Pelleted bedding????

[7HL]

Regarding the OP’s original question–I have never noticed pelleted bedding clumping/packing in horses’ feet, at least not to the degree that it doesn’t all fall right out when I pick the hoof up. No digging or excavating necessary.

Not sure if it’s the particular pellets or the way they are being used by our B/O. Most of the stalls are just a very fine dust.

With any moisture at all they seem to be packing in every crevice of ours and others hooves. It doesn’t just fall out. It gets packed in solid and has to be picked out. We have some concern what is being packed is urine soaked pellet dust.

Our horses are in stall about 8+ hrs during the day and are out at night.

[movo]

I have used pelleted bedding (over rubber mats) for years. I am very happy with them. When I clean (twice a day), I take out the soaked bedding and rake the dry stuff over the top of the wet spot. I have never had it clump into my horse’s feet.

If I wet the bedding down with water, just so it is damp, not soaked, it dries out fairly quickly again and doesn’t clump in their feet. Clean water evaporates out of the shavings.

Pellets don’t turn into very fine dust until they have been hammered into dust by the horse’s feet and the stall is kept too dry. If they are wet, then they are not dusty. If they are super fine and clumping into the horse’s feet, I think they have been in there too long and the stall cleaner is not taking out the urine soaked bedding.

[Graymaresrule]

FWIW, if you don’t moisten pellets sufficiently they will pack. For example, at least with Guardian pellets, you can’t simply dump the pellets onto the pee spot and expect that they will expand. Well, they will, sorta, into a solid mass. With Guardian you have to wet the pellets until they are completely un pelleted

[morgansnmind]

does anyone else have the problem with their horse eating the pellets? My BO used them some last year and I didn’t really like them much becase they seemed pretty slick, uncomfortable for the horse to lay on and my horse nibbled at it like it was grain.

Now that I’ve been reading more about it I no that the BO didn’t wet them down at all and he didn’t bed deep. I’m going to be buying my own small farm and I’m thinking about using it because of composting…is it really that much faster to break down than shavings? Not sure why my horse liked to eat the pellets but maybe if they were watered down she would leave them alone.

[MistyBlue]

Yes, for about 6 months I had an issue with one gelding who would try taking a mouthful of freshly dumped new pellets and chewing them up fast. He’d then get a disgusted look on his face and spit them back out.
That would only happen if I was adding bedding when he was in his stall too. He’d see the bag, see the pile I just dumped and it does look like some grains. And of course he’s a hog about food anyways. :lol:
Once activated he left them alone…and now years later he’s learned that white plastic bag + dumping on stall floor does NOT = food. :winkgrin:

My manure pile hasn’t changed size in years. Since there’s very little bedding in it and the little bedding that is there breaks down very fast, it composts at just about the same rate I add to it. It does grow larger by end of winter but by mid summer it’s composted back down again. I do also water it during dry spells and turn it once a week in hot weather to keep it compoting down. I’ve also found adding grass clippings heats it up and breaks it down faster too. So I toss weekly grass clippings on it right before turning it.

Helps a bunch living in a small property with somewhat nearby neighbors. No smells, no flies and no growing manure pile.

[my_doran]

i have used them as well…you get dust no matter what u do.
to lessen it…i soaked a whole bunch overnight and seemed to lessen some of the dust problem,but the downfall was it lost some of its absorbency it was intended to do.i don’t really use them anymore as i also felt it was more expensive then using shavings and more time consuming.i also agree with with the other problems others have posted about this product.

[Zu_Zu]

A Prepared = Broken down bag of pellets in a wheelbarrow at all times

I highly recommend once you get your stalls set up with pellets ~ many bags and watered =misted to allow them to break down to “FLUFFY” then I have a plastic wheelbarrow = I dump in a bag of pellets and then when dumping water buckets dump about 2 gallons of water in the wheelbarrow and it stays in the aisle barn until it turns fluffy and/ or I need it for a stall – Once the stalls are set up you will only need to add a bag or two a week :yes:… this works for a small barn at least. I never dump the slick pellets in the stall and water ~ I only add broken down pellets. My wheelbarrow is always holding the next prepared bag ready to be added to freshen a stall.
I put pellet bedding in my sheds - I place ten bags in a cart pulled by ATV drive to water source - punch hole in top of each bag - insert hose for one minute or so into each bag - deliver to shed - unload the bags scattered down the entire length and then split open bags and rake out bedding ~ TOOK AWHILE TO FINE TUNE :yes: ~ THOUGHT I WOULD NEVER :eek: EVER USE PELLETS BUT NOW 90% OF MY BEDDING IS PELLETS - JUST PURCHASED FOUR PALLETS ` ON SALE ! $3.80 A BAG :D:yes:

[shawnee_Acres]

I have used pelleted bedding for YEARS and never had all the problems people list. It does not “clump” in feet, never had a horse try and eat it and it is not dusty as long as you don’t leave it in the stalls like FOREVER. I use about 1 - 1 1/2 bags per week per stall. It is ecomnomical, nice for spreading or composting, easy to pick, easy to store (bags instead of a HUGE pile of shavings), absorbant etc. Whats not to like? I use it over mats in the stalls and will NOT use anything else!

[MistyBlue]

$3.80 a bag??? Whoa, great price.

[RubyLink]

The barn I worked at 6 or 7 years ago used pellets and I loved cleaning them when compared to cleaning stalls that had used shavings or straw. The horses were only in at night and that probably helped a bit, too. It wasn’t dusty and we were in an area where it rained a lot both was not humid at all.

I just had to learn how to clean them properly otherwise the smell was horrendous. It didn’t help that the barn had zero ventilation. The barn was built in a U shape and it only opened at both ends of the U and the curve was the arena. There were no windows or anything. Switching to pellets did help with the smell a lot.

When I started working at I place that used shavings I wanted to shoot myself in the foots so I would have an excuse not to clean those stalls.

The downside is if you don’t find the right way to clean the stall when using the pellets they just make the smell worse. My friend boards at a barn where the stall cleaners takes out the majority of the urine and then mixes the rest in with the bedding. I couldn’t even stand in the barn while my friend was tacking up. All the stalls had windows, it was a single aisle barn which had big sliding doors at both ends that where all the way open and it still reeked.

If you find a great system then they work like a charm, if not, they are horrible.

[Zu_Zu]

My thoughts exactly ~

@MistyBlue;4984011

$3.80 a bag??? Whoa, great price.

My thoughts exactly :yes: that’s why we bought all the pellets that two stores had left — three and 2/3 pallets of pellets…:D:cool: 150 bags plus 61 oops I sit corrected ~~ that’s four pallets of 50 each and an extra 11 bags… the stores were having a Clearance … I seriously feel we hit the jackpot…

[7HL]

Maybe they are great when used properly. So far my experience with them, not by choice, has not been positive.

[Langfuhr]

Ive used Streufex only, and its great IF youre using the stall on a daily basis and you turn it over every day. You have to, have to, have to flip the Streufex or otherwise it compresses and gets moldy/very dusty and dont even think of not wearing a face mask while doing the stalls. I love that you can spread it, which makes disposal a breeze (its a very efficient bedding)…Otherwise, I hate it.

[Ridge_Runner]

@7HL;4985026

Maybe they are great when used properly. So far my experience with them, not by choice, has not been positive.

Honest to God…I’m with you on this. I tried the pellets (Guardian) for months and no matter what I did or how much I wet it or how deep it was, it was a nasty dust pit only days after we’d bed it down. I also found that it packs down to a hard layer if you wet it too much (or in this case enough to finally stop the dust) and then mucking was anything but easy. We actually broke tines on our mucking forks trying to dig out that packed down hard layer.

I did find that the very piggy wet horses that went through more bedding had less dust than the neater horses…but that means that we had to strip out the neater horses anyway after some time as it would just turn into a fine silt powder.

I found it more expensive than bulk shavings and really do not think it’s that much faster to clean than any other wood product stall.

I guess every form of bedding will have it proponents but I was very unhappy with the pellets and I gave it a good try. We had 14 horses on it over the winter in our barn and into early summer.

[CatOnLap]

OH yeah I forgot about horses eating the darn things. My big gelding would munch and crunch on the pine pellets like grain, even if he had hay in front of him. Once I clued in and moistened them in the wheelbarrow for 20 minutes first, and then spread the resulting sawdust, it was not a problem.

He’s not the sharpest tool in the shed…

[ASB_Stars]

Several people have PM’d me about my pellet/shavings source. He is an old order Amishman, so I asked him if it was OK to spread the word on the internet- he’s fine with it, so here goes:

Sam Beiler 717.354.7737

He is located in the New Holland area, if memory serves. His price is $4.40 per bag, for either product, for 100 bales, or more. Delivery is available, but is extra.

Tell him ASB Stars sent ya! :lol:

[ICStables]

I love using pelleted bedding. I use ABS brand. There are a lot of different things that do effect the way they work. As others mentioned climate humidity and how the person applies the bedding. For me I add (to a stripped stall 12x12) 3 bags and wet them so they expand and they do expand ALOT. If they don’t fill the stall or look thin they are not wet enough. I use a manure fork to periodicaly fluff them to make sure they are thoroughly damp. From there it depends on the horse. Some this lasts me a month others I need to add a bag. When I do add a bag I don’t wet the new one. This works for me but again may not work else where. I do have one that would eat a bite when I added a new bag but quickly learned it tasted bad. I do need to mention that the horses at my barn are nice and clean in their stall except one.

[7HL]

@ICStables;4996602

I love using pelleted bedding. I use ABS brand. There are a lot of different things that do effect the way they work. As others mentioned climate humidity and how the person applies the bedding. For me I add (to a stripped stall 12x12) 3 bags and wet them so they expand and they do expand ALOT. If they don’t fill the stall or look thin they are not wet enough. I use a manure fork to periodicaly fluff them to make sure they are thoroughly damp. From there it depends on the horse. Some this lasts me a month others I need to add a bag. When I do add a bag I don’t wet the new one. This works for me but again may not work else where. I do have one that would eat a bite when I added a new bag but quickly learned it tasted bad. I do need to mention that the horses at my barn are nice and clean in their stall except one.

This appears to be the a very similar method that my BO has bought into. What I believe the main issue is that some use Pellets as bedding and some use it as Stall Litter. There is a big difference. I don’t see how it’s possible to start with only 3 bags and ad only 1 bag in one months time, let alone have 3 bags last a total of 1 month.

I think many are told that it will be cheaper to use pellets, then think they can use less and change it less frequently. My experience so far has been negative to pellets. I am hoping the “experiment” doesn’t last much longer and we can be done with pellets.

[Graymaresrule]

FWIW, I start with six or seven bags, but usually only need to add one a week

[maresnest]

In order for pellets to work correctly, you have to wet them thoroughly. I use my dirty water bucket water. I put a bag of pellets in a muck tub or wheelbarrow, dump on about 4 gallons of water, and wait for it to double in volume. It’s quick in the summer, slower in the winter. (But even in the winter, the pellets are done cooking by the time I’ve got the buckets clean and refilled.)

Using this protocol, you get a very soft, not-at-all-dusty sawdust that is still able to absorb a lot of urine. Under these circumstances, I like pellet bedding vastly better than shavings, sawdust, or straw. If, however, my only option were to use dry pellets, I probably would hate them. It’s all in the preparation.