Horse skin, sebum & rugs

A horse’s skin consists of three layers: the epidermis, the dermis and the subcutis. In horses, the surface film on the epidermis normally has a pH of around 6, but it can rise as high as 9. This surface film protects the skin and hair and keeps them supple. The skin lipids that form the surface film come from perfectly normal sebaceous glands. We don’t like to see greasy or oily skin and a greasy coat, but it can be normal depending on the individual horse, how it is kept, fed and used. If your fingers have a kind of new layer of skin on them and feel sticky after giving your horse a scratch, it may have or be developing a metabolic problem.

What are we getting at?

A number of customers contacted us saying that our cooler rugs and saddle pads weren’t doing their job and weren’t absorbing sweat. These comments puzzled us, as we have already put our tried-and-tested functional fibre through its paces and it actively absorbs sweat in all our tests. This is exactly what the positive feedback we receive from our customers confirms.

The devil is in the detail

We advised our customers to wash the rug once and then put it back on their horse to cool off. It worked! Why? When the rug was tried on or first used, the functional fibre absorbed a great deal of sebum and grease from the coat. These oils had literally clogged the EQM functional fibre, so that sweat or moisture could no longer be absorbed. Only a wash in the washing machine freed the functional fibre from its greasy "waterproofing", so that it could once again live up to its name. So if one of your rugs or saddle pads ever works less well than before, first check your horse’s coat and skin, then the condition of the functional fibre, and then treat your equipment to a wash.