Do you bed your run in shelters, especially in the cold/rainy months? My horse lives in a large field that stays grassy for most of the year, (we are in OR so there are a few wet months where the grass gets pretty thin, but we are lucky to avoid true mud due to well draining fields), and has a large run in with a hard packed dirt floor where he typically spends the night. When my gelding was stabled, I used to catch him napping in the deep shavings pretty frequently. Now that he’s living outside, I’ve never seen him lay down in his field or run-in shelter and I’m wondering if people tend to bed their run in’s with pellets or shavings? I don’t want to drive my barn owner nuts, so wanted to see if this is a normal thing first.
I use a sand for outdoor shelters. I make it 6 to 8 inches deep and that keeps it soft enough that they want to lay down but is very easy to clean out and does not blow away in the windstorms. It also drains so no need to pull out any material when they pee in it.
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I do. It’s more of a mini barn but remains open on one side year round and functions as a run in. It’s 12 feet deep.
I did bed on dirt but water seeped up and wasted the bedding. So I laid rubber mats and bed on that. Both horses use it to sleep in regularly and I often find them still down and snoozing if I feed early. I learned my gelding in particular really needs it so I try to make it comfy.
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Feronia’s BO and I went a few rounds on this. The sheds all have stall mats and she had been putting shavings in, not a lot, but enough to soak up pee. But the horses (all mares) - except for Feronia - were all peeing outside. She decided to just not use shavings anymore, and I was worried about Feronia because she hates getting splashed. BO gradually reduced the shavings until there were none. Feronia persisted in peeing in her shed for a while, which was gross, but she has since moved outside to pee.
I will note that all the mares prefer to pee in shavings, so if they get put in a stall or on a trailer, they will pee. Feronia also usually pees on our trail walks, where the footing is softer or covered with leaves. So they have adapted to not having shavings, but they don’t like it.
The horses all get their hay in their sheds, but generally don’t sleep in them much, except to doze. Right now, they are all having morning naps outside.
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I do! My mare is retired at a private barn with one other horse now but I did at a boarding barn too and just cleaned it myself.
I used pellets in the past and just added a dry bag every now and then. Last year I started using straw. I’ve always seen horses lay in their hay in the winter so figured they’d love it and they seemed to!
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I have sand under my run-in shelter, which seems to make my herd happy.
Though I admit that mine will happily nap outside in the grass too.
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I have crushed stone/sand in mine, like arena footing. They go in for shade or rain, but sleep on the grass outside.
If you want your BO to do this, I would expect to pay for the bedding and possibly have to do the cleaning yourself. It’s a lot of extra expense and work and very uncommon for field board to provide.
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We bed with sawdust in the runout sheds. Relatively easy to clean. Not as “messy” or windblown as shavings.
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Thanks all, sounds like it’s normal to have something in these run ins. I think my gelding is fine sleeping out in the pasture when the weather is nice, but now that we’re moving into winter here in OR, the dry days are getting pretty rare, and I don’t expect him to sleep out in the rain. I’ll have a conversation with my BO, and see if there’s a material that she would be okay with me adding to the run in shed. I’m happy to pay for the material and do the work of adding it to the shed. The sheds typically get picked 1-2x a week- is it really much more work to pick a shed with sand or shavings vs/ hard dirt? I’m happy to pick myself, but I do have work travel pretty frequently, so I’m not always able to clean it on a weekly basis.
One of the issues with shavings is that they are organic and degrade in time, which means they make mud. I would never permit anyone to put them in an outdoor space of mine, and that is why I use crushed stone/sand. But I absolutely HATE mud and wage a war against it, a war that never ceases and I have spent many thousands of dollars on. You have to replenish these things with time, I think my 3 run ins cost me about 1,500$ a year in mud abatement. IT was a lot more establishing the base so it might be quite costly to truly address this issue.
I think some people in the PNW use tree bark or something like that. Maybe ask @PNWjumper what she uses, I think it is that.
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On the picking – it depends on if they start using it more. Sometimes if you add stuff like this, the horses will decide it’s the new bathroom spot and go from not really using the shed as a bathroom to filling it with pee and poop in great amounts. I don’t know why they like to ruin nice things, but I have seen this happen pretty often with some horses! So it could be a lot more work or not, depending on how the horses in the field decide to treat the change. You can’t really know ahead of time, unfortunately!
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It can be. Yes. And then the shavings need to be replaced so that is an extra trip out there with new shavings.
Fordtraktor makes a great point about shavings are organic, which means they hold moisture and you will have a wet situation.
Hear hear! I would never bed a run in with anything organic for this reason. Makes me shudder to even think about. Keeping the upper hand on the mud is a big enough job without purposefully putting a bunch of bedding out there to blow around or get walked out and rot 
@aBayDay also consider if you want your horse lying down in the shed. One benefit of having them not in a stall is the reduced risk of getting cast. I’d much rather dump a load of sand or whatever outside as a nice place to nap.
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Oh tree bark is an interesting idea. I think right now sand or crushed rock sounds like the most reasonable substrate. The sheds are luckily designed in a way that they are completely protected from the rain- they have large overhangs and protective walls on 3.5 sides, so no concern about mud forming within the sheds, unless organic matter breaks down too much from pee? But sand or crushed rock should avoid that issue. Is crushed rock comfy enough for horses to sleep on? Or any comfier than hardpacked dirt?
When new, the crushed rock is quite comfy, then it settles and gets hard with time (like dirt actually! a fresh plowed and tilled spring field is positively lovely and soft!). I don’t care if it is soft or not in my sheds, I just want the footing dry. That is my only concern, so I only add more when it gets too low height-wise.
Sand is soft and will stay that way if it is river sand, but if you are feeding hay in there, risk of sand colic so I wouldn’t want that.
The mud issue with shavings isn’t so much for inside the shed, it’s right outside. They track it and before long you’ll have a big pit of mud in the entry. Not ideal.
Honestly horses have been sleeping on the ground for hundreds of thousands of years. I think they are fine without “bedding” in the sheds, as long as they can have dry feet some portion of the day.
Mine have always enjoying napping outside in the sacrifice paddock, which is covered in pea gravel. They’ve either curled up little lambs or been flat out on their sides. This has been true of several different horses over the years, never had one that wouldn’t.
This is what I was going to say.
Mine are out 24/7 with a 1 acre drylot that has sheds and access to a 6 acre pasture behind the drylot. The sheds have mats over crushed stone, and I lightly bed with shavings. I feed 2x daily in my sheds, and I will not ask them to stand in a messy shed to eat, so I pick them at least once daily.
During high winds or heavy precipitation (rain, sleet, snow), I have one mare who spends most of her time in the shed (which makes me happy, that’s why we have the sheds!) but she is very messy. The more deeply I bed it, the bigger the mess she makes, the more time it takes me to clean up before I can feed. I seem to have found a compromise with her that is adequate for comfort yet not too appealing as a toilet. Her buddy gets a lot more bedding and sleeps in it most nights, but almost never uses it as a bathroom.
