[Melelio]

And dry hair coat? Horse in question is an IR mare, overweight, dewormed. Eats McCauley's M30 and a bit of TC Lite to get salt/mag/MSM and CTB in her. Timothy hay and muzzle.

It's not so much sun burned, but some. It's just straw like, brittle. Any ideas that don't involve external, like conditioner?

[JLR1]

My guess is that she is not getting enough fats/oils in her diet, but unfortunately you say she is overweight, so adding those would probably not be such a good idea. Hopefully our resident nutrition experts could help you. The only thing I can think of is to use heavy-duty conditioners.

[sublimequine]

Sounds like she may not be getting a balanced diet, although I'm unfamiliar with McCauley's feeds.

As for topical solutions, Healthy Hair Care's spray (the "pink stuff") is a good moisturizer.

[Hampton Bay]

I LOVE the M30. Awesome stuff, and my mare looked amazing on it. She was also on a hoof supplement and some omega horseshine though, so maybe that helped?

Is there a reason you don't want a topical? Some horses, like some people, just have dry hair. I have to use a ton of conditioner in my hair but there is no lack of fat in my diet!

[Melelio]

They've been on M30 for about 4 months now. My black horse looks great on it, but she just doesn't shine anywhere, and has had this straw like mane/tail condition for a couple or 3 years now.

I was just avoiding the topical suggestions in case there was something else like copper deficiency or such that someone would come up with first. I find topicals tend to just collect dirt, too, but I may go that way if it continues to bug me.

[Hampton Bay]

What I do with mine is wash and condition weekly. If the tail isn't terribly dirty, I just condition, and then rinse. It collects much less dirt than the leave-in topicals. Plus it helps protect the hair from breakage, so you lose less hair when they are swishing at flies.

I've also noticed a huge improvement in my mare's tail since I put her on SmartHoof. Her diet was excellent before, but the SmartHoof has helped a lot. She also no longer gets thrush. So you might try something like that for a couple months or so. SmartHoof is pretty inexpensive and is flax based, so you're getting some fat and omega fatty acids in addition to the copper, zinc, and biotin.