Horsekeeping Rant: Bedding
Normally, I'm a pretty easy-going person. I tend to get a little annoyed about something for a minute, then get practical and move on.
But it's REALLY hard for me to just let it go when someone detrimentally affects a horse's well-being due simply to laziness. So here I am ranting before I get started with work for the day.
Every weekday morning before my 'real' job I take care of 2 mini horses that live down the road. Duties include the basics of feeding, turnout, stall cleaning, providing fresh water, and sweeping up the barn. All in all not tough tasks, and on average it takes me half an hour at most. Sometimes if I'm pressed for time I will skip non-essentials like picking out the fields or scrubbing the buckets if they are still clean, but I always leave with the ponies fed, watered, and their stall clean and bedded appropriately.
A new person was recently hired to do the barn on weekend mornings, and this is their idea of "enough" bedding in a stall where two minis live:
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ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!
Now I know the owner of these minis prefers the stall not to be deeply bedded, and that's fine, but what I saw when I walked in this morning made me absolutely furious. This is NOT OKAY.
Bedding has two essential purposes in a horse stall: to absorb moisture, thus keeping the stall dry and clean, and to provide a comfortable place for the horse to lay down and rest. Not enough bedding leads to horses standing around in their own urine and developing hock sores from lying on hard surfaces. The amount of bedding pictured above does NOTHING to prevent either of those things.
Needless to say, I'm a little ticked off and will be mentioning it to the minis' owner.
So bed your horses down well! Happy Monday, everyone.
But it's REALLY hard for me to just let it go when someone detrimentally affects a horse's well-being due simply to laziness. So here I am ranting before I get started with work for the day.
Every weekday morning before my 'real' job I take care of 2 mini horses that live down the road. Duties include the basics of feeding, turnout, stall cleaning, providing fresh water, and sweeping up the barn. All in all not tough tasks, and on average it takes me half an hour at most. Sometimes if I'm pressed for time I will skip non-essentials like picking out the fields or scrubbing the buckets if they are still clean, but I always leave with the ponies fed, watered, and their stall clean and bedded appropriately.
A new person was recently hired to do the barn on weekend mornings, and this is their idea of "enough" bedding in a stall where two minis live:
.JPG)
ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!
Now I know the owner of these minis prefers the stall not to be deeply bedded, and that's fine, but what I saw when I walked in this morning made me absolutely furious. This is NOT OKAY.
Bedding has two essential purposes in a horse stall: to absorb moisture, thus keeping the stall dry and clean, and to provide a comfortable place for the horse to lay down and rest. Not enough bedding leads to horses standing around in their own urine and developing hock sores from lying on hard surfaces. The amount of bedding pictured above does NOTHING to prevent either of those things.
Needless to say, I'm a little ticked off and will be mentioning it to the minis' owner.
So bed your horses down well! Happy Monday, everyone.
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