Smart Grooming Review - Black Show Make up

As I am sure you're aware by now, I swear by Smart Grooming for show prep and Georgie and I will be using them from now on.

After the lovely ladies at Smart Grooming sent me a little care package a few weeks ago i've been trying out all the lovely products. I've been a very busy bee lately but a couple of weeks ago I tried black showing make up on a friends retrained racehorse, now polo pony, called Aggy (Annia Galeria)

She's a light bay and very dark legs. Unfortunately she also has some scars and white fur on her from old injuries from racing, but this also meant she was a perfect test pony!

To start we brushed off all dirt, dust and any dry sweat etc from her legs so they were nice and clean. Then, using a small clean piece of cloth (wrapping the end over the index fingertip) and dipping it into the pot. Making sure to get a decent amount of black make up on the tip. I should note that we had a good few white fur marks to cover up so did use a good covering on the cloth but if it's a small blemish then sparingly if it's just a small blemish as does go a long way (As previously mentioned in older blog posts, all Smart Grooming products go a long way). Depending on the type of blemish, you can also use a small sponge if you'd prefer - This will be better for dabbing on and using more on larger areas. We wanted to cover the white dots so choice a more sweeping motion of going with direction of the fur. The pot is only about an inch and a half wide so it would have to be a small sponge to fit.

Going with the motion of with the hairs direction we made sure to cover all the white hair underneath too, rather than just cover the top layer of fur as with work this may rub off more easily.

Test one was Aggys white marks on her knee, cannon bone and back of her tendon are.

This is before applying the make up - 

Rather a lot of white spots from old nicks and cuts..

After - 

Completely covered up! Can you find where they were?

Now that is impressive. They were pretty prominent white marks on her legs and now they're completely hidden. Covered really well, and from a foot or so away you couldn't tell she had white fur scars at all!

We also had a bigger scar to cover- Before Aggy was a polo pony she used to race, and must have had an incident racing or while in training as when my friends Steph and Francis bought her she already had this scar just below the knee. It doesn't bother her or affect her performance but it's pretty noticeable as it doesn't have any fur coverage..(As you can see)

Doing the same as above with the white marks, we got the cloth over the index finger and dipped it into the pot to cover it generously.

Then in a more circular motion set to covering the scar.

Me and Steph were impressed by the coverage of the white marks so were keen to see how it would cover something this large and prominent. Well here's how it turned out - 

Yup, I can hardly see it either! It's covered the skin of the scar and blended it into the black fur making it pretty darn difficult to see! I am seriously impressed.

As my background is showing I am aware that this kind of scar would be no doubt be seen by the conformation judge and held against the horse in a show setting such as ROR competition (Although it would be ignored if it were under TARRA rules) but if you were wanting to hide a scar or knock such as this, then this makeup would do the job spot on! I'd even go so far to say that if it were a small enough blemish that this makeup would camouflage it sufficiently for it not to be seen

(Note - use to cover blemishes in showing at your own discretion)

I am absolutely amazed at just how well it worked.

The above pictures were taken on a Saturday, Aggy was left out overnight in a field, rolled and got rained on and it still stayed on all day Sunday without needing to be reapplied.

A week later after multiple rides and a couple of wash off's after polo it still stayed on (yes we checked)

It had faded a little, but it did stay on which really is a credit to it's staying power. 

Another time i'll try the brown one on the chestnuts and see how well that covers on them. 

It can also be used as make up around the eyes and muzzle of a bays and black horses to accentuate those areas.  Once the black make up has dried highlight then using enhancing gloss 

Overall I'd highly recommend Smart Grooming make up! I've never used make up on a horse before so went into this review with no idea how it would work or if it would work at all. But from the photos you can see it really does work! 

I'd highly recommend it. They're only £8.95 and will last for ages! 

I know some people use boot polish and such would I wouldn't recommend. They're made for polishing boots and could highly agitate the skin and could a reaction.

Smart Grooming products have been specially made for horses to avoid such things happening 

Aggy will be appearing in this weekends Mansfield Advisors/Tattersalls Flaming June Tournament at Suffolk Polo Club so I can't wait to use my Smart Geooming products to make her and Boo look amazing and fingers crossed they win best playing pony! 

Smart Grooming Review - Coat Sheen

Good afternoon everyone, I hope you all had a lovely weekend with your horses?

I had a very busy one with Francesca's 3rd birthday party Saturday morning, a Polo tournament Saturday afternoon and then showing yesterday at Houghton Hall Equestrian Centre.

Sadly it was not to be our day, with the judges preferring Hacks to Riding horses. Beanie is the epitome of a riding horse - He's a nice 16.2 with sturdy muscular legs with a nice amount of bone, and very equal in this proportions. 

But Georgie and I couldn't fault him so we're not disheartened. He was a perfect gentleman giving the judge a lovely ride, he went off beautifully and smooth in his transitions and wasn't pulling and was soft and buttery in his mouth. He was a pleasure to groom and get ready yesterday and was so affectionate and sweet (not sure it was just cause I had polo's in my pocket or not! haha) not tugging me around and being pushy! Such a good lad! 

Talking of grooming I got to use my Smart Grooming tools again - This time I used Coat Sheen. I've had this for a couple of weeks now and used it before but only now has it been sunny and dry when we've been out and I wanted to wait to show the true level of shine it creates!

Our class was the very last one yesterday so after a lovely lay in and giving Beanie a chance to chill out and graze on the grass, we got him in and due to the lovely warm weather he had a bath! He's a very water happy horse so loves them as you can see, covering Georgie in bubbles while washing his tail. Pesky flies!

After giving him a good clean with baby shampoo and getting the ingrained oil and dirt out of his coat he was squeaky clean!

We allowed him to dry naturally in the sun shine, meaning his coat dried nice and flat. Once he was fully dry I got my coat sheen and positioned the bottle about half a foot away from his body (so not to get too much in one place, but to make sure it evenly sprayed his coat) I sprayed the sheen directly onto his flat lying coat. Once he was evenly covered I brushed it in with a goat hair brush like this one. It gently works the coat sheen into the coat slightly under the top layer, allowing it to lift out the other colours in the coat.

This was taken just as we were leaving and wow, he is shiny huh!? He's a very copper orange chestnut as you can see, and coat sheen really makes his coat shine!

We worked hard to get B as beautiful and shiny as possible with perfect plaits and white legs. Smart Groomings products work together to compliment each other and have more than one use which is partly why I love using them so much! 

I was really excited to see another competitor with a tub of leg and body whitener out yesterday making her horses legs sparkly white! I hope these reviews have been helpful and if there is anything else you'd like me to try, so let me know! 

Until next time

S x

Smart Grooming Review - Super Shine

Happy bank holiday Monday everyone, I hope you all had a lovely weekend with your horses.

I certainly have and I got to use some new products, so I was in my element.

A couple of weeks ago I did a review on Smart Groomings Leg and Body Whitener so I had a play around with that again on our Shetland Millie as unlike our ex racehorse Beanie, she has white on her body and she has feathers so I wanted to see how it fared on those. As well as using Smart Groomings Super Shine on manes and tails! 

I got Millie in from the field and, to begin with, her little jockey (My niece) Francesca gave her a brush over to remove dried on mud and start from a relatively clean pony.

First I thought i'd try the new Super Shine I'd been sent earlier in the week. Millie has a lovely long soft mane but does enjoy rubbing it into the mud, like all Shetlands, so I shampooed it and brushed the tangles out.

I rubbed it dry with a clean dry towel and left the rest to dry naturally in the wind. It was still slightly damp here so to act as a anti tangling agent, I put a pea sized amount onto the palm of my hands, rubbing it over both palms equally and then ran my hands and fingers through her mane to cover as much as I could with the product.

As you can see it dries beautifully, tangle free and somewhat fluffy. It doesn't stick and clump together like some finishing oils, lovely result and I was really pleased.
I used Super Shine on Millie's mane as she is an M&M that shouldn't be plaited for the ring. Do not use this product on a horse or pony you have to plait up as it makes it extremely silky, therefore your plaits wouldn't stay in! And that is not what you want when you're trying to get your neatest tight plaits!

I also put a small amount spread evenly on a clean dry cloth and rubbed it over Millie's body. She was being turned out that evening so if she did roll in the mud, it wouldn't stick to her! And low and behold, it didn't and brushed off instantly without leaving any dusty brown marks on her.
Great product and works for ages.Even today after being out all day she's still dirt free as the formula of the products keeps working days afterwards expelling dust and dirt.

I also wanted to try it on Millie's tail. Unfortunately with mares, she has got a urine stained tail. The disadvantage with a Mountain & Moorland pony is you have the leave them quite Au natural which means we can't cut her tail too short. The downside to this is that a long tail does get muddier and more likely to be wee'd on.

First I just washed her tail with normal shampoo and then a bit of conditioner.

It did come out quite white but still unfortunately horse wee does stain tails, especially those that are white or have white in them, as you can see it does still have a yellow tinge to it, so I thought i'd see how the whitener did in her tail.

While Millie's tail was still wet slightly I dampened a sponge and dipped it into the whitener and spread it through the strands of white tail only. I also found dabbing the tips of my fingers into the whitener and spreading it through the white tail hair helped also.

Look how lovely it turned out! This is after it had dried. To seal in the whitener and also make it soft and smooth I put a pea sized amount of Super Shine into my hands, rubbed it in so it was evenly coating my hands and ran them through the tail. Millie's tail didn't tangle up at all and keep a clean fluffy appearance!

When Smart Grooming put my review on their Facebook I noticed quite a lot of people asking how the whitener works on feathers, so while I had my shampoo's out I hosed Millie's 4 white socks and gave them a clean with some whitening shampoo and tried the whitener on her feathers. Same as I did with B's short hair socks, I damped a sponge and dabbed it sparingly into the powder to just coat the sponge and brushed it over the fur, and in circular motions worked the powder into Millie's longer fur. Here it is, slightly wet but with the whitener on -

Here she is - All clean, soft and shiny! (Note - she naturally stands on a mounting block, she is in no way made to do that. It's self taught and she came to us doing it. Maybe she likes to see a bit higher than her natural 10 hands 2 inches?)

The final verdict, lovely products that really work. They have good, clear instructions how to use them that make them easy to use and they work amazingly well! They're also multi use products, so you can buy one products that has more than one purpose. Better than buying 1 product for every little thing, it saves a fortune!

The whitener isn't just for legs, it can be used on short or long hair, use on the body and even a tail! I'd highly recommend it for all horses, especially greys and piebald/skewbalds!

If you use the whitener on a tail, make sure to finish it with a silicone based shine/softening product to make it soft and clump free as the powder does make it quite matte in appearance.

The Super Shine can be used after bathing to act as a finisher. Ladies, we use oils on our hair after washing to help it dry shiny and tangle free, well that's what Super Shine does for horses! 

You can also add it to a cloth to rub over the horse or ponies body to expel dust and dirt after bathing, as well as just before you go into the ring to give that final finishing shine!

We had a lovely day yesterday and won, not once but twice! Lead Rein Pony and Ridden Mountain and Moorland. Not bad for Francesca's first show and my first attempt at lead rein showing! Thank you so much to Smart Grooming for your wonderful products. There are a lot of big name products out there but Smart Grooming will be the ones we use from now on!

(See Millie's tail soft, white and flowing in the wind.. because she's worth it!)