Oh dude. We are the same person. I have never seen red like when that mare jumped INTO the paddock with my gelding and when he trotted over to say hi, she turned her butt to him and started squirting and squatting and then trying to kick his face in. Wait, that’s not true. I might have been more mad when the reckless boarder (who also refused to wear a helmet) with the green-as-grass, one-eyed horse who bucked her off every third time she rode him decided to mount him from the back of her pick-up truck and he bucked her off, got loose and ran into traffic. That was super fun. And then it was on me to sink a post and put up a barrier across the access road so that never happened again.
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This, exactly. I’m charging enough to cover my costs and maybe bank an extra $100 a month lol. If I raised it any more to actually make a bit of a profit or hire someone else to do everything I’m doing now, I’d have to increase it by at least $375/person and they’d all just go somewhere else that’s cheaper.
Around here, the farms that make their own hay are able to charge low board prices. And the other boarding facilities offer training, lessons, sales, etc., to make up for what they absolutely lose on board.
It’ll be interesting to see what happens in the industry over the next few years…
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We have that situation too. Most of those farms don’t do what we do in terms of care though, so I’d hate to eject folks into those situations. Might have to though. It’s becoming really old really fast.
I inherited a few boarders who were very clear on not wanting to wear a helmet and instead of battling with them I had my attorney draw up a clause in my boarding contract that basically says if they’re maimed or killed because they didn’t wear a helmet, that’s totally on them. Decided to choose my battles with that one, LOL. Ugh.
Yep, same. I have a few boarders who have come back here after bouncing around to a few of the larger facilities because they weren’t happy with the care they were getting. But if I increase board…
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Just here to commiserate. Northern VA here - lots of clay in the soil, and one of the rainiest AND warmest winters we’ve had in awhile. We just got our first dusting of snow last night (which already melted), and aside from a few hard-freeze days before Christmas, it’s been melty, muddy goop for weeks. Our local park trails have been unrideable (mostly mud, some standing water). The paddocks are a mess. The bobcat tears up the ground just putting out the round bales. My BO typically does a fantastic job keeping the paddocks clean, but with the mud this bad it’s a losing battle. It’s more a matter of physics than manpower at this point. There is no more demoralizing feeling than sinking the manure cart up to its axles just trying to get through the gate.
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Or hitting a frozen mud rut and having it punch you in the gut. That’s a lot of fun too. One of my favorites, in fact.
Today I had to bang the barn door open with a crowbar because the ice had frozen it shut after it had rained and freezed back up for several days.
Over it. So over it.
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I feel so sorry for all of you here. I’ve been there, and done all this. The foundation of our barn was rotting out, with full drainage and it wasn’t even an old barn. But no more as of 14 years ago now. Really. We decided to stop beating our heads against the wall, and sinking more money into this operation to try to fix stuff, sold it to a billionaire who didn’t care what it cost or how much work it was gonna be, and moved to an area in which this is simply not an issue. It works so well- really. Don’t even try to keep horses in high precipitation areas… because unless you are a billionaire, it can’t be done in the horse’s (or your) best interest. We are a distance from the “hub” of equine competitive pursuits in this province, but it’s not difficult or (comparitively) expensive to load up and drive your truck and trailer to competitions. Feed is cheap here, it’s great hay growing country and we bale our own. Bedding is not needed, because stalls are not needed. A workforce to care for horses is not needed. We don’t have to board horses any more to help to pay for our passion any more. Dry cold is easy on horses. Wet conditions are horrifically bad for horses, and humans and your bank account. If you want to keep horses, live in an area where horses prosper and the living is easy and affordable. Sorry. Go back to your regular programming.
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Add me to this group! I have three horses- one riding horse, two retired pasture pets - who live outside 24/7 with run-ins on about 17 acres of fenced pasture. But I also have an empty 6 stall barn (well, I built a chicken palace off the back side of it, and use it during vet/farrier appts) and around 15 more acres of unfenced pasture, and often get asked why I don’t have boarders. I really don’t think there’s any price where someone could pay me to take care of their horses. I work a very full time job, thankfully fully remote, and while I do make time to ride, it’s at the expense of the kind of property upkeep I know boarders would (rightfully) want. I’m very comfortable with my horsekeeping choices, but I can’t imagine having to justify them to anyone else.
I boarded for years before bringing the horses home, and each of those places offered things I don’t miss at all. But at home, I can make up for the things about boarding that drove me nuts (empty water tubs in turnout was the #1 irritation).
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Yes!! This is just another defeating aspect of the mud…trail rides are darn near impossible 
The other day I decided to head out on a ride because I just really needed to remind myself of the reason why I’m slopping through all of this mud, LOL, and my baby OTTB took one look at the soupy, mucky, soggy trails and went “uhhh lady you’re crazy, we aren’t doing this…”
I went home and cracked open a beer instead. Sigh.
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*AlterrationTraining Level*
[quote=“hwake, post:127, topic:781023”]
There is no more demoralizing feeling than sinking the manure cart up to its axles just trying to get through the gate.
[/quote]
Or hitting a frozen mud rut and having it punch you in the gut. That’s a lot of fun too. One of my favorites, in fact.
Today I had to bang the barn door open with a crowbar because the ice had frozen it shut after it had rained and freezed back up for several days.
Over it. So over it.
FYI, a sturdy plastic sled works almost as well to haul hay on mud as it does on snow. It will wear the bottom out sooner, but much easier than anything with wheels.
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I feel ya. My barn backs up to a regional park which is usually great for ride-out - but this past couple weeks, hardly anyone has bothered (even though our outdoor ring is also a soupy barely-rideable mess). Our back gate is uphill of the trailhead, and even the path leading from gate to trail has been churned into an ankle-deep slip-n-slide.
I’ve stuck to hand-walking on the roads through the park, just to have something solid underfoot.
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Try a sled (or one of those plastic Home Depot bins for mixing concrete) with a couple of short 2x4"s bolted to the bottom.
Seriously, we have these wonderful hay sleds (each can take a small bale). They are $12 ‘concrete mixing trays’ from Home Depot. We bolted 2x4 runners to the bottom and ran a clevis hook through the front, with the rope run down through the clevis and the bolts on the bottom. I think we are on year three with them. They run on mud, snow, grass, etc.
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when we lived in Kentucky we had the sliding barn doors hung on the inside of the barns, the barns slid back into pockets
We did that after having to dig all the snow out of the way to get the doors open
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That’s actually brilliant and I’m filing it away for future use.
To keep my current doors from freezing I dug out underneath about 3-4 inches and added gravel. Also sprayed the top with some lubricant I found at Lowe’s
Thank you, sincerely, from the bottom of my heart.
–signed, one who went thru this a couple years ago.
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Unfortunately our barn has concrete block walls so we wouldn’t be able to do that as it’s currently built. Great idea though!
Would a garage type door work, one that slides up and into the barn on tracks? A length of stout rope attached to the handle to help pull it up all the way is helpful.
Another great idea, but I think the ceiling is too low. It’s an old block barn, with a ceiling that is lower than I’d prefer for tall horses (I think they had all little QH’s in here when it was built). My 17h saddlebred’s ears brush the ceiling beams when we walk through the front entrance (the back, where he lives, is a bit taller). To be fair, he’s a giraffe, but I wouldn’t bring anything any bigger in here. Lowering that with garage tracks would make it 4-5" shorter and I’m just not sure I could stomach that 
I think actually swinging doors would be the most practical, but there’s a concrete retaining wall on one side that would make the doors uneven when open. We don’t get a ton of snow where we are (we tend to get ice more than snow) so it could work.
Overall, if we can get some of the other improvements in that we need to, then we’d be less likely to be bringing horses in and out of the “short door” and we could make the back door (which has a very high ceiling) into something like a garage door. Right now the short door is the most expedient door to get to the ring, and 3 horses are turned out via that door.
I understand you not wanting the ceiling lowered.
I thought of this thread this morning as the slinger truck brought screenings to freshen up my dry lot and leave me a big pile for future other plans. This winter has been tough but in short order you will get your mud gone and next winter you will celebrate every single day.
Farm girls choose the LUXURY of screenings and having a dry lot over just about ANYTHING and I’m talking eating beans and rice for lunch if that’s what it takes. And that is what it takes in my case. @sivaj1 So let’s celebrate you are not far off from not having mud any more. I told the delivery guy he had no idea how much he means to me. Buwhahahah!
My hero:
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