I prefer basket forks too and the only thing I will buy now is the Fine Tines Fork: https://www.bigdweb.com/product/fine+tine+pitch+fork.do. The space between the tines is narrower so smaller pieces of waste don’t fall through. I can’t stand using a regular fork anymore.
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I use a small one of those to take ice and snow out of tanks.
Works wonderfully for that.
My horse is in a dry lot, so except for his pee spot with pellets, I am picking poop off of compacted soil. For this I much prefer the metal Apple Picker forks. Even if I hit a rock the metal tines don’t break.
Forever Fork! It has a life time warranty, managed to break one, emailed the company and they mailed a replacement that day, no charge.
The Greenhawk forks. They last longer than Duraforks do. And are cheaper to buy. And you can just buy the “business end” separately, if, by chance, you actually do destroy the previous one. These go on sale at Greenhawk sometimes, even cheaper then. And I chip horse shit out of snow and ice with mine.
I also like the basket forks MUCH better than the flat ones. Otherwise as soon as I start to sift, the poop falls off the edges. I am interested in trying the fine tines version because I hate how the smaller poop bits will fall through the regular spaced tines.
I started with the fine tine because I have miniature donkeys with “miniature manure balls”, and the fine tines hold them with no fall through.
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I like the wave fork, although the end tine finally cracked after 4-5 years. The only problem with that is the end tines aren’t sold individually that I could find, but no big deal, a zip tie fixed it perfectly. But I finally got around to getting a new fork, and I figured I would put the old one in the trailer for horse shows. etc.
I laughed so hard when I got the new one I set it side by side with the old one, and the old one was about 2-3" SHORTER in the tines department! That is kind of a testament to how tough they are. They don’t break, but apparently you can wear them down to nubs 
(I clean a mix of bedding and hard packed sand dry lot, so I’m sure the sand contributed to the significant disappearance of tines!!)
The durafork heads are available without the handle, too. I always make sure to keep one or two around, just in case! :yes:
It does take some time to become accustomed to the ergonomic forks. The neighbor who kindly feeds for us when we’re traveling always brought her standard- type fork over, while I took my ergonomic fork with me when taking care of her animals. She’s finally come around to preferring the ergonomic fork:yes:.
Just trying it once or a few times - or swapping back and forth with a straight-handled fork - is not sufficient to get the knack of using one, IMO. They’re not expensive, so might be worth a decent trial.
DMK, Give the Wave folks a call, tell them about that one broken tine. FORKS are warrented to be unbreakable! Perhaps the lady answering the phone will send you a replacement tine or two! Then you will have two good Wave forks! She sent me two plain tines to replace those side shield tines I did not like on my Wave fork. I like it better as a plain fork. I quickly wore down the two new tines to match the old ones. They do not LOOK short from wear, work perfectly!
Fine tine for the stalls and a metal Durafork in the dry lot. Honestly I’m not super picky though, I’ve used a ton of different ones over the years and never had an issue.
This:
https://www.valleyvet.com/ct_detail.html?pgguid=30e073df-7b6a-11d5-a192-00b0d0204ae5
Has a modified basket shape and spring steel tines that you can keep bending back into position if they catch and bend on anything. I am only on my 2nd one with 20 years of daily use picking up after 7 or more horses both in the barn and their outdoor sheds.
Although the Future Forks are my favorites, when my local farm store puts the Duraforks (handle and head) on sale for $12.95 (every couple of years!) I will buy a couple and toss them on top of my tack room, as you can’t buy a decent replacement head for that price.
Yeah but this thing weighs a ton. I use it to pick rocks out of the arena “sand” when I get sick of bending over all the time to grab them.
As the owner of small ponies and miniatures (small poos), I love the Fine Tines, so I bought one as a birthday present for my husband.
I typically am a basket fork kinda girl… but I got the shakenfork as a Xmas present from DH, and I kinda am obsessed. I haven’t been able to
total stop shaking(because of habit) but I sped up my stall mucking significantly.
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I park the forks where they’re exposed to rain, rain and more rain in the summer so they rot early. Plus the aluminum handles are much lighter and once you get used to them, much easier to use.
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I love these forks. They make a huge difference for me. I am also very tall and lanky with long arms. The shorter folks I know seem to prefer the normal straight handles, but the other gangly gal at the barn and I are devoted to these forks.
Wave fork all the way.
My children do god-knows-what with my rakes whenever they have jobs to do (like cleaning up leaves in the lawns in the fall) and ALWAYS break something. The Wave Fork folks have sent me new tines 3 times now with no hassle at all. Considering how many plastic forks I’ve been through in the same time frame, it’s pretty amazing that my wave fork has made it 7 or 8 years without anything but a replaced tine here or there.
Funny, though, @DMK, every time I replace a tine I spend a minute looking at the new tine and wondering if they changed the size…it always takes me a minute to realize that we’ve just worn down the old ones! :lol:
