the same with oil drums, tyres, telegraph poles, sleepers, etc? Were we all dicing with death before those serated-lego-Toblerone things in hot pink and purple were invented?

*splintery

My best friend's mum had a pair of Matchmakers; I was always 'forgetting' my boots when I went to ride her pony because I loved borrowing them so much!

We were just talking about this the other day and remembering the excitement when denim jodhpurs appeared because they weren't beige or black.

I rode for a few years at a place where all the ponies had two NZs each because they wouldn't dry in a day. And we had to wear hairnets for lessons.

I do like this reminiscent thread.

Velvet head bands. Blankets and folding the back with a roller. Happy days
I also head the click clack boots they were red and white but they use to snap all the time! so went back to the rubber ones.

I remember thinking I looks so cool on my grey pony with red numna, red girth, red exercise bandages over gamgees and red and white overreach boots.
I think I was the equivalent to the all the bling now

Oh and coloured rubber rains had just come out so had red ones too to match