OP
Did you get your martingale back?
Have one more discussion with the BO about the subject. It may not change things, but you will have been heard.
For whatever reason, the BO has chosen to keep a known thief on her payroll.
So, knowing this your choice is to stay and dont leave anything out . Period
Your other choice is to move.
I dont blame you for being angry and feeling dismissed.
Employees (or anyone else in the barn) shouldn’t take others’ things. Off the rack or in the aisle or left on a trunk. Barns are not free tack supply stores.
Its hard to to enforce though, is the problem. How do you know when something is abandoned or it’s just forgotten? For how long do you forgive forgotten? And how do you keep track of how long each glove has been in a lost and found? Put a date on it? That’s a lot of extra work. And what seems like a short time to you (a few days) feels like an eternity to someone walking past the mislaid item 50 times a day. IME, if it’s left out two days, tops, it’s fair game.
shanks, whips, hoof picks, polos and saddle pads are easy things to forget and grab the nearest. Or a martingale. Once someone took my girth that was in our tack room. It was missing for 3 days. I had asked about it, no one said anything, and I went snooping and found it in the tack stall of some renters still on a saddle, filthy, with the elastic stretched out. I was pissed and told them the tack room isn’t their tack store and not to go in and help themselves. They told everyone I was crazy and overreactive; they were just ‘borrowing’ and didn’t know it was mine (as opposed to someone else’s they didn’t ask?!). I didn’t give a shit. They didn’t stay long.
And it’s hard to find good help, so the BO is probably not going to do much about it. I am one of those super conscientious people who take good care of my stuff, don’t use others’ stuff, and get annoyed when people don’t return that courtesy. But barn life is just a chaotic place. So I would label every thing you own and lock it up. Do a sweep before you leave. And expect that anything left out is fair game. You’ll stay saner that way. It sucks to live like that, but that’s the situation you find yourself in.
This is true, but I am truly seeking guidance on how others would handle this. Am I upset at a disproportionate level? What should I expect?
I’ve gotten valuable feedback that I may be too upset and I should change my behavior. It’s made me think about the situation in a different way for sure, which is basically what I was seeking.
💯
The martingale has not reappeared, but I also don’t know that the employee took it. It may have been borrowed by any number of people and not returned by accident. The only things that were identified were the gloves and vest.
It’s the tone, it’s the condescension to the “barn worker,” it’s the taking this to a public forum, that are all appalling and not getting you the response (from the forum and the barn owner) that you are desiring.
I certainly understand being upset because I don’t take other people’s things and claim them as my own, so I expect others to do the same.
I am often the last people, or close to it, in the barn at night. So anything that is left out and I know where it goes, I put it away. Saddles, helmets, etc. If I am unsure I just leave it. I have left some of my own items out and they’ve always been there when I’ve come back. Our barn has a ton of lesson kids, but most of them have help tacking up, so they’re not wandering around picking things up on their own.
If I was in your situation at my barn, I would first make sure I was not upset when speaking to the trainer/barn manager. Then I would let her know that some of my things have continued to go missing and I believe Barn worker took them. I would ask her to speak wit the barn worker about not taking things that don’t belong to her. If it continued to be a problem, I would expect that person to no longer work at the barn.
Is this person taking other people’s things, or are your the only ones you know of going missing? I would want to know that as well before going to the BM.
I feel like realistically, as long as there are boarding barns, there will always be someone with sticky fingers and people who aren’t good about putting their stuff away. Maybe not at all barns, but I believe those people will always be out there.
Please bother to label your equipment in an obvious way. Zip ties for tags in neon colors are easily snipped off before a show and replaced.
Please put your things away where they belong.
The vest got left out post-accident and sticky fingers wore it. She sucks for that. Get it labeled in some obvious way and put it where it goes. Securing your things is going to be important going forward, and as others have said you need to eyeball the aisle before you leave to ensure you’ve done so. Heck I’d slap a zip tie around my hanging stuff at the end of each day to further convey that it’s not community property. That will also make you account for all it.
I think the correct approach here would have been to go to the barn owner directly with your complaint, not circumvent chain of command and confront BO’s employee. That might have gotten things off on an iffy foot. Gloves are pretty similar; you’re going on hearsay that she lifted them when a plausible case could be made that she mistook them for her own. No idea. But if I have a complaint with a serviceman I lodge it with the boss.
Really? I have absolutely no idea which barn this is, and unless you boarded at this barn, or know the OP, how would anyone know what barn she is referring to? I used to live and board in Austin, and I don’t know which barn she’s referring to. Presumably it’s in Austin, but there are a number of barns in the Austin area. Unless the OP noted the name of the barn where she boards or the name of the employee in her post, how would anyone know? It’s not like she said “I board at Happy Pastures barn in Austin, Texas, and assistant trainer Jen stole my stuff”.
I honestly don’t understand the mentality of beating up the victim on this board. Maybe she’s overreacting, but the bottom line is that her stuff is being “borrowed” or stolen by a barn employee. How is that ever OK?
It’s SOP here.
To clarify, 1000% not okay for anyone to take something that doesn’t belong to them.
Nothing I said indicated it was the OP’s fault that any of this happened. No victim blaming here. I did offer a possible solution that is within her control - develop a routine to ensure her stuff is put up before she leaves.
As BO, I would give my employee final notice that things left in aisle must be put in Lost and Found, not taken for personal use.
I would however not be happy about my client posting all of this on the internet. But, that is just me and my opinion. And I believe this thread asked for opinions.
Go to the BO again. Obviously, vests and gloves don’t just magically appear, free for the taking, at a barn. They belong to one of the boarders. The employee (and yes, I would also refer to them as a “barn worker”…nothing condescending about labeling the what they are to distinguish from say, “the trainer” or “barn owner”) should not take items that are not theirs. Period. No matter if they are left out for a day, two days, a week. Most barns I’ve been in just put unclaimed clothes in the office or tack room. Yes, label your tack (mine all has round tags or plates or sharpie initials on fabric items) and no, no one should take it permanently-- you know, steal it.
OP- make a time to visit with the BO and express your concern that the barn worker seems to view anything left out as fair game and that if they haven’t spoken with the person, maybe it’s time to have that conversation. And you need to be vigilant about tucking your gear away safely.
I used to board at a barn where small things going missing was the norm- and it SUCKED. Everyone occasionally forgets to put something away at some point. Even things that were well labeled still went missing. I even had instances of later finding my stuff where my initials have been sharpied over or somehow obscured. I eventually left that barn for a variety of reason, but petty theft was definitely one of them.
I feel for the OP- sucks to have your stuff go missing. Not sure what the best recourse is. I think a few people mentioned speaking with the BO/BM and I think that is what I would do too. Nice martingales are pricey- I would specifically mention how it is missing, and give the BO/BM a thorough description and ask her investigate. Maybe someone did borrow it, in which case it should be easy enough to locate.
Someone mentioned zip-tying your tack together (I assume they meant martingale to the bridle so they couldn’t be separated). Although it’s not a bad idea, I can see how this wouldn’t be practical in a lot of barns. If your horse receives training rides, then your trainer would need easy access to your tack, and having it locked-up in any fashion would probably be pretty difficult. At the end of the day, you just have to trust the other people at your barn.
Keep us updated if you talk to you BO. I hope a resolution can be found.
I’d be furious. Gloves happen - they get left out, moved around and no one knows who they are. But a vest is pretty easily identifiable. And you KNOW if a vest is yours or not.
I’d be making sure your tack trunk is locked and I’d have a very frank conversation with the BO. The first time could easily have been a mistake. The second was not.
Of course it won’t work for everyone. She didn’t mention any trainers being involved in riding her horse(s) and i thought if there were, they would have been mentioned. If it works, great.
Use what works and toss the rest.
I run a barn with 25+ boarders. Additionally, we coach a college team and have abundant lesson students.
If stuff is left behind, it gets two weeks before it goes into the “free stuff” bin. I don’t care if it’s a saddle pad, gloves, a hoodie, or spurs.
It is YOUR responsibility to put your stuff away. The assumption that someone is going to come behind you, pick up your scattered belongings, and deposit them neatly in your trunk like a fairy godmother is HILARIOUS. Particularly assuming that you are a full grown adult.
if my clients leave their tack out, I have been known to lock it away in my office and they have to see me directly to get it back. I should not have to teach people to be responsible for their own equipment by resorting to these tactics, but it typically only takes one time for my frequent forgetters to get the message.
I grew up riding in a barn with an explicit policy of taking any unattended thing without a name on it and immediately labeling it as barn property. As a result, I am fanatical about putting my name on 100% of horse items I own. This situation seems particularly terrible, since it seems like a person is deliberately stealing things they know to be yours. But I think other posters are right that no one likes a messy barn, and it can be difficult to figure out what belongs to whom.
If I was you, I would make it as hard as possible to steal my things by making it exceedingly obvious that they belonged to me. I would also make every effort to put my things away when I’m not using them. My various nametagging methods include: iron-on camp nametags for clothes, wraps and saddle pads; stick-on waterproof nametags for plastic and metal items, and the insoles of riding boots; transfer vinyl monograms for gloves and spurs; nameplates or metal dog tags with s-hooks for tack and blankets. A sharpie works on most items too. I can recommend vendors for each nametag type, if you’re interested.
Do you have locked tack lockers, OP? Or are some areas common/shared?
I think there is a difference between going through someones things like a tack lockers or tack room and picking things up that are left and ‘forgotten’.
I dont think it is ever ok for anyone take anything, and I think should people find things laying around they should put it in the lost and found, no one is exempt from forgetting one or two things, I know I have done it and im basically ocd with things, I dont even like sharing tack items between my own horses, so should someone ‘borrow’ my things without asking me I will loose my mind.
But saying that we can not expect to leave things and expect them to be there day/weeks/months later.
I know my BO should he find things laying around it gets thrown or it gets put in a bin in his office.
I personally would never take anyones things especially horse things as I know people have worked extremely hard for those items, but not everyone thinks this way, as I have notice.
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