Tricks for tail growth?

The first suggestion is when you are working with the tail, never use a brush! Use a detangler and work the knots out with your fingers. You lose a lot of hairs using brushes! One of my favorite detanglers is Cowboy Magic.

Sometimes it takes a little bit of time for MTG to kick in. It lasts longer if you only put it on the dock, or tailbone, because that's where the hair grows from! Follow these directions:

-Work knots out of tail with detangler or even MTG.

-Liberally apply MTG to dock. I always really work it in and make sure it gets down to the skin.

-Wrap with a tail bag and leave for a week.

-Repeat every week.

Doing this, I saw results in my appendix in about three weeks. It really makes a difference when they can't tug the hair out, and the bag keeps the tail protected and helps the MTG absorb even more.

Also, have you considered taking a look at her diet? I know you are just showing her (not sure if you own her or not) but make sure it is balanced. How does her coat and hooves look? Coat, hooves, and tail will easily show a horses condition based on the diet. You can consider a cheap supplement, such as Black Oil Sunflower Seeds (BOSS) to help in this aspect.

Hope this helps!

I'm told that having a tail bag on for the winter can really make a difference, come spring.

Good nutrition is another. Adequate protein, lysine, so that protein can be absorbed, The star players are minerals...for the feet and the coat, particularly copper, which strengthens connective tissue in the feet and will give your horse the coat color they were born with. The copper and zinc together fight iron, which is a baddie. It's in the hay, 10x more available in water and high and hidden in store bought feeds. When iron capacity has been reached, it goes running through the blood like rust. When iron is dominant, it plugs up all the intake sites and makes copper and zinc go wasted and therefore deficient. A good trace mineral thats low in iron will get the copper and zinc competing again. If the coat color is dull, not one true color, or brown faded spots or just all faded color, or red tinged ends to mane and tail, many people think the horse is anemic and needs iron, but actually the opposite is true. Unless the horse has had a recent horrific accident and has bled out, he's not anemic from Iron loss, its iron overload thats making copper and zinc deficient. I've turned a brown horse jet black in 3 months in the summer sun and seen others bloom into their own true colors from buckskin to brilliant palomino even. 4oz. of fresh ground flax will give you incredible shine as well. I got a $10 coffee grinder and grind it just before feeding. The flax has just the right balance of omegas and is the only fat that a horse requires. Flax is a good anti-inflammatory for the whole body as well. A horse needs 150mg of copper and 500mg of zinc/day. Read those feed labels and compare the iron/copper/zinc numbers. The balance between them should be 3:1:3: Iron, copper zinc. Iron should be close to 3x more than copper and zinc should be 3x more than copper.

You can also soak your hay for 1/2 an hour too before feeding. This helps to remove 200mg of iron and also the iron on the surface that the baling machinery left behind. Slow feeders make this process easy as dunking a bag in a pail of water and then coming back later to hang it up. So, fight the iron and up the copper and zinc accordingly and with a tail bag, you should not only have a gorgeous tail in the spring, but a gorgeous horse as well. Hope this helps....

Yes. 18 months ago I started lessons with a person who had gone from riding at the track to showing grand prix level dressage horses. When I started my lessons with her, I asked this Q. She told me to blunt cut my horses thin and scraggly tail at mid cannon bone. This is not a stylish length in which to show your horse! She said my horse was breaking off mad hair, while standing.....after being asleep on the ground for a while he would tear the long hairs out/off when he stood up. When I shortened his tail 4 inches...apparently he no longer stood on it while rising and girsh dern it if it is not twice as thick now...and just a bit longer!

I put MTG in and then put it in a bandage or tail bag. I find keeping it covered and tightly wrapped where the air can't get to it makes it thicker and if its protected it will grow longer which = a longer thicker beautiful tail :)