Dirty Horse What Bedding

[ibot]

Hey

so i am finally at a yard where i can choose my bedding.
Paddy has been on straw so far but since friday i have used 3 1/2 bales will be 4 after today as he is disgusting so i am wondering if there is another bedding out there which might suit paddy better but does not cost a small fortune

Help and advice pretty please

 

[horseygal18]

Hey, we use Verdo bedding! It's great, one of our horses is disgusting and could get through up to 6 bales of straw a week however only uses 4 bags of Verdo which at £3.50 each is nothing! Hope this helps

 

[xspiralx]

I swear by snowflake softchip. At my local place it is only £5.50 a bale.

My filthy horse on that and rubber matting was only using around 3 bales a month and that was with a full muck out daily.

 

[ibot]

I swear by snowflake softchip. At my local place it is only £5.50 a bale.

My filthy horse on that and rubber matting was only using around 3 bales a month and that was with a full muck out daily.

wow that is amazing i bet i will not be able to find a stockest now

 

[palominojess]

Anyone thinking of using Verdo bedding should be very wary of delivery.

We had a sample stable set up for us (free - thank you Caroline) but they only left 1 spare bag. That lasts a few days, say three at most - you then order it because you like it and they take your £290 for a 65 bag pallet.

Then you wait - and you wait - and you wait - untill eventually the rudest most incompetent haulier rings you up and arranges delivery and you wait in - and you wait in - and you wait in and eventually - nothing! (you have to sign for it or they won't leave it - bonkers!)

Verdo is great bedding but they simply do not have a delivery system in place that is reliable or competent (they admit as much).

By all means try the sample bed set up but for goodness sake get them to leave at least two bags or you will be left short before the delivery arrives. They are also really pathetic about access - if you have even a remotely tricky yard to get to they will turn around and go home rather than deliver.

We have been waiting over two weeks and have had to move back onto straw as we simply had such a shallow bed left. I posted a negative comment about it on their facebook page but they removed it!

There's lots of hype about Verdo but so far their customer service and delivery has really let them down.

 

[hobgoblin]

I really like Megazorb fantastic bedding imo

 

[Wagtail]

I really like Megazorb fantastic bedding imo

I love megazorb, but it can be expensive for a messy horse as I find I need three - four bags a week when a horse is really dirty.

My most economical bedding so far has been straw pellets by Liverpool Wood Pellets. Unfortunately, two of the seven horses here eat them and so have to be on wood pellets or megazorb. At the moment, I have two on megazorb, two on wood pellets, and three on straw pellets.

 

[OpalFruits]

I use verdo for my mare and I really really like it.

The initial set up cost was expensive but I bought 20 bags at the start of february and still have two left and I don't plan on putting them down any time soon

The pellets are really absorbent and it's really easy to get poo out of so you don't waste any of the sand that way

 

[ibot]

wow do you remember back in the day when there was like 3 types of bedding how did we cope lol

 

[JillA]

A base of something chopped and absorbent, like chopped rape straw (Bliss for example) or hemp (like Flaxcore) which absorbs the wet, then plenty of straw on top, to keep them off the wet base. I have done this this year and saved loads - a big round bale of wheat straw costs £30 and has lasted 3 stables 3 weeks and counting. The base uses less than a bale a week to top up.
I lift and muck out the straw layer and leave the base to air duing the day. Sometimes I add some antibacterial powder to it, or some more of the base material if it is very wet. Then re-lay the straw for the night - it keeps them off the wet, and the base means they are never at risk of shifting the straw to expose concrete floor (unless your name is Caspar and you apparently wriggle around in one corner all night long )
I leave the base all summer too - it dries out and makes a decent day bed if they have to stand in for any reason - then add the straw on top next winter, having just skipped out when they have been in.

 

[soulfull]

Depends in what way he is mucky
Wet then I use hunter shavings and wood pellets from Corley's
I've gone from
Putting 4 or 5 bales of shavings a week to 1 shavings and 1 bag of pellets. Very happy bunny

 

[Paint Me Proud]

i'd recommend pellets. I have used both straw pellets and wood pellets and both are very absorbent (i'd say straw more so than the wood).

I would never go back to shavings or straw now.

 

[criso]

I have a very wet and also messy horse who scatters it everywhere and likes to put himself on box rest.

I have tried in order of use

Shavings (Hunters, Snowflake, other brands)
Megazorb
Wood Pellets
Straw



Shavings

Worst for wet and cost, 4 bales of Hunters a week and his bed still never looked clean and he had thrush. Hunters went further than buying local shops cheaper brand but cost more per bale.

Megazorb

Switched but didn't save me money, bed didn't look any better and no improvement in the thrush.

Wood Pellets (first aquamax then I think it was corley bio pellets)

Big improvement in the thrush, the absorbancy meant his feet were nice and dry, the bed smelt a lot less than shavings and no longer squelched as much. However fiddly to muck out as he scattered lots of tiny poos everywhere which had to be sifted and even just taking out the really brown pee soaked squelchy bits, the promised one bag a week didn't happen. Still cheaper than shavings.
Other issue, he was on 5 day livery and yard manager hated them and complained constantly as she liked shavings.

We had been struggling with allergies and it turned out various woods were a trigger so on vets advice moved away from wood based bedding onto straw. Yard had no straw policy but made an exception.

Straw

From a cost point of view straw was the best, Current yard gets big bales so works out really cheap but even when I was on small bales it was cheaper than the other options. Use half a bale a day of a small bale or 1 - 1 1/2 slice of a heston.

Trick was to put a very deep bed in which meant wee drained down and left a drier layer on top so feet were OK. The bigger the bed the less I take out but even after an especially dirty night, it's quick to muck out as you just fork it all out.
I prefer not to wash legs every day but to let them dry and brush off mud. I found it helped with drying wet muddy legs out if they are standing in a deep straw bed
Smells more than wood pellets when you are mucking out.

 

[BobbyMondeo]

i am currently using laysoft on my mucky wet box walker its 5.90 a bag from my local shop and ive used 2 bags (apart from the initial 2 to set up the bed) since 23rd march