Large boarding barns! Systems for graining a barn of 30+ horses?

[IPEsq]

I like the tape flag idea for meds!

My barn has one color bucket for AM and a different color for PM. All have labels with horse’s name, get made up in the feed room and stacked in order. Fed off the wheelbarrow used for hay in the barn and the outside horses have theirs driven out with their hay.

The barn does not offer soaking. Any horse who needs to have something soaked such as to administer a certain supplement or medication, the boarder feeds that themselves or works with another boarder or their trainer if they can’t be there. I do this for my horse’s Robaxin because he doesn’t get enough grain otherwise to make him want to eat it.

It is kind of a pain for some of the horses with meds and supplements, and we have several horses on pergolide which can’t be taken out of the package too early. But most boarders try to just have one container to dump and not several supplement things. These are on a separate shelf and labeled per horse.

I feed a different grain and supplements so I bring containers with everything mixed. I suppose you could ask your horse owners who feed supplements to make up containers on a weekly basis or something even if they are feeding your provided grain. I try to make things as idiot proof as possible in case of staff changes and also just to cut down on the amount of individual needs one has to keep track of for so many horses.

[mmeqcenter]

A golf cart would probably make it go a bit faster

[scislandsprite]

I was at a barn that used buckets with lids & left prepared outside each horse’s stall. Then you would just dump the buckets and bring it back to the feed room to restock & put them out again.

[pony_baloney]

At a barn where I worked we had a shopping cart. Some buckets got stacked in the cart, others were easily hung on the side with hooks or put on the bottom shelf. Feed was premeasured beforehand.

[quietann]

little hint: if you are nesting buckets, put the supplements in the bucket first and cover with the feed… reduces cross-contamination and mess on the outsides of the buckets. (note I have been responsible for setting up feed for more the 1 horse maybe 5 times in my life, but have seen enough cross-contamination…)

[sophie]

At my big barn, each horse has 2 buckets, labeled with its name and AM or PM. The feed is prepared after AM feeding, buckets are then stacked int he feed room with the PM bucket on top (and one of those shower caps to prevent birds or other critters to get to the grain).
Then the people feeding use a cart to go down the aisle and feed everyone. Those horses living outside get fed that way too.
Not ideal, but it works.

[SBrentnall]

At every dressage barn I’ve ever been at in CA, the owners make grain baggies and the barn staff feed them. At my current barn, we have metal filing cabinets with a drawer for each horse.

[fordtraktor]

I only have 12-14 horses at a time, but I feed by section because I don’t have more than 5 horses in any one barn. I prepare and distribute in the little 8 qt. Buckets as I go along, so I don’t need enormous piles of buckets.

I find that easier that doing it all at once. Note that none of the horses are on any meds or supplements that would make cross-contamination an issue (no Regumate or banned ingredients). The horses don’t eat out of the buckets, they are dumped in separate buckets in the stalls or fields.

A lot depends on farm layout and maximizing workflow/minimizing steps…with horses fed in different groupings, it makes more sense to go by barn/field for me (my feed room is very central). By the time I am done with the last grain group the horses in barn 1 are done and ready to be turned out.

[AW]

I only have 15-19 to feed but lots of special needs/supplements/soaked feeds, etc. Grain and supplements are in a shed outside the door. Each horse has a bucket labeled with their name. Supps are boarder-made packets in drawers on top of the feed table, grains are in 4-5 bins under the table. I keep the chart as updated as possible but the buckets are also labeled with what they eat, and the bins are labeled with which horses get that grain. We don’t do stall-front charts because horses can’t have nice things, but the ones with really special stuff get a small magnetic sign that they mostly leave alone. We set up the next meal as soon as we feed. The buckets get stacked in stall order in a big tote on a gorilla cart and covered with a towel for flies. We have another gorilla cart of soaked beet pulp and any liquid supps lined up in stall order that stays in the aisle and yet another for soaked meals. After we hay we do beet pulp and liquids. The few horses that don’t get bp get their liquids squirted in their feed tub. Then we grain and set up everything for dinner. My amazing dinner feeders set up lunches/soaked meals when they set breakfast, too. It’s as idiot-proof a system as I could come up with!

[ProfAmEq]

Have been at a few places. This is what I have seen work best and was easiest for me when I had to pick up feedings etc.

Labeled buckets (name, AM/PM) and carts. Feed chart on wall. Feeds in labeled trash cans with calibrated scoops (weigh a pound and mark each scoop with duct tape). Supplements bagged by owners or in smartpaks, in plastic drawers. Meds are dispensed per directions on white board if they can’t go in grain, otherwise they are bagged with supps.

Feed gets batched into buckets and put on the cart. Then at feedtime, liquid supplements get added into the buckets, carts roll to the wash rack, grain gets soaked there, and then wheeled out. Wet buckets are one color, dry another, to keep it clear.

[Marginally_Safe]

To answer some questions:

We feed stalled and pastured horses.

We buy all the grain (we have limited room to store different kinds), if an owner wants a different kind of grain they buy their own and keep it at home.

Some owners make their own bags, but for 80% they pay us to make them.

What we find the most time consuming is making the grain bags + each horse having their own bucket. Finding each bucket (having them stacked by stall is helpful but lets me real that doesnt always happen), dumping, rinsing then stacking when dry.

I was hoping someone had a magic system but I think the real problem is the supplements and the meds. Which are not going to go away.

The current graining system is doesnt take all day but it is tie consuming task I was hoping to simplify (for weekenders), and cut down on time.

[trubandloki]

@Marginally_Safe it sounds like one problem would be fixed by putting the buckets back all in one place after feeding. That way no one would have to go looking for them.
(Or are you talking about the buckets they actually eat out of in their stalls?)

[quietann]

Agreed. Every barn I have been at had different buckets for preparing grain kept in the feed room, and eating it.

[trubandloki]

@quietann

Agreed. Every barn I have been at had different buckets for preparing grain kept in the feed room, and eating it.

Yes!
Even if the horses eat from floor tubs, the grain is brought to their stall in something else.

But it does lead to an interesting question of how to deal with the floor tubs too. If they are rinsed out daily at this facility someone needs to move them all back to the stalls. That is quite a bit of work (they are not light so moving them in mass is work).

[ProfAmEq]

Are your horses eating out of said buckets? Because that’s not how we do it—the buckets get dumped into feed bins. Then put back on the cart and rolled back to the wash rack for rinsing. Our cart has holes (flat cart, made with what looks like the same stuff as milk crates?) so buckets are left upside down to dry until they get filled again the next day. We have two buckets for each horse. AM and PM, so the next feeding is batched right after mealtime, locked up in feed room until it’s loaded on the cart (other buckets are now dry and can be filled, etc.). Feed bins get cleaned up when stalls and water are done.

The supplements don’t take much time because they are prebagged and added to the buckets with grain.

Meds are a little more complicated but for anything that goes in food, it’s bagged with supplements and added with grain. Maybe have a third color bucket for horses that have meds, or a piece of red tape like someone else suggested is a great idea. I like that we have a separate board just for meds so it’s really clear who needs what and when—but only one or two regular people ever dose meds anyway.

ETA; we use cheap food grade plastic pails, nothing fancy, 5 bucks bucks each, if that helps.

[ProfAmEq]

We do it when we dump water buckets, which for me is when I’m doing the stall. I will dump water from water buckets into it, and then dump the dirty water in the wheelbarrow. If it’s super nasty, I hit it with the hose—and once a week everything gets a real scrub anyway.

[MsM]

I have never boarded at a barn that washed feed buckets daily! At best, they are cleaned once a week when the water wont immediately freeze!

Current barn has a small bucket with each horse’s name on it and a few extras. Feed is put in and supplements supplied by owners in baggies is dumped at the same time. Buckets are stacked in order for each side of each aisle. They don’t use a cart, but could. As a bucket is emptied is is nested with the last empty bucket etc. Feedings for the next meal are then prepared and the buckets are either kept in a bin or at least covered until feeding.
The only difficulty happens when a horse is on something liquidy (no horses here on Regumate etc) Those buckets would be top of a stack regardless of location and left to soak in the washstall if not too cold while a spare bucket is used for the next meal.

[scislandsprite]

@MsM

I have never boarded at a barn that washed feed buckets daily! At best, they are cleaned once a week when the water wont immediately freeze!

I think it also depends on what the horses are eating! For example, mine is on a small amount of grain without water/mash which would make the feed tub a bit messier so it’s always clean after she eats. About half of the horses at my barn get a mash and the horses don’t use the same feed tub every time so we wash all of them after each feeding so I guess YMMV!

[Angela_Freda]

Here are my flagged buckets

Red indicates a med should be/ is in feed

Blue indicates feed needs to be soaked

[Alterration]

We don’t have that many - 10-12 at max capacity (although that sometimes feels like too many) but we’ve got a 2 level cart that I bought from Harbor Freight with a handle on one side. Then I have smaller buckets (square) that I bought from Uline that all fit on the cart and are labeled with each horse’s name.

I fill each bucket in the feed room with the appropriate feeds and supplements and then wheel it down the aisle, dumping as I get to each horse. I have the buckets in the order of the horses so I don’t screw up

I wet all feeds so then when the weather is nice enough I have an extra container that I fill with water and then give each bucket a quick swish before returning it to the feed room and covering the whole thing with a tarp.

The nice thing about those buckets is that they are easily dishwashed and come with a lid so that if you need a longer soak, you can do so. And they are cheap! But I don’t feed a lot of feed at any one time (since I’ve switched to Hygain, it’s a lot less volume) so it works well.