Poo Picking dilemma

CastlelackSportHorses

CastlelackSportHorses

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Ill give you all a little background.
My in- laws run a livery yard. Its Full livery Monday - Friday and DIY at weekends and bank holidays.
All winter horses are in our winter turnout pens which are super easy to poo pick.
We are now changing to 24/7 grass turnout for summer.
My In- laws are both in the 70s(he is not afraid of hard work, but they are getting more and more crippled every year)
We have a quad and tipping trailer for picking.
Our issue is how do the liveries poo pick for the 2 days over the weekend. I suggested wheelbarrow(like we used to before a quad)
Our yard is set up with 4 4acres paddocks with 3 horses in one, and 2 horses 2 ponies in other. We normally graze the paddock for 10-14 days and swap, giving each paddock 14 days rest.

Would you as a livery be ok to poo pick a 4 acres field 2 days a week? With help of the other horse owners in the same paddock?
 
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Depending on finances you could look at those things you drag behind a quad which hoover the poo up. I've never liked them but them I'm a bit fussy about poo picking!
 
Depending on the lay of your land and overall yard layout you may find some liveries physically struggle if it is particularly hilly or there is a long walk to the muck heap. But they have signed up to the new contract so you would hope they had considered that already.

Like Meleeka, I think you'll find some liveries are great and get every bit of poo religiously and others will do a half hearted job which might make your Monday poo pick slightly less fun ...!
 
Kino said:
Depending on the lay of your land and overall yard layout you may find some liveries physically struggle if it is particularly hilly or there is a long walk to the muck heap. But they have signed up to the new contract so you would hope they had considered that already.

Like Meleeka, I think you'll find some liveries are great and get every bit of poo religiously and others will do a half hearted job which might make your Monday poo pick slightly less fun ...!
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All our liveries are pretty young and fit, we allow them to tip wheelbarrows in designated spots around fields so not having to push barrows to muck heap in main yard. Fields are relatively flat.
This is my only issue is some liveries are more anal than others. :/
 
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Nuisanced answer:

If weekend is DIY then it’s not unreasonable to have owners do their poo picking on those days at all.

But from a personal POV, I may just rather pay the yard to do it, especially if the field is hilly / a long distance from muck heap / other owners are unreliable and it’s not strictly enforced.

If it’s ‘easy’ poo picking with a good bunch of liveries then fine. If it’s not, I’d rather avoid the hassle
 
I think it's fine to expect them to do their daily barrow at the weekend. I would allow field sharing friends to help each other out if someone had a busy weekend/wasn't well. When she was a teenager my daughter done a bit of poo picking for liveries when the YO didn't want to
 
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We are on 5 day livery and in the summer on overnight turnout we have to do a barrow per day per livery - doesn't matter if it's two on a sunday, or one a day. Some liveries pay a youngster to do theirs - it all works itself out.
 
I’d say give each livery a different colour wheelbarrow or large tub trug (maybe with a smaller one to ferry the poo) which are left outside the field gate for emptying
Everyone can then see who is doing their fair share.
 
Maybe set up a separate WhatsApp and everyone has to post a tick or something when they are done.
Hopefully you could quickly do away with it if everyone is well behaved, but it does help to have some accountability.
 
I knackered my ankles walking round uneven fields poo picking, repeatedly spraining them and never having the chance to let them recover properly as I needed to keep poo picking. They are still not right 15 years later and I make sure I'm at livery somewhere I don't need to poo pick.
 
Would you consider harrowing and rotating, use 2 fields at a time and rest the others? Then your in-laws could drag a harrow with the quad or a 4x4 - very easy - maybe charge a small amount for this instead of the rota. In my experience some liveries seldom do their share and it’s tough on the others.

I’ve done this for years and am careful with worm counts - we rarely have any that need worming - plus o prefer to put the poo back into the soil - cheaper than fertiliser. Yes, they look messy when horses have been in there for a few weeks but it’s a small price to give up poo picking. We just bought an incredible harrow that turns the poo into the tiniest bits, the fields look brand new after it has been over.
 
Abacus said:
Would you consider harrowing and rotating, use 2 fields at a time and rest the others? Then your in-laws could drag a harrow with the quad or a 4x4 - very easy - maybe charge a small amount for this instead of the rota. In my experience some liveries seldom do their share and it’s tough on the others.

I’ve done this for years and am careful with worm counts - we rarely have any that need worming - plus o prefer to put the poo back into the soil - cheaper than fertiliser. Yes, they look messy when horses have been in there for a few weeks but it’s a small price to give up poo picking. We just bought an incredible harrow that turns the poo into the tiniest bits, the fields look brand new after it has been over.
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Just read your post and I am looking into buying a harrow at the moment - can you let me know the make of yours?
 
Abacus said:
Would you consider harrowing and rotating, use 2 fields at a time and rest the others? Then your in-laws could drag a harrow with the quad or a 4x4 - very easy - maybe charge a small amount for this instead of the rota. In my experience some liveries seldom do their share and it’s tough on the others.

I’ve done this for years and am careful with worm counts - we rarely have any that need worming - plus o prefer to put the poo back into the soil - cheaper than fertiliser. Yes, they look messy when horses have been in there for a few weeks but it’s a small price to give up poo picking. We just bought an incredible harrow that turns the poo into the tiniest bits, the fields look brand new after it has been over.
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My yard harrows (tractor) and rotates the fields with sheep. I've never had a positive worm count.
 
Appreciate this is difficult as this is not your yard, it is in the remit of your in-laws.

However, looking at this as a YO myself, my feeling is that rather than trying to "tweak" things as in asking the question as to whether liveries are "happy" poo-picking - I would respectfully suggest that there actually needs to be a far wider and more radical re-organisation taking place at this yard in the near future.

The YO's (your in-laws) are obviously struggling to get the actual physical work done, and this certainly isn't going to get any easier. However, from the point of view of the liveries at the yard, if the poo-picking (and other tasks as well which they are paying for) isn't done like it always has been done - AND which they have paid for under the full livery arrangement - this is going to naturally cause dissatisfaction, both in the short and longer term. You have to see it from the liveries' point of view actually, they'd be getting less for their money. It really isn't advisable to allow a situation to develop where liveries are unhappy, and feeling they are not getting what they have paid for. This leads to discontent, and can easily lead on to public grousing about it, people leaving, and the yard getting a bad reputation. Not something your IL's would want to happen I'm sure.

So, the way I'm seeing it, there are two options:

Option 1: the in-laws step back from running the yard and appoint a Yard Manager - and give them free rein to appoint whatever staff they feel appropriate to get all the jobs done. The In-Laws could still, if they wished, retain the "Final Word" on the way the yard is run. The current livery services (mixture of Full & DIY) could still be provided. However obviously the cost to the liveries would increase considerably.

Option 2: everyone on the yard is placed onto a DIY arrangement and "does" their horses themselves. This would not satisfy the needs of every livery client, and some would most likely leave if this were introduced. However under this option there would need to be someone who carries ultimate responsibility: this would need either to be your IL's, OR (as in Option 1) appoint a Yard Manager. A DIY yard, if it is to be run properly without people taking the mickey, actually needs the same level of "management" as a Full Livery set-up, and I would gently suggest that this option would still require the services of a YM as your IL's may still struggle to do the physical work - unless they employ (and supervise - very important!) outside labour.

Under both these options, livery fees would obviously need to be increased to be commensurate with the hiring of the appropriate staff.

(edited: had to dash! - returned now)

Option 3: everyone convert to a DIY arrangement and do their own; IL's (or YM/whoever is in charge) sets up a rota for duties including poo-picking.

Hope this helps.
 
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sollimum said:
Just read your post and I am looking into buying a harrow at the moment - can you let me know the make of yours?
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Our new one is a whopper that needs a proper tractor and 3PL - it weighs a ton (actually more). I don’t know the make but if it’s the sort of thing you want I’ll check with the maintenance guy (OH). I think it needs this weight to really break up the poo as it does. Previously we had a chain harrow - does an ok job but bounces a bit, and it definitely wouldn’t have smoothed the ruts in this field (which is new to us and hasn’t been grazed for 7+ years). If you’re using a chain harrow get the widest one you can (we also weighted ours with pallets/ tractor weights).
 
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