For a very long time, the working ranch horse of California has sported a very specific style of grooming, namely with a long, natural mane, and a “pulled” or shaped tail that ended at the bottom of the hocks. The only exceptions to this rule were for Morgans and Arabians.
Like much else that goes along with working horses for a living, there was a practical purpose for this.
Unlike modern show horses who a subject to hours of professional grooming, protective bandaging and tail bagging, and carefully controlled exposure to the environment, a buckaroo’s horse had to work in all kinds of mess, uncertain schedules, and varying lighting. I’m most familiar with the working conditions in Merced and Mariposa Counties—well, a little Fresno, thrown in, too—which meant working in sloughs, tule stands, alkali dust, stands of star thistle, tarweed, and manzanita brush. A single day’s work could put balls of alkali mud and snarls of various stickers, twigs, and burrs in a horse’s long tail.
Because of the summer heat, it also meant days that saw us a-horseback at 6 AM after feeding at 4, and that stretched to sundown, which could be 8 PM or later. Even with a dinner break at noon, and a siesta til 3 on the hottest days, that’s a lot of hours. It was a heck of a lot more practical to shape up a horse’s tail so as to keep it out of most of the stuff that would otherwise snarl it up, rather than stand around brushing, braiding, bagging, and washing tails.
Not to say that the horses were ungroomed. They were always curried and brushed well, and had their backs rinsed off after a day’s work. Yes, there were emergencies when they got a cowboy curry job (one takes the corner of the saddle blanket, knocks off any burrs or big dirt clumps that might be found on the saddlebed, and then saddles up). While it is a good idea when washing down a hot horse to start with the legs, then work through the underline, the head and finally the back, working horses were always walked that last mile back to where they would be unsaddled. It was thus safe to simply rinse down their backs, and that practice was well-suited to a country where there were sometimes only water troughs to draw a bit of wash water from. Not to mention a certain percentage of horses who weren’t fond of showers.
Traditionally, the horse’s tails were shaped by “pulling,” which is pretty much exactly like it sounds. There was a fair bit of skill to this, which amounted to selecting the longest strands of each part of the tail and basically yanking out two or three hairs at a time until the desired length and shape were achieved. Savvy buckaroos stretched this process out over a few days so as not to sore the horse’s tail.
Although I still think a shaped tail is practical, I prefer to achieve it by barbering the tail to the appropriate length. Being tender headed myself, I can only imagine how uncomfortable pulling must be for the horse.
As for the natural manes, that’s mostly because it was just what the Californios found pleasing to the eye, although again there was probably a certain element of timesaving. Today, on horses with very long or thick manes, I like to put them in an Andalusian or running braid on hot days, or windy days, or if I need to keep them from tangling in reins, lead ropes, catch ropes, etc. It is not strictly traditional, but it is easy and quick to do and will stay for several days. There's a good example of a practical Andalusian braid here. I also cut a tiny bridlepath, maybe 2 inches long at most, to accommodate the hackamore hanger or crown piece of the bridle. Done right, you can’t even tell there’s a bridlepath when the horse is rigged up. It’s strictly speaking not traditional but I do believe it contributes to the horse’s comfort.
One other point of grooming: I never saw a ribbon of any color tied in a horse’s tail to indicate that he was prone to kick, bite, strike, or hum arias. It would’t be of much use in the early morning before dawn or after dark, not to mention nobody wants to run around finding a red or yellow or whatever color ribbon at zero dark thirty. The convention instead was to ride as if all horses, including the one you were on, would kick or bite. In other words, pay attention and don’t crowd the other guy’s horse. It’s a good approach, because in fact every horse kicks, but they differ in the degree of aggravation it takes to make them do it.
