Keeping Shavings white all week

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Sags_Deer

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How do people do it then, i come across people who have white beds everyday - mine up looking a right mess. So where am i going wrong - and yes i have rubber matting.
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I know........ well, to keep them white you need to develop OCD so that you can spend hours picking all the manky ones out - alternatively you can pay someone to do this for you. OR you can do what I do and ignore the rest and glory on with my grubby looking beds......
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Seriously, I don't know the answer to white beds other than lobbing in endless amounts of new shavings every other day!
 
The thing is, some horses will hold it in all night as they resolutely won't pee on their beds, or if they do it will be on one little corner, and others (mine) hold it in all day in the field, so they can let rip as soon as the stable door is shut.

It's not a fair competition!

(The trick is to have a bucket handy)
 
muck out using rubber gloves and painstakingly pick up all the poo & dirty shavings......

Mine can look fab for a week and then one day i go, and it looks like I neglect them as the beds have turned brown and shitty overnight....

I try not to worry too much now....I doubt I will ever be able to muck out with a fork again though!!!
 
1. Be very rich and change the whole bed daily

2. Never put the horse in

3. Have a stallion

4. Have more time than I do to skip out every time they poo

5. Use a bucket and make them wear a nappy

In winter when they are in a lot, I have a nice bed for a few days and then it starts to look mucky Mine are mucked out am and skipped pm but they are big horses on a high fibre diet - nuff said
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I have found that I can keep a white dry bed (even with the messiest horse I have EVER come across!!) by having neoprene matting down, with a medium thickness bed, then taking out all the wet (inc damp) daily and picking out the poo, I only use a shavings fork, I dont go looking for anything. I try not to mix the banks with the bed either. As the bedding thins I take some of the banks down to keep a clean sheet on top. By the weekend the bed has reduced down enough to use the all banks as bedding and use a fresh bale as banks only and start all over again! And doing my beds this way has actually cut down on the amount of shavings I was using to keep the bed dry.
 
My mare box walks so the shaving are always brown and/or powdery. I've given up and am semi-deep littering now as the bedding is always brown within a couple of days no matter how much I take out or add in.
 
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I have found that I can keep a white dry bed (even with the messiest horse I have EVER come across!!) by having neoprene matting down, with a medium thickness bed, then taking out all the wet (inc damp) daily and picking out the poo, I only use a shavings fork, I dont go looking for anything. I try not to mix the banks with the bed either. As the bedding thins I take some of the banks down to keep a clean sheet on top. By the weekend the bed has reduced down enough to use the all banks as bedding and use a fresh bale as banks only and start all over again! And doing my beds this way has actually cut down on the amount of shavings I was using to keep the bed dry.

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Exactly the way I do it. I think the only way to keep the bed white is to remove all the wet daily. I also skip out in the evenings if possible which helps and means that when I muck out in the mornings it is only 1 wheelbarrow for 2 horses for a full muck out (they are in about 10-12 hours).
 
I can't bear my shavings to get dirty! I pick all the bits of poo out, lift any wet (I have mats) as my filly pees into the banks...GRRR! Turn the banks over and pick any more poo bits out. Also take any strands of hayledge out.
 
remove droppings by hand (skip out), full muck out every day and remove every little gollop of poo you missed on the muckout. Put clean bales of shavings in the cleanest corner of your stable, so that they stay white for longer.

Works for me, since my yard friend who is queen of the shavings showed me how to do it.
 
I challenge any of you with white beds to come and do my two.
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I do a full muck out daily - all poo and wet, bed lifted. On days they are in they are also given a thorough skip. I don't have banks. Chancer is on a approx 1' deep shavings bed and uses 1 - 2 bales a week of shavings.

Cairo was (and Farra will be) on thick porous mats with 4" shavings and mixed straw over half the floor. I used about half a bale of each a week.

I still have beige beds nearly all the time. However, I do have two horses that have high fibre feeds and ad lib hay and they poo for England. I don't think it helps keeping a 17 hand horse in a 12 x 12 stable.

Any takers for the challenge - they will be in at night from the end of the month.
 
The yard I work on has matts in all the stables and normal beds (well, they look normal to me). We full muck every day, and pull all the banks, every other day we drop a bank and add 1/4 bale of shavings (will soon be on a shavings/cushion bed mix) to make the new bank. Even the minger who stays in has a pretty nice looking bed. Just depends on the horse I think, as the other horse who stays in has new bedding every day and is foul!!
Melly is like a stallion and only pee's/poo's in one place - as far from her food as poss! She pood over the gate yesterday to keep it away from her tea! Shes the same in the paddock! x
 
Sounds like you have too much bed in chancers stable. I found that when Diji had a lot of bed I couldnt keep it white, but now he has a thinner bed - still fairly deep - I can keep it white and dry.
 
You def need OCD. Skip out with rubber gloves, and take the wet out every day. Can be done but it takes time.

Spend the time with your horse instead:-)
 
I am not the only cant keep a white shavings bed. I have developed OCD and went round handpicking out the mucky bits this morning. Isher and the have a box walker/trasher and the dirtest horse in the world. I cant keep white shavings for more than 48hrs
 
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