Hi,
I’m planning on competing at Hagyard and I remember the stall floors are cement. What does everyone lay down over the cement before putting shavings down? I’m worried horse will either get scrapes, or not be able to get up. Do most people just put a ton of shavings down?
We just do deep shavings. I did buy a couple cheap thin area rugs at Aldi’s, thinking we would just throw the rug away, but they are still sitting in my garage. I still think that would work pretty well.
I just used a ton of shavings. My trainer actually takes an extra set of stall mats she keeps for shows.
I boarded at a barn for years that had cement floors - horses never had any problems with the floor and the owner didn’t use a ton of shavings either. Horses were fine, never soundness issues or anything. Your horse should be fine.
I bring mats but I believe you can also rent mats from Devers. It’s important to provide some cushion when we are asking them to work that hard & encourage them to lay down to give their legs a good rest.
Found it - https://deverrentals.com/feed-hay-bedding-paddocks/
We’ve taken a bale of straw and lined the bottom of the stall with whole flakes as a mat then added shavings on top. It eventually does get stirred up but the straw thickens the mix.
I’ve used shop mats in the past. Depending on how often you are showing at places with questionable stall flooring you can either rent them from Devers, or purchase your own for re-use. I used to show often enough at places with hard floors that I purchased my own for a bit more but never have to rent again.
I ordered two bales of straw ( along with hay and shavings) from the vendor on site at KHP. It was at my stall when I got there and my only young-at-heart TB enjoyed a weekend knee deep in straw.
Nothing. Lots of shavings. If you have sufficient shavings, you will not have problems with scrapes or rubs, and you also wont be dealing with Ill fitting or even well fitting mats shifting and trapping urine that would otherwise be soaked up by shavings and removed.
I have bedded Olympic and weg horses on concrete at csis for weeks, and at home full time. At home mostly using straw, but with the olympian, shaving on concrete at home. It really does keep a better cleaner stall, and if bedded well, horses are happy and comfortable. A lot of weddings. I usually start with six big bags of shavings, and add a new bag every other day.
Normally when I stable overnight at shows, I do the same thing regardless of the flooring underneath. I start with 4 bags of pelleted bedding and wet it down thoroughly by opening the top and pouring water in until it starts to pool at the top. The pellets will expand into a lovely cushy mattress and give you the opportunity to flatten out any deep pits. Then I put 2-4 bags of shavings on top of that. The bonus is that you won’t have to add as many bags of shavings throughout the show since the pelleted bedding will absorb most of the urine. I normally take another bag of pelleted bedding to add as I remove urine soaked spots, but I don’t use it if we’re there for less than 3 or so days. To be honest, I haven’t noticed a difference in how my horse feels using this method over another one, but I know that it’s significantly cheaper than using lots of shavings and mats, and a lot less work than lugging mats all over the place!
@KHP I either rent mats from Devers or bring my own. I have bedded shavings really deep and found my horses still scrambled and slid when getting up, so started always using mats. I’m definitely the exception though, most people just put the shavings on concrete and seem to be ok.
A bale of straw/stall with shavings. Works great. We bring ours, but they can be purchased there for retail plus 10%.
I ordered mats from www.therubberman.com and have been really happy with them! My horse pees a ton and also drags his feet around his stall (so fun to clean), so the mats really help with maintaining a nice stall when in the past I have used 10+ bags of shavings over a long weekend. They will more than pay for themselves over time, and they are lightweight and easy to hose off when we are packing up.
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