Poo crisis on DIY yard

During the spring/summer I tend to poo pick every other day or so as the horses live out 24/7, once they come in at night I find it much harder to fit it all in, so maybe do it once a week and then clear the backlog (if any) come the spring.
 
I only poo pick the small fields as it is much more noticable than the big ones. In summer I sometimes poo pick the bigger field, but find the dung is all in certain places anyway. In winter you're lucky if you can walk across the fields without losing your wellies, let alone drag a wheelbarrow.

We have 16 acres for two horses, and all of the fields regularly get harrowed, rolled and rested for at least six months. We have sheep grazing now too. We also have rarely had a worm burden.. Of course the fences and fields get checked regularly.

Sometimes I go to my friend's yard and their individual turnout is only about 3/4 an acre per horse, so there is no way you couldn't poo pick that.
 
We pay a local teenager to do our poo picking, he does a really good job and it saves my back from visiting the physio quite so often!

OP if I was you I would implement a hefty charge for not poo picking, say £20 per week, and then find a local teenager to come one set day a week to do all that is in the field. You will easily cover their wages. Your liveries will know if they haven't cleared the field by Monday (for example) then it will be done and they will pay for it.

If you have CCTV I would point out to your lazy liveries that you KNOW they are slacking and they can either poo pick, cough up £20 pw, or s*d off!

You sound like a very reasonable person to livery with and they are taking advantage of you.
 
There are very few on our yard who do poo picking - mainly me. I have two mares out of the eight mares in the field and i try to go in with the barrow when I've done the mucking out in the mornings as long as it's not heaving down with rain. Unfortunately I don't want my horses eating round their own poo so that means I have to pick up everyone elses. Whoever suggested that the farmer/YO should charge more to those who don't poo pick should try having a word with our farmer - we were all given a set of yard rules to sign which were reasonable rules - one of them being to poo pick at least twice a week. You'd be lucky to find some people on my yard who have poo picked twice this year. Farmer won't say anything as he doesn't want to cause problems but it's starting to really irritate me now. I have suggested a rota for next summer when they are out 24/7 and he has agreed that this is a good idea, so I will be reminding him in spring if I'm still there!
 
OP I don't think you are being unreasonable - having just spent a lovely hour today poo picking it's not a nice job but it's got to be done.

Surely it's good paddock management, when the poo is removed there are more areas for the horse to graze and play, and less s^^t to attract flies in the summer.
 
I think poo picking is vital.

But 3 wheel barrows aday is a bit much.
1 if its daily turnout or maybe 2 if they live out 24/7.

If they really won't do it all I can suggest is charging them more for livery or get a willing teens to do it
and pay buy the wheelbarrow.
 
amymay said:
Sorry muckypony, that's simply not true.
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Really? So no yard exists where people just rent a stable and a field and are left to get on with it?

I have first hand experience - my last yard was owned by someone totally non horsey and we all (four of us) paid for a stable and the land and had to get on with it. This is a full DIY yard. Whats the point having a yard manager on a full DIY yard?.... Poo-picking after 4 horses doesn't take all day, every day...
 
Wagtail said:
I just don't get the bigger fields therefore don't need to poo pick argument. :confused:If you have 3 acres per horse, it will look as bad after 3 weeks as one acre per horse does after one week. It looks awful! Horses won't eat where poo has lain for a long time, fresh manure is actually BAD for the soil and the grass which is why you should only use well rotted manure to fertilize. And it is bad for horses due to worm eggs. The longer poo stays in the field, the longer the contamination lasts. Our horses have had a clear wormcount for seven years! Except for the mare that went to stud and the pony that goes to shows where they can graze on the grass.
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If I had the time, etc I would def poo pick every field. But doing a 20 acre field with 9 in? I don't think so. I'll take photos of the fields that aren't poo picked (just harrowed in spring, then rested for 7 months) and you'll see 1. they don't look awful whilst in use, there's loads of grass still, not much poo and 2. The fields look in great condition. Probably because they are harrowed, rolled, rested and grazed with sheep. All our worm counts (3 per year) come back clear.

All individual paddocks that are 1 acre in size are poo picked at least once per week.
 
Of yards like that exist MP. But not all DIY are run in that way.

I've always been DIY - Always with a very conspicuous YO and a beautifully maintained yard and land.
 
I'm a YO of a 30 horse DIY yard :D We include maintanence of the paddocks in the livery. All paddocks get harrowed and rolled in the spring. All broken fencing is fixed by us, and straight away. And the horses in the 'herd' have their fields harrowed by us :)
 
muckypony said:
Really? So no yard exists where people just rent a stable and a field and are left to get on with it?

I have first hand experience - my last yard was owned by someone totally non horsey and we all (four of us) paid for a stable and the land and had to get on with it. This is a full DIY yard. Whats the point having a yard manager on a full DIY yard?.... Poo-picking after 4 horses doesn't take all day, every day...
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Yep - this is my set up. Love it, hassle free and its all managed by us!:)
 
Interesting. So you girls who are on DIY livery, how do you go about refencing fields and fertilizing and reseeding your fields? Do you all chip in and pay a tractor man to come and do the pasture maintenance? And fencing contractors to refence? What about when water pipes burst or valves break in the water trough mechanisms? I'm just trying to get an idea of how you all decide what needs to be done and what order to do them in. What happens when something breaks and needs repairing with immediate effect?
 
amymay said:
Of yards like that exist MP. But not all DIY are run in that way.

I've always been DIY - Always with a very conspicuous YO and a beautifully maintained yard and land.
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Thats why I said full DIY - I have also been on yards on yards that are assisted where maintenance is done, but of course you pay a little more.

I too wouldn't have it any other way, I love caring for my own by myself. Sometimes it is a bit tight for time but I'm so fussy I'd much rather do it myself! However, there are often liveries who are on this type of DIY that expect other people to do their horse for them.. I don't object to helping people out but sometimes the mick gets taken!
 
Spring Feather said:
Interesting. So you girls who are on DIY livery, how do you go about refencing fields and fertilizing and reseeding your fields? Do you all chip in and pay a tractor man to come and do the pasture maintenance? And fencing contractors to refence? What about when water pipes burst or valves break in the water trough mechanisms? I'm just trying to get an idea of how you all decide what needs to be done and what order to do them in. What happens when something breaks and needs repairing with immediate effect?
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You make do with what you have and fix things yourself!
Electric fencing - easy to put up. I was at a yard where everyone chipped in to buy fertiliser and we did it ourselves! Although I've always had good-doers so don't actually need to do this! If a farmer is needed with a tractor then yes, you all chip in. However, if you've been in an area a while and get to know the local farmers they sometimes do you deals or help you out :p our hay supplier cut the hedges in the fields for us!

I went to the yard one morning, late for work, and broke the pipe that connected to the water trough and water flooded everywhere - I went a got the owner (non-horsey) and explained and he got his handyman to fix it! In the meantime the water was turned off, so for 1 dat we bucketed water to the trough, no problem at all.

If sometihing breaks, theres always a way to patch it up immediately and then you can fix it properly when you have time. I've spent several evenings bodging fences with show jumps/electric fencing old peices of wood until I have time to do it properly!

I'm currently mid-move to my 'own place' where I pay the owner (again non-horsey) to rent their stables and land and have to maintain everything myself... Having a useful dad helps :p So far he's fitted my new lights, built shelving, put up fencing, collected loads of hay, given me a supply of water and cut down any poisonous plants... :D

Where theres a will theres a way!
 
Spring Feather said:
Interesting. So you girls who are on DIY livery, how do you go about refencing fields and fertilizing and reseeding your fields? Do you all chip in and pay a tractor man (or we borrow a tractor by flirting :0 and do it ourselves) to come and do the pasture maintenance? And fencing contractors to refence? What about when water pipes burst or valves break in the water trough mechanisms? I'm just trying to get an idea of how you all decide what needs to be done and what order to do them in. What happens when something breaks and needs repairing with immediate effect?
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We don't fertilise, we reseed if we need to but only around gateways, yes we pay a tractor man to top the fields once a year as we have so much grass or the actual land owner will do it free, we have wells for water, we fix our own troughs and collect water from roofs in containers we bought ourselves, borrowing the land owners trailer to pick them up and getting our OH's to install them. The land owner repaired our toilet recently too and we bought him a bottle of whisky to say thankyou. Things pretty much tick over nicely. We are all responsible for our own rotation of paddocks and our own fencing and we are pretty strong ladies, handy with a pole basher! We can always find a solution between us to most things - and if not, the actual land owner is fair and fab :)
 
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amymay said:
Bodging fences? Hope you've got good public liability insurance.
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Yep :cool:

Obviously its safe - I don't poo pick my fields to not care about the safety of my horse ;)

Sure I'm not the only one who has to patch up fences and then do it properly the next day when its daylight. But then again, the fields tend to nbe full of grass where they've been poo-picked so the horses have no reason to get out :p
 
muckypony said:
You make do with what you have and fix things yourself!
Electric fencing - easy to put up. I was at a yard where everyone chipped in to buy fertiliser and we did it ourselves! Although I've always had good-doers so don't actually need to do this! If a farmer is needed with a tractor then yes, you all chip in. However, if you've been in an area a while and get to know the local farmers they sometimes do you deals or help you out :p our hay supplier cut the hedges in the fields for us!

I went to the yard one morning, late for work, and broke the pipe that connected to the water trough and water flooded everywhere - I went a got the owner (non-horsey) and explained and he got his handyman to fix it! In the meantime the water was turned off, so for 1 dat we bucketed water to the trough, no problem at all.

If sometihing breaks, theres always a way to patch it up immediately and then you can fix it properly when you have time. I've spent several evenings bodging fences with show jumps/electric fencing old peices of wood until I have time to do it properly!

I'm currently mid-move to my 'own place' where I pay the owner (again non-horsey) to rent their stables and land and have to maintain everything myself... Having a useful dad helps :p So far he's fitted my new lights, built shelving, put up fencing, collected loads of hay, given me a supply of water and cut down any poisonous plants... :D

Where theres a will theres a way!
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That sounds great and really positive, thanks for typing all that out :)
 
No point harrowing - all it does is spread worm eggs - it only works in hot countries where the heat kills the eggs. We are on individual grazing and I poo pick everyday - cant stand poo on fields - we are DIY - I wouldn't like to share a field and have to pop pick as always someone who doesn't pick
 
OK so it's not truly DIY as in you do everything yourself. I think that might have been what Amymay was alluding to that there are other people (including the owners of the land) who do a lot for you to keep the field and stables up and running. This may sound strange to some but this is why I couldn't do this sort of thing on my farm as bodge jobs don't slide with me. My farm is stunning and my fencing and stables, field shelters are kept in tip top condition and I wouldn't have anything less. I do have to wonder if it would really have to be a non-horse person, or a horse person who doesn't care, who could put up with make-do fixes and with no proper care for the land. Regardless of what your horse needs, the land needs to be properly tended too otherwise it will end up seriously lacking in nutrients.

There are land owners and some of them are just that, then there are land owners who really view themselves as land caretakers; I'm the latter.
 
Oh horses always have a reason to get out.

Anyway good luck at your new yard.

And get the contract checked by a solicitor so you are absolutely clear on what your liabilities are.
 
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