Does/has anyone liveried at a riding school?

holeymoley

holeymoley

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As the title really.

I’m on a waiting list for another yard but I think there’s a lot before me and it doesn’t have a very quick turn around. Wondering what people’s experiences have been if you’ve been a livery( preferably diy) at a riding school. It is mainly for children and has only recently opened up to livery. They run clinics and pony care days/camps during the summer etc

It does sound a bit manic for me but interested to hear how other yards managed. It’s bonuses include having an indoor and outdoor arena and small paddocks.
 
But will you be able to get in the arenas? My first pony was kept on working livery at a riding school, it was ok in the summer as we could ride in the fields if the school was busy but it was impossible during winter to do anything in the evening. My friend keeps hers at one now though I don't think she'll last much longer, they start lessons at 10am weekdays and go on well into the evening, weekends they start at 8.30am but at least they finish at 5pm.
 
I used to work on a yard that was a riding school with a separate yard, school and facilities for the liveries, so I guess it would depend on how highly the liveries were valued as separate from the school?

for me the ‘busy- ness’ of it would be a no. I am intentionally on my own in a field...bliss!
 
I would be coming off a yard of 20 and a further 10 in another area which has a very high turn around for liveries and sharers so used to constant ‘traffic’. I just wouldn’t want lots of kids snooping about! I don’t think they’re that busy. They seem to use the indoor most of the time and I would only require the arena twice a week at the most.
I suppose it depends on their layout. I was at it many years ago as a kid and loved it but wasn’t as wise to the horse world then as I am now. It’s certainly not as busy now as it was back then.
 
I did. Yes, kids had a look at your horse. Yes, sometimes the arena was not available. yes, sometimes your head collar went missing. Once I even found my horse being trotted up for the vet for the annual riding school council inspection!

But... It was a fun yard. My horse was busy proof. I learned to put the head collar away. The arena was maintained. I had a fun time, and was at the yard 3 times. Of course, I also left it 3 times so it was not my ideal yard as otherwise I would have stayed, but it was good enough to keep going back to.

ETA - I kept leaving because the turnout was poor, the hacking was poor and there rats were plentiful. Also, stuff would go missing, like feed. It was not because of the riding school.
 
I am liveried at a riding school there are pros and cons.
Pros- monthly dressage and show jumping in the winter and cross country in the summer. Arenas are well kept with a nice set of show jumps and fillers. The standard of care is very high for both riding school and livery horses and guaranteed daily turnout as the school ponies come in during the day. Theres also a fab instructor on site so I dont have to travel for my flat work lessons.
The mains cons for me are parking as it's often busy and getting in the school. I have to ride at 8am on a weekend to get both horses ridden before lessons start and I often struggle to get in the school on a week night especially in the winter
 
I am stabled at a riding school yard that also has livery, with my two horses. Personally I wouldn’t ever do it again, purely because it’s difficult to get into the arenas. When I have to exercise two horses in the evening after college/work, I sometimes can’t even get into the arenas until late which makes it so much harder.
 
I'm at a riding school too, and have the same issues with getting in the school! Summer is better as we have fields to ride in but I can get in here and there in winter. There's kids around but they don't tend to get too involved with the livery horses. I can have lessons on site but I tend to go off site for mine. We have an xc course in summer, as well as a WH course and SJ, and dressage boards out (again all summer as they're in fields - but good practice for summer comps!) so there are some good facilities, it's just waiting until they open up again!
I've been on the yard almost 20 years (riding school client then livery) so it's not too bad :)
 
I'm at a riding school, separate stabling for liveries however. We have a huge outdoor school and small indoor school, so it isn't usually that difficult to find somewhere to ride. Weekends are busy but we usually go out hacking, you can usually get in the school in the afternoon though if you really want to. We have a riding club on site which is great, monthly dressage/clear round/clinics etc. and you never have to leave the yard if you don't want to. It is a very busy yard, we have nearly 100 horses on site in total! But it means my pony isn't at all phased if we ever go out and it's a bit busy. Everything is well maintained and we have access to all facilities. I've been a client for 21 years at the same yard (first riding school customer and then livery same as Chippers) and I wouldn't want to be anywhere else.
 
I had my ponies at 2 different riding schools in my younger days. They weren't on working livery and I hd no problems with my times there. I quite liked that there were plenty of people about and they had weekly competition evenings for pupils and liveries. I remember it as a fun time.
 
I'm currently on livery at a riding school. I love the fact that there are always people around to chat to, help if I need it, and hack out with. We have a fantastic supportive community and it's one of the main reasons I stay there. I would really miss the people if I moved! I also value the 24/7 turnout, which they have to have because there aren't enough stables for the riding school horses; and the experienced instructors and yard staff. I've learned a huge amount from them.

It is sometimes frustrating not being able to get into an arena, but at weekends I ride at lunchtime, which works fine. I don't like the overstocked muddy fields, but we are on clay here and I think most places are the same at this time of year, so I put up with it. It's the one thing that almost tips me over the edge into looking for a new place in winter, but as soon as the ground dries up I get happy again!
 
ihatework said:
Yes, for a brief period, and it was as feared! Mayhem on the weekends, schools often busy, lots of teenage ‘staff’, low standards and just generally not relaxing or fun!
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This for me too. Mine was on 5 day livery and I found out he was only ever "turned out" in the indoor school in the week, his bed was disgusting by the weekend (I don't think he had bene mucked out at all) and I think they used him in lessons. We were there under 2 weeks and moved as soon as I found out he was never turned out.
 
I've liveried (part livery on both cases) at riding schools twice in my life. I have also looked at other riding schools when looking for yards and rejected them. Both times worked successfully for me because I did my homework first. Both were well run professional yards which valued their liveries. The first was many years ago before I had children and whilst the arenas were busy at the weekend, there were set times reserved for livery use and that worked for me. Also the hacking was good so that was always an option. There was no question of any "child helpers" helping do the liveries, they were solely looked after by qualified staff and I trusted that this was actually the case. The livery yard was slightly separate from the riding school yard - different courtyards so was always quieter. The second time was after I had children and was for my children's ponies. This also worked well because the kids loved the company of other children, joining in the activities and instruction going on and also I enjoyed the free child care when they were happy to have them help all day in the holidays (and supervise them properly and safely as well)!

The riding schools I rejected were ones where it wasn't possible to get in the arenas at the weekends or evenings (or at least not without booking an extortionately expensive private lesson with one of their instructors), ones with fixed opening and closing hours so I wouldn't actually be able to get in before and after work and not on bank holidays either or ones overrun with uncontrolled kids and ponies and mud. If the yard is set up to prioritise the riding school and not consider the needs of liveries then it won't work.
 
Must admit the things I disliked about liverying at a riding school included:

Limited access to arenas - at one place the arena would get so full of liveries there was zero chance of schooling because we'd all cram into the only 'sociable' hour of the day it wasn't being used for lessons.
Arenas full of poles/jumps/poo...
Fields full of mud.
Visitors messing with my horse (not in a bad way just feeding him tidbits etc).
High turnover of staff so no consistency of care.
Crap hay/haylage as the manager usually ran the place on a very tight budget.
 
Years ago, and I mostly enjoyed it, but as I get older and grumpier I couldn't go back that scenario again.

Reasons for not wanting to go back to it include:

Too busy through the day, too many people getting in the way when you want quiet time with your horse. The yard I'm at now is tiny by comparison and I still avoid certain times whenever I can so I miss the busy times.

The RS yard I was at had good staff for the most part, but novice teenagers are a likelihood which needs to be considered.

Can't get into arenas through the day and some evenings - back in the day all I did was hack, but I compete now so this would be an issue.

Too many children - my tolerance and patience for small children/huffy teenagers has declined to almost nil.
 
yes (full livery on a busy riding school yard)

Experienced coaches and very easy access to comps and clinics (Andrew Lovell tonight so good quality teaching)
Schools get harrowed and maintained regularly
Yes, schools can get busy but so do warm ups when we go out competing
Pony enjoys being on a busy yard, a god send when he was on box rest post surgery!
Plenty of spook busting!
Know loads of people, both liveries and riding school clients ... given horse is my social life thats great.

There's riding schools and there's riding schools....
 
My experience is not good my horse was tacked up and mounted by a child on the riding school, the escorted ride then proceeded down the drive on a hack, my 5 year old tricky Welsh d found this highly exciting, she took off child fell off and she ran across a busy road, luckily child and horse were ok but the riding school manager for some reason thought it was my fault and started to ignore me, I left shortly afterwards as the facilities were not great anyway.
 
I have. Sometimes it was difficult to use the schools if lessons were happening.
The fields were extremely muddy in winter and often turnout was restricted.
I was there when my daughters were at school so it suited us on the whole as they had regular lessons there.
Not sure I would have chosen to be there if I didn't havd children though.
 
yes i did when i bought my first horse. i worked in london and worked at the yard 2 nights a week and all day sunday for part of my livery..and i also used my horse as lead horse to take out the rides. we only had a tiny arena and most people wanted to hack (including me) ..it worked well for me as i used to help out anyway before i got my own.....it was a well run yard and kids were not allowed to run riot so i didnt have any problems..
 
Eons ago I had a lease horse at a riding school/livery. I was a working boarder so I did a lot of feeding, bringing horses in and out, that sort of stuff. The turn out was iffy at times and the person who had the job of mucking stalls did not do a good job. I often had to do my stall after it was "done." After that horse was moved by her owner I ended up buying a grade Quarter horse and lived out, I guess what you all call grass livery.
Getting riding time in the arena could be tricky. The arena was lighted so when I was able to ride light it was OK. One time I decided to take a few days off from riding. When I arrived, finally in the mood to ride again, I found a child riding my horse. I won't get a horse again unless I can afford full livery.
 
I've done it twice in my life; the first occasion was my old pony when I'd lost my livery and just couldn't find anywhere around the immediate area as there just weren't the livery yards around back then.

I went on part-livery - all I could afford at the time - which meant my boy was used at weekends. I could ride him over the weekend, but TBH I did feel guilty as because he was a popular pony, he was used a lot and I felt I was adding to that burden.

Frequently my tack would go missing and end up on another horse; and I'd get particularly annoyed by having stirrup leathers of different length all the time!

I managed to find a little private yard after about a year of my boy being there, and moved him back nearer home.

The second time of being on a riding school was my last horse. This would be about 10 or so years back: I sent him out on loan and the loanee (with my permission) kept him at a riding school. Huge mistake! My boy had sweet itch, and I'd sent him up to the yard - and met the Yard Manager - and explained that he had to have his sweet itch rug on at ALL times when turned out, and a light fly rug on when he was in the stable. YM assured me that my instructions (also contained within the loan agreement) would be adhered to, no problem. The first weekend he was there, some kids (who obviously had no idea) turned him out without his rug, it was one of those very hot weekends in September, and during that time he'd rubbed himself raw. I was livid. His lovely mane and tail which I'd worked sooohh darned hard to get right, all gone and rubbed away.

Rang the YO, who was unhelpful and said he'd been sent in that condition to his yard. He only backed down when I offered to get my vet to certify in writing that he'd seen the horse during the week before he'd been to the yard, with full mane and tail. When I said that I'd explained all this to the YM, he said that he'd instructed the YM to give priority to the "Riding School horses" rather than private liveries, and that she "hadn't got the time" to worry about livery's horses!!!

I wish I'd removed my boy then, but gave them another chance. I hadn't got anywhere else for him to go at that time, so he had to stay there. However, a mere five weeks into the loan it transpired that the numpty girl who'd had him had paid diddly squat for livery fees! Or shoeing. YO said he expected me to pay it. I told him it was nothing to do with me, his livery client, his problem, get a legal beagle to write client a letter if she wouldn't/couldn't pay.

There was a show at the venue that weekend, coincidentally; a friend was taking her lorry and had a space. Under cover of all the hustle and bustle of the show, I went and got my boy and chucked him in the lorry (thank god the blighter loaded!!) and left a note to say he'd gone, even cleaned out his stable! We somehow banged together a structure for him to go in at home, not exactly the horsey Ritz, but at least it got him out of where he was (we're still using that stable now!!).

I'd never ever keep a horse at a riding school again. Too many people who don't know the horse or its health/feed/welfare needs, or its foibles, hanging around. No one to take direct responsibility, and way too many people who think they're in charge. Never again!
 
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There's a difference between having your horse on livery at a riding school and having it on working livery. I've done the latter too, and wouldn't do it again if I could possibly afford not to. I used to spend half the weekend looking for my stuff; booked to ride my horse only to find she'd been put on a lesson; and anything I taught her was undone by being ridden by others during the week. Even at a good riding school, which I am, it works best if you are diy, or just get a bit of assisance. If you can do that, it can work well as in my earlier post.
 
I'd never do working livery but I have been on a busy riding school yard for years. In the end I moved some of mine because I could not access arenas often enough. But I miss the sosical aspect. And the help from 24/7 onsite staff was amazing. Plus unlimited turn out all year round.

There are far more kids on the livery there than other places I've been because a lot of the kids buy their first ponies after a few years of lessons and stay on. Plus kids are more likely to use working livery., So you have to be tolerant enough to cope with mess, noise and stuff disappearing. As kids are generally messier, noisier and more disorganised than adults. At least in my experience!
 
Yes and I hated it and the horses were worse for it. There were a lot of weavers and head bobbers and other stress in the horses on that yard. There was constant noise and the horses only quiet time was after closing at 10 in the evening. Pony lessons all afternoon, adults all evening, constant noise, constant movement.
I also had the occasion to show up and see my horse tacked up in random gear because a student thought he was the school horse.
 
I have. Evenings were fine - I had no problems riding after work as the riding school shut at 5. Weekends I learned quickly were for hacking! I loved that the yard held competitions.

I left because the staff were too busy and the riding school took priority, which meant that (in my view) my horse's standard of care wasn't high enough. Lots of teenage staff too - some were super, but others were less knowledgeable. Headcollars, saddlecloths, water buckets etc. sometimes seemed to appear on other horses/in other stables.
 
Yes I had my first horse at livery at a riding school many years ago . I did really enjoy it as there was always lots going on. You could ride at 6pm to 7 pm in the indoor in the week but it was so busy I would ride at 10 pm when most people had gone then you had to hay and put the school horses in there for the night I don't think I could deal with that now . The horses coulD live out 24/7 over the summer but only had extremely limited turnout over the winter which was why I moved on. The school was run by a real old fashioned horsy lady who kept a tight rein on everything so it was a great introduction to owning my own horse as I did not come from a horsy family .
 
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