And there it is.
Properly executed, a deeply bedded stall is far less disgusting than the minimal bedding so many people have become convinced is “better.” They do take a little longer to clean though - no argument there.
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Having cleaned lots of stalls in my life I think there are plenty of stalls with way too much bedding in them.
That does not mean stalls should have no or almost no bedding in them.
There is something between those two things, and I am guessing that is what is being suggested here. The amount of bedding that keeps the horse clean while not making stall cleaning into a crazy burden for the underpaid staff.
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There’s properly bedded and then there’s a boarder’s interpretation of that term. I find the people who have to do the work themselves quickly change their tune.
And, I would not be Beowulf, the Nagging Queen Of Turnout Advocacy, if I did not point out that a deeply bedded stall should never be a substitute for proper turnout. Horses should not spend so much of their time in a stall that they need 6" of protection. 
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Yep. Pick 45 of those deeply bedded stalls and let’s see how you feel. People’s time is valuable… 100% chance they go into “screw it” mode and start wasting shavings because sifting through a whole fork full to get one turd is infuriating, and when you have 44 more to go plus 10 other barn chores waiting…
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The easiest stall to keep clean is the one the horse doesn’t use bc he’s outside 24/7 
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My hackney keeps his stall pristine. Lol, I wish every horse was as neat in their stall as him.
I bed deep, around 6”-8”, it does take an extra couple minutes but no one has any pee or poo spots on them either. I do keep mine at home so only wasting my own time and shavings.
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No one explained to mine that they should not wander back inside and use their stall as a litter box.
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Lol. One of mine does like to come in and pee on shavings. I keep meaning to make him a sand pile to see if he’d like to pre in it
If you’re looking at me with that pointy finger, you can lower it. I clean and bed my own stall daily. I am done as quickly as my fellow boarders who are in the minimal bedding camp. Our horses get the same amount of turnout. I quite likely go through fewer bags of bedding than they do as they seem to be adding bags all. the. time.
As to your general finger pointing about no horse should spend that much time in a stall to need a deep bed, please come to Southern Ontario where we no longer get snowy winters. We get ice. Inches and inches of ice. If you’re stupid enough to turn out on that, rather than leave them in and exercise them in the indoor everyday, well, enjoy your vet bills and your heartbreak, and count yourself lucky if its only vet bills and you manage to escape with a horse that can be rehabilitated and not put down on the spot.
And then we have (not just in my area) horses that are prescribed stall rest. Should they not have a nice comfortable supportive bed, or is your convenience more important?
And while we’re on it, whoever said that deep bedding was a substitute for turnout? How in the heck did you invent that out of ANYTHING I’ve ever written on this entire bulletin board? Of course proper bedding is not a substitute for turnout.
The only reason people have embraced minimal to low bedding amounts is that the mat companies sold them a line of horseshit and horse owners took that line of horseshit to the bank at the expense of their own animals’ welfare.
I wasn’t really pointing fingers at anyone, I was just posting a general thought… Yeesh.
Since your post addressed me in specific, I live in NA and we get plenty of snow and ice – for months. My horses are out 24/7.
Ironically, my worst pasture injury to date happened in late summer! Horses don’t need ice to make poor decisions.
Going back to my very general comment about a boarder and their interpretation of that term, yes, it is my totally general experience that boarders don’t see the big picture. They see the micro: how their horse is cared for, sometimes in relation to others. They see ‘three bags of shavings every day’ as a perfectly reasonable request. They see the stall after it’s been picked and swept. What they don’t see is their horse sifting through deep footing, not standing evenly because the footing is so deep, the 15+ minutes it takes to thoroughly muck that stall, how much additional hay the horse wastes because there’s too much shavings in it, the additional single wheelbarrow trip that is from their horse’s stall alone, the additional shavings waste from it being churned into the ground, and the additional dust and debris that ends up in the barn and the horse’s breathing space.
It’s not just about convenience - if you bed that deeply the horse’s aren’t standing level, they’re walking around for 10-16+ (industry standard) hours in deep footing, they’re breathing it… I always find it funny when well-meaning horse people are aghast over riding in a ring for 20m with slightly deep footing but standing in shavings more than 6+ inches for hours at a time is okay. Shavings are not ‘supportive’. They do not help ‘support’ any sort of healing in the horse. They are good for collecting urine and providing a light buffer between the mats and the horse, but that is it. If you are truly concerned about your horse being comfortable when they sleep, turn it out on good footing with good herd mates. They will never sleep better.
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No. My one mare does not sleep on the ground. She is now on night turnout and pushes all her less desirable hay into a cushion and that is where she sleeps. She paws it all up like a dog fixing its bed. She likes her fluffy bed. The other mare has her door to the stall open 24x7. She will not sleep in the stall no matter how many shavings are in there. She lies down in the dirt outside. She is however a huge pig and will not poop outside so she gets very few shavings in her stall. This does make her pee outdoors. So I don’t believe in “all horses” because they are individuals with different preferences.
And NO - I am not cleaning other person’s stalls. And nobody else is cleaning my stalls. They don’t do it right! And I am not cleaning their “deep litter” bed that they have not cleaned out the wet spot in 5 years and they are not trashing my stalls by slinging poop all over and calling it clean ! Not that I am anal retentive or anything like that. And yes I spend a lot more time cleaning the stalls than my house.
And everybody has to be on the same page with hay feeding. I guess round bales outside would take care of some of this problem. I have been in the situation co-oping during the winter when the other person saw no reason to feed hay in the pasture during the day when there was no grass available to graze. There was one pasture. I didn’t want my horses to go without hay for 12-14 hours during turnout. She was fine with no hay available unless I wanted to feed my hay to all the horses and she was fine with that too.
If you can get all the people on the same page and they have similar philosophies it can work.
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For gardening or to sell to gardeners.
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My arthritic old man prefers fewer shavings. If you bed him deep, he won’t lie down as consistently, and his legs stock up. I’ve tried it.
And no, he’s not on mats. The stalls at my barn have clay bases.
I think this makes a good point. It probably works best if these types of situations have horses turned out by owner or in groups of like minded owners.
I can not imagine paying to feed another person’s horse all winter because they do not want to put hay out.
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Not to derail this thread even more into a bedding discussion, but I have one super tidy horse (never steps in his poop and even makes a point of peeing outside) and my issue is that because I don’t remove soaked bedding daily, it gets extremely dusty. Stripping clean but dusty bedding throws my compost ratios off, so I either rotate stalls or shovel older bedding out of his stall into the messier horses’ stalls so they can pee on it. Do you do something similar? My horses are out 24/7 as much of the year as possible but in the summer they prefer to be in the barn during the day (especially the poor old man with anhidrosis). I use America’s Choice Mini Flakes, which is more or less clean sawdust. It’s by far the best bedding I’ve tried, but still gets dusty as it ages.
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Perhaps you could moisten the bedding with a spray bottle of water?
I’m a fanatic about having bedding rotated. Once the stall is clean, the oldest shavings go in the wet spot(s). The newer bedding goes around that and any fresh bedding goes where the empty spots are, or may be slightly banked in the corners. I hate when a half inch of new bedding is sprinkled over the cleaned stall. Horse comes in, walks around twice and it’s all mixed up. Oldest in should be first out IMHO.
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I don’t notice his bedding getting super dusty.
I use the big flakes and it takes a while to break down as he doesn’t really walk around his stall. He is either laying down, by his hay bag, or napping at the door.
When I strip his stall those shaving go in his outside stall pen or the pee spot for the big horses, sometimes I save them in a big pile and use them around my blueberry bushes or any icy patches in the winter.
when i boarded at golden gate park i purchased extra straw bales and cleaned my own stall every evening. They had done it in the morning and left everything dry, including dried poop. They added three flakes of straw shaken over top of their leavings. That’s NOTHING!!! So every evening, i cleaned it ALL out …put down some shavings then 1/2 a bale of straw for the night. It was at my expense and my labor, but a labor of love…they did not do a satisfactory job. And it would be worse than useless to complain as it was the only stable in town and the wait list was a couple of generations long…
hmm, naive maybe. and Nice.
