beautiful barn! ours had access in the past to two different plenty-spacious stalls that were converted to run-ins – they also like to dogpile into one (always the smaller of the two!), regardless of how little room it leaves them. :rolleyes:
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Where you live makes such a huge difference in what your horse needs in terms of shelter. In high rainfall areas, horse shelters are necessary, otherwise, your horse is standing in hock deep mud and soaked to the skin 24/7 for months on end, and will develop health issues as a result. We used to live in such a place. Our horses used to stand in their stalls, by choice, looking out into their flooded paddocks (with thousands of dollars worth of drainage projects in place- to no avail). There is nothing colder than a wet horse in 100 % humidity atmosphere in pouring rain for days or weeks without letting up, at 1 degree C standing in a stall to keep out of the deluge. Horse blankets help, but don’t do much for feet. Just the humidity in the air makes the feet soft, even if the ground/floor is dry. Horse keeping in a “swamp” is not healthy for the horse. We moved away.
We now live in a “semi-arid” area. Our hayfields need irrigation in order to grow grass adequately for harvest. Our horses now live outdoors 24/7. I have a couple of stalls available if necessary, but they are rarely used- only if someone is sick or injured. They mostly no longer need horse shoes, the quality of feet is so much different. It gets cold in the winter, and the snow is dry. The snow as footing in winter is like white sand, squeaks under foot. If horses feel cold, they go for a run together in huge fields, and everyone warms up. If they are hot, they go for a dip in the creek or pond, splashing, pawing and rolling in the water, a “pool party” in summer, or roll in the snow in winter. When horses are in training, they are in paddocks in summer. If it rains, they get wet. They don’t shrink. Rain happens only for a few hours, then goes away and everything dries up again. “Spring breakup” happens for a couple weeks in the spring, when we have some mud in places. But after that, no mud.
Our wintering areas have shelters, which horses may use if they so choose. Sometimes they do use them. Mostly, they prefer to shelter in the trees. If you have “dry cold”, horses thrive in these conditions. If you have “high humidity cold”, horses do not do well without help in this sort of environment.
The other huge bonus to keeping horses outside is the lack of stall cleaning and production of dirty stall bedding/manure, which can be so expensive to get rid of, and damaging to the environment in huge amounts. With no stall use, no expense for bedding for stalls either. Daily cleaning of paddocks and shelters without horses being locked into stalls with bedding produces only a small amount of top quality manure, pure manure without bedding, which breaks down quickly and becomes valuable compost soon. So, no stall muckers need to be employed, no sawdust needs to be purchased, and no manure disposal costs. Bonus!
My point is… it depends so much on where you are located, and the environment that the horses live in, how your horses are kept healthy (to the best of your ability). There are risks and problems with every decision you make for your horses’ care. If you are in a high rainfall area, horses need more shelter than they do in drier areas. If you are in an area where horses must be locked into stalls for many hours a day to keep them dry, healthy and comfortable, there are other health issues that become more likely to crop up in time. Hoof circulation issues, and impaction colic being the prime issues due to the lack of 24/7 motion, the way that horses were designed to live. So choose carefully where you wish to live, if your horses are important in your life.
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Thanks, it was , still very useful/utilitarian, but, ohboy does it need a deep cleaning! :uhoh:
Yup, they Jenga themselves into the space & nobody gets hurt.
They even manage to sleep (sternal) in a shared stall. Although usually that means TWH & mini or mini by himself.
Although…
Last evening the TWH did a little Dinnertime Dance of Joy - complete with all 4 off the ground, inside a stall the mini was just entering.
They routinely share the stall for feeding as mini’s stall does not have an entrance from the outside (yet).
Both mini & I were like :eek:
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del
I didn’t do it yet, I’ve just been thinking about it. But…change in plans…I was going to keep them in shed area for 2 more weeks…BUT the amount of rain we have had has made it HORRIBLE for me to have to go out there to take them hay. I was using their stalls to store hay (about 2 weeks worth, so my plan would work) but guess what last night I went and moved those bales so they could come in their stalls and I don’t have to slog through boot-sucking mud to feed them. I HATE MUD.
We’re on the wet side of Oregon, and our four horses (minis and small ponies), have their choice of:
• a 3-1/2-sided run-in,
• a DIY ShelterLogic-type shelter,
• a horse “umbrella” (tarp suspended from posts in corner of turnout),
• dense windblock provided by the surrounding woods.
Their favorite shelter (by far): the umbrella.
My shed is from Klene Pipe Structures so it is… a pipe frame. There is enough space between the pipe and the wood that I can pass a chain through, and I chain the panels top and bottom to the structure. In a pinch, hay string wrapped multiple times would work, that stuff is nearly indestructible. I think yours was posts, so you could put in screw eyes and chain or tie to those, or use the half-circle clamps and screw them to the post.
I used farm gates to close my run in shed. Shed was 16’ wide with a center post in the middle of the outer edge. The gates were mounted on the outside posts and folded in against the wall. When needed, they were swung out and attached to center post.
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I know this is just me but of the horses I took care of while in college five were killed by two separate events of lightening strikes on the trees they were standing under … something that I just do not wish to happen again… so all of ours have stalls they are put up in when needed.
I get it. I had a friend lose a horse to lightning as well. The OTTB lived in Western WA, we never had lightning (well, I shouldn’t say never, I did see it once of twice when I lived here). Now that we are in the Midwest and lightning central, they come in during electrical storms…….
that doesn’t protect them either, though. my horse was killed in his stall by a lightning strike, 2012 - the horse in my signature.
My 2 are turned out 24/7 with a 3 sided shelter. After 3 years, my show barn raised gelding still hates “roughing it” and uses the shelter a lot - stands under fans when it’s over 90°, takes cover at the first drop of rain, takes regularly scheduled naps, and stands inside glaring at me when he wants a blanket. My senior mare uses the shelter to poop in, and will keep grazing during a hailstorm after angrily refusing all blanketing attempts. I use corral panels to create a “stall” when needed.
When I lived in the snow belt of Michigan I had one old horse who preferred to be nekkid & outside and one who wanted a blanket and cozy stall, so I rigged my barn for free choice access.
My horse lives outside 24/7. I used to stall him at night until he started trying to disassemble his stall every night. He took the door off the rollers,broke the cross bar on the door… you get the idea. After 2 weeks of this, I told the barn manager that Dune had spoken. He moved to an outside herd and someone else got to have a stall. He’s happy and although I’m not thrilled with hunting for him in the dark (dam turning back of the clocks), he is happier living outside.
I’m so jealous when reading this thread and looking at all those nice shelters!
My 20 yo Ottb is boarded and lives outside with a buddy from April to November but I stall her at night during the winter months. I wish I could let her live outside all year, but the shelter in her pasture is not great. It is a 3 sided metal one, divided in 2 so that one side opens south and the other opens north. There is no floor other than the pasture floor so it gets really mucky and never cleaned (this would be a huge job, tractor required…and useless unless the shelter was modified). The main reason though, is that in winter, with prevailing winds etc, the best shelter side is hogged by the boss mare, who won’t let anyone else in it.
If I had the money I would buy a “step-up” shelter similar to @wsmoak 's.
@2DogsFarm you have the ideal set up in my book. Years ago my mare was boarded at a friend’s backyard barn with a somewhat similar set up except that her mare’s stall opened up to one paddock (which served as run-out to the big pasture) , my mare’s stall and the pony’s stall opened to a separate paddock. It made it easy to clean the stalls, and the horses decide where they’d rather be (my mare often chose to be in the smaller pony stall…grass is always greener… lol). On most days, they would all 3 be turned out in the big pasture that had a 3 sided shelter in it.
My horses have a three side shelter, an in-and-out barn, and abundant trees as their shelters. Each stall is 15’x16’, and has a radiant heater that turns on at 35F. We just had record low in history two days ago. Guess where they were standing:cool:?
:lol: Probably like my horse, in dense fog, 35°, drizzly and a stiff breeze to boot - instead of being in his comfy shed eating his lovely Bermuda, he was out in the middle of his field, grazing. It seems to defy logic sometimes. What seems the warm and cozy option to us humans, the horse ignores. 
But I am envious of your radiant heating! How cool is that!
Goodness - I want to live at your house!!! It sounds perfect to me!
Any pictures of those stalls you could share with us?
Do you happen to know the specs on the heaters, brand, size?
They sound awesome!
Here is a picture of the stall. The red glow is the radiator. I wish I kept the specs. I had a complete sheet of all the parts that went into the barn, but alas, it has gone poof. However, if memory served, I believe it is this one: https://www.premier1supplies.com/p/prima-heat-lamp?gclid=CjwKCAiAz7TfBRAKEiwAz8fKOOQeqj6tYGMUvVk7MWgPtR-qnR2xv5i7Nr96MJjykjD6I9MKKh4mhBoCAqUQAvD_BwE
We hang the heater from the rafter, then wrap the cord around the rater that has an outlet built in. That way, there is no chance of the heater touching the bedding while still connected to the outlet. It is a fire hazard. The radiator generates a lot of heat. It swings so if horses bump into it, it will just swing away. We then got something like this https://www.amazon.com/Farm-Innovators-TC-3-Thermostatically-Controlled/dp/B0006U2HD2/ref=asc_df_B0006U2HD2/?tag=hyprod-20&linkCode=df0&hvadid=167133658256&hvpos=1o1&hvnetw=g&hvrand=15855423040387244726&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9060362&hvtargid=aud-467599743108:pla-274612062233&psc=1 that actually plugs into the outlet. It turns on when temperature falls below 35F. The radiator is plugged into the cube so it will turn on according to temperature.
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My guys have 10 acres and a 3 sided shed plus plenty of trees with good shelter under them. I do have access to a couple of stalls but none of them, esp my senior gal, are happy when they are inside. Usually she’s good for an hour or two and then she gets frustrated with being in.
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