Bedding...

[lisa-tredellans]

Hi all,

Sorry in advance as I’m sure this has been done to death but can’t find any recent posts on this

Mare stabled on shavings (can’t have her on straw as this makes her cough as well as she eats it all!) with rubber matting and currently going through 1.5 bales a week of Bedmax.

I know this doesn’t sound too bad but wondering if there are any preferences for other brands for a wet horse that might last a little longer?
She’s in from about 6pm to 7-8am

Also - currently skipping poos out daily and pulling wet out once a week. Do we reckon keep up with this or should I factor in taking the wet out everyday instead?

thanks

 

[shortstuff99]

I use a base layer of straw pellets (no dust) and topped with beddown excel, works really well for wet horses and little to no dust.

 

[ownedbyaconnie]

My mare is very wet and a trampler.

She has wood pellets in her pee corner with shavings on top. I take the wood pellets out at the weekend, let the mat dry and put new wood pellets down in the evening. I put down a new bag of shavings once every two weeks as without the wet I literally only have to take out the poo so minimal waste. Her bed doesn’t look “pretty” but it saves me a lot of time and money in shavings. Before I started doing this I was easily getting through 2 bags a week just to keep her bed dry.

 

[Coblette]

Yes I also used wood pellets for my wet mare as was the only thing that soaked up all the wee! You can bill buy pallet loads and it’s much smaller to store than shavings also love that it’s so quick to muck out ??

 

[SEL]

I deep litter my really disgusting one. Base layer is wood pellets - about 6 bags. Then Pro bed shavings on top. There is a really grim area that I still dig out about twice a week but otherwise the bed keeps building.

And sometime in summer I pay child labour to clear the stable.

 

[chaps89]

I use nedz bedz pro for a very very wet mare.
I semi-deep litter with droppings taken out daily and full muck out and bed left up to air once a week.
It's £9.50 a bale but I don't use much, 1 bale 1 week then 1/2 a bale the next.
I tried shavings under straw but that was a bag of shavings and 2 bales of straw a week so more expensive, messy, smelly and loads of waste.
I love wood pellets and they worked really well but that was 2 bags a week minimum and in summer even with watering them, they got too dry and dusty.

 

[benz]

I do the same as yourself (similar turnout schedule, on Bedmax, poo pick daily, full muck once or twice a week as needed) but I have sawdust as a base layer then the 'old' shavings as a mid layer and fresh on top/banks and I'm still using about 1-2 bags a week of bedmax (including for banks in case staff need to put extra bed down on days hes on livery) and say 1/2 bag of sawdust a week but I like a proper deep bed and looking clean so I could probably get away with less of the bedmax if I was less fussy! My lad is quite wet but probably not as bad as a mare tbh

I have used pellets in the past and chopped straw, pellets were too dusty or me/used too much of them so the cost/time saving was not enough to justify (to myself!) the beds (didnt like the look of them, and a faff to do with the wetting down, having to order pallets which was always a nightmare etc). Chopped straw (equinola) was fantastic, but again for a wet horse I could easily go thru 2 bags a week in winter with reduced turnout (semi deep litter) so not sure how much you would save?

If theres good drainage in stable best bet would be to get rid of the mats under the bed so the wee drains away. If you need something to soak it up you are always going to be spending more on bedding no matter what you use (but the sawdust is about half price of bedmax bag so some savings there). If you full muck out every day you will use more bedding so if your goal is to use less bedding, muck out less and keep bed nice and deep

 

[P.forpony]

Bedmax is one of the thickest flake shavings you can get, thicker the flake the less absorbent the bedding.
So not ideal for a wet horse. Only useful imo if you have walkers because it moves about a bit less.

Personally I’d deep litter, with a smaller flake or pellets underneath.

 

[asmp]

I might be wrong but I think Bedmax is similar to Laysoft (which is much cheaper, especially if you buy it by the pallet from the manufacturer).