Groom roles

Winters100

Winters100

Well-Known Member
Joined
18 April 2015
Messages
2,511
Visit site
Hi,
I have a question about jobs for grooms. How many horses does 1 groom usually care for (including everything except riding)?
Any indications of salaries?
What would the hours usually be?
Apart from salary what would be the most effective ways to attract best grooms and keep them happy?

I would appreciate frank opinions on these questions.
Thank you in advance.
Amanda
 
Groom is a rather general term and can cover anyone from an inexperienced but keen youngster wanting to train on the job to a top class yard manager who runs the yard either as part of a team or on a smaller private yard maybe does the whole yard with some part time cover.
How many horses they care for will depend on the type of yard, how the horses are kept, if they are expected to do a more managerial role as well, as well as their experience and the expectations of the owner, anything from 3 or 4 up to often ridiculous numbers well into double figures, which usually means corners are cut or staff move on quickly.

Salary commensurate to experience and responsibility, racing is fairly well structured regarding pay and staff get from £178 as a starting wage to a minimum of £368 per week for the most experienced, they will also get pool money which can be good if in a successful yard, many equine roles will command a higher salary and often other perks such as accommodation or livery .
https://racinggroom.com/become/what-does-a-racing-groom-get-paid/

Hours should be realistic but may include some late duties, traveling or emergency cover.

I had a chat a few days ago about yard staff and think the main thing is that they need to be respected even if they are not 'riders', treated fairly, given credit if they do a really good job and not treated as if they are at the bottom of the food chain, which can happen to non riding staff by the staff who do ride, their job is as important as the exercising, if not more so in many ways from the horses point of view, picking up minor injuries, signs of ill health can make a huge difference and needs to be encouraged.
 
Racing is hugely different from any other kind of equine job. As Be Positive says there are many, many different roles in racing. I, for example, ride 2-6 lots a day depending on how many horses need clipped at the moment. Other days I will be away racing either as part of a team or by myself - this involves early starts and late finishes. Other days I will ride 5 or 6 lots then groom 6-10 horses. I only muck out on Christmad Day and New Years Day.

We have people purely ground based that muck out, put horses in and out of the fields and on and off the walkers. These are mostly young lads that are having their first jobs out of school and may never haveeven seen a horse in the flesh. They last a year or two before they move on but there is a steady stream of them and we don't begrudge them moving on with their lives when they figure out what they want to do. These lads are paid just as well as the rest of us, get equal shares of any bonuses we get, join in with all out of hours activities and are well liked abd respected by all.

It depends on what you want the grooms to do as to how much you need to pay them.
 
Thank you so much.

The reason that I am asking is this. I live in a country where groom work is almost exclusively for men, and I see how most do not even like horses. Having mucked out stables since a small child I do not really see a reason that it is only for men. I can accept that the majority are stronger, but I am thinking of 2 things:

1. Would yards here run better if there were professional grooms supervising the 'muscle', and would that actually cost that mush more?
2. The salaries that you mention are not very far off those where we are based, and yet living costs are way lower, which makes me wonder if there are opportunities for people.....

Sorry to keep asking, but if we looked at the first option of using people as in your yard to muck out etc how many horses would they do?

Thank you so much!
 
Our lads have from 7.30am-1pm to muck out about 20 stables each alongside doing the fields and horse walker. They get a 1/2hour break from 9-9.30am. So whilst they are always moving they aren't rushing or cutting corners.
 
20 in that time seems reasonable, I would say 4 per hour is enough time to do a decent job on each bed along with the other bits and bobs that need doing, I have had up to 10 here and would need 3 hours or so to get through them properly although on a good day it could take half that time, on a bad one all day:rolleyes:, doing just one or two is luxury.
 
I don't think we could answer the 'how many' question as every yard is different.

On an efficient yard, as morning person, I could muck out and walker/turn out 16 horses in an 8 hour shift 6am to 2pm. This would include feeding, put nets in skip out and square up (not full muck out), sweeping, pick feet, remove rugs, replace rugs, empty and scrub water and fill 32 nets, make feeds, replace horses, rug up, final skip out and sweep/wash down out so it was all immaculate at 2pm change over time. But, the waters were automatic, the muck heap was on a trailer with a great ramp, the stables close together and everything was easy. That left no time for any maintenance etc. I also would not have wanted to do that every day as it was pretty relentless.

The afternoon person would do any full muck outs (2 or 3 a day) as well as sweeping the walker, sweeping the hay area, anything else like washing the horse boxes etc, putting an extra net in, making up morning nets, feeding and making up the next feed, maybe riding one or two, fetching any in that were out, changing rugs, picking feet, cleaning tack, skipping out, sweeping again last thing.

If the muck heap is inaccessible then it all takes longer. If the water has to be done by one tap and lifting, then that takes longer too. If the fields are a way away then that takes longer.
 
Mucking out 4 or 5 empty stables an hour is reasonable, I do find it can take a little longer if you're mucking out with the horse in the stable.
Some bedding systems are quicker than others, a full straw bed would take me twice as long to do than a wood pellet on full matted bed.
 
To be honest it depends on the groom. I am super fast if I muck out stables I have mucked out the previous day, but I have employed grooms who were horrifically slow and could only do two an hour - not ideal when you have around 100 in and they need to be done by 9.
The biggest thing is pay and respect. Treat your grooms well, get an excellent yard manager, and you will get the best grooms working for you.
 
Starzaan said:
To be honest it depends on the groom. I am super fast if I muck out stables I have mucked out the previous day, but I have employed grooms who were horrifically slow and could only do two an hour - not ideal when you have around 100 in and they need to be done by 9.
The biggest thing is pay and respect. Treat your grooms well, get an excellent yard manager, and you will get the best grooms working for you.
Click to expand...

This - it's all about respect which many in the equestrian world don't have.
 
I'm a freelance groom so I have about 6 yards I go to ranging from private to livery. I average from doing 15 to 30 horses a day. I normally do 6 in an hour but like others have said it depends on the set up, how far the fields are, the muck heap and also the size of horse too (though that doesn't always correspond to how messy they are!) The hours are tough starting at 5am and sometimes not finishing till 7pm so being a freelance is much tougher I think. Travelling to and from yards and managing time so I'm not late for my next yard can be difficult at times but somehow it all flows pretty well! I do have about 3 hours free from 11am so I top up my income with dog walking, repairing horse rugs and having a decent lunch break. There isn't that many freelancers about (good for me) I've found and I've turned down a lot of work this year. The pay is pretty good though as I set my prices but getting paid is a whole different ball game as I've found with one client! I've stopped working for them now but can't see the bill getting paid anytime soon so I'm massively out of pocket. I average about £350-550 a week but unfortunately being self employed once I take out time doing paperwork, time off etc I have to do a lot of hours to take home a decent wage. Being a groom isn't just a job but a lifestyle, I wouldn't change it for the world!
 
Thank you all. This is all interesting information. I now see that the groom in our stable is not as hopelessly overworked as he claims. He is full time and has MUCH less than what you describe.

A big thank you for all of your answers - they will really help me in trying to solve the problems that we have.
 
Winters100 said:
Thank you all. This is all interesting information. I now see that the groom in our stable is not as hopelessly overworked as he claims. He is full time and has MUCH less than what you describe.

A big thank you for all of your answers - they will really help me in trying to solve the problems that we have.
Click to expand...

I will just balance it out a bit then - I take my hats off to those above who are doing 10+ a day.

I’ve done a bit myself and also observed a number of decent pro competition yards and I can confidently say that the ones with high standards and who value and keep staff generally work on the basis of 6 horses per groom including their share of keeping yard tidy and may involve lunging and riding one or two.
 
Carrottom said:
Mucking out 4 or 5 empty stables an hour is reasonable, I do find it can take a little longer if you're mucking out with the horse in the stable.
Click to expand...
I agree with this, mucking out an empty stable is much easier than mucking out a stable with a horse in it. I could probably do three empty boxes an hour inc scrubbing water buckets out if the set up re muck heap was well laid out, I’m an amateur.
I’ve been on yards where the staff have to do everything at the run inc carrying tack across the yard before riding to get the workload done - that’s IMHO unsustainable. A good steady speed should be sufficient.
 
ihatework said:
I will just balance it out a bit then - I take my hats off to those above who are doing 10+ a day.

I’ve done a bit myself and also observed a number of decent pro competition yards and I can confidently say that the ones with high standards and who value and keep staff generally work on the basis of 6 horses per groom including their share of keeping yard tidy and may involve lunging and riding one or two.
Click to expand...

I agree with this. The example I gave was for 16 horses, but one early groom and one late groom, so 8 each, if you look at it that way. It was do-able but as I said, I would not like to do it every day.
 
The best grooms job I had was looking after 5 horses, all competing at a high level. It gave me time to muck them out properly, give them all a proper strapping every day, work them, and keep the yard/tack/equipment immaculate. I didn't work myself into the ground, so I was always fresh and full of beans.
I've had jobs where we had double the number of horses, and they simply didn't get the same level of care, as there weren't enough hours in the day.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top