Little Things Mean A Lot

Cold hands. The bane of any horsey person’s life. Bitter winters with strong winds, driving rain that hits you at such an angle as to go straight into your ears, and bitter cold that penetrates right through to your bones, no matter how many layers of high-tech thermals and waterproofs you are swaddled in. Trying to lead horses who are prancing and turning sideways to put their backs to the wind, carrying water buckets that spill onto your legs and leave icy water running into your boots, peeling mud out of your hair after leaning on a muddy horse to pick out feet, and fumbling with icy fingers to undo buckles and straps. 

There are of course the beautiful crisp, frosty mornings, when the sky is ice blue and a watery sun rises over fields where horses snort plumes of steam from their nostrils, the smell of boiled barley and hot bran mashes for tired horses, the sounds of horses peacefully munching hay in their stalls, tucked up warm and safely out of the elements for the night, and the feeling of a hot bath after a long day out in the cold. These things do help to ease the sting of winter, but sadly as anyone who has worked as a groom will know, they are few and far between, and the reality of winter is the cold-clumsy fingers and soggy feet.

My last farm-based job was on a large equestrian center, with over one hundred horses on site, fifty-four of which were full boarders, hunt hirelings, and lesson horses that we cared for on a day to day basis. In the depths of winter I would be faced with a barn full of thirty horses in filthy turnout blankets which needed changing.

One particular day stands out in my memory – it had snowed heavily in the morning, and then over the course of the afternoon the temperature steadily plummeted until it was the sort of cold that takes your breath away and leaves your eyelashes feeling heavy. I was the last person working, teaching a lesson at 8pm in the indoor school. Before the lesson began I popped into the house to make a cup of coffee, and by the time I walked to the arena and got my rider on board warming up, there were icy crystals forming around the inside of my mug! That night, I had to go and change blankets after I finished teaching, swapping now de-frosted turnout blankets for lovely dry stable blankets for a barn of about thirty horses. My hands were so cold that no amount of flailing, jumping jacks, armpit hugging, or hot breath would bring back the feeling in my fingers. I fumbled with buckles and wrestled with clips on the first ten or so with useless, freezing fingers, until I came to a horse whose owner had purchased a WeatherBeeta Ultra Cozi turnout blanket. Now I’m sure that this horse’s owner bought this blanket because it has such fantastic features – 1680 denier ballistic nylon outer, waterproof fleece snug fit in the neck cover to ensure mud and rain don’t get down inside the blanket, shaped “cozi guard” to ensure no part of the horse’s chest is exposed to the elements, and a whole host of other things – however, the “Quick Clip” front closure was so appreciated. My cold fingers didn’t have to fuss with a buckle, they merely had to work two clips – much easier than a buckle when you feel as though your hands are in a bowl of  ice water, being operated by someone else!

WeatherBeeta regularly use the hashtag #LittleThingsMeanALot, and I think this perfectly sums up the way grooms all over the country feel about those little Quick Clip front closures. It is clear that WeatherBeeta products are designed by horse people, for horse people. Designed by people who know the frustration of cold hands fumbling with buckles, the WeatherBeeta ComFiTec range is a game changer. Since I first saw the Quick Clip front closures on an old WeatherBeeta Orican Blanket in the early 2000’s, I’ve been hooked. When a product is designed with such care and thought for the people (and horses!) who will be using it, it shines through in the way that these small things can turn a day around on a busy farm.

Nowadays I only have one blanket to change with my frost-bitten fingers in the depths of winter as I no longer work on a farm and only have my own horse to do. However, that blanket will always be a WeatherBeeta, because I still remember those days of small mercies in the glassy mornings and gloomy evenings of winter, and appreciate that little things really do mean a lot.