Rubber Mats? The Jury's Still Out On Them Here!

Maesfen

Maesfen

Extremely Old Nag!
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Some of you might remember I was given some mats which I wanted to use in my 'foaling box' - grand name for a slightly larger stable on the end! After we fitted them, the livery decided she wanted them in her boxes too so she bought them so we thought we might as well finish the lot off. Six from Eight boxes have been fitted, others just have them laid in with some gaps at the edges.

Our main boxes are an old shippon which has a very gradual slant from left to right; you can't notice it but water does so the right hand side of each box gets wetter; as the doors are in the middle of the front wall, that means there's no easy way for them to drain properly if that makes sense as wet seeps down at the wall side of the mat. Up until the mats, I semi deep littered by having solid deep beds, skipping out daily and only digging wet out if absolutely necessary which isn't very often; that way, the beds stayed deep, clean and dry even at the right hand side of the boxes; even if I turned the bed over, it still wouldn't be wringing wet as they are now.

Now, I've tried using just a scattering of shavings and sweeping the lot out every day (have to do that for Spring, she's a real mucky wet madam!
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) I've also tried a good bed at the back, leaving the front clear and mucking that out properly each day and trying semi deep litter (poo taken out daily, other left to bed down and more clean on top, same as I did before the mats). Now it might be me but nothing seems to drain as well as the beds before the mats and even if I wash them down, they've started smelling which they never did before.
I also like deep beds because a lot of the time, if they come in wet, they all love to roll and end up looking like snowflakes, which of course they can't do with these mats, they also love to go back to bed after breakfast and I just feel guilty that they won't be so comfortable on almost just the rubber and their droppings from that night.
Has anyone any bright ideas what I can do before I'm tempted to take out most of the mats and either just leave the centre matted or take them all out and go back to semi deep litter which I know works well for my boxes which mats doesn't seem to suit? Any suggestions will be welcomed, thanks!
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I had exactly the same problem, and never worked out a solution, ended up leaving said yard anyway. Rubber mats just created more of a problem then before, I think deep littering is better if your horses dont churn the bed up.
If we start our own yard, then we will have mats in the stables - but they'll be new build and drain to the front. Sorry I cant help, just sympathise, cause I know its a right pain in the arse
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I only use mats at the front, where they stand, and have a proper bed at the back, where they pee and sleep - front mats can be lifted and swept under - never understood the love affair with mats in this country TBH!
 
I'm so glad it isn't just me then; thought I was doing it all wrong! Yes, if they had been new floors/boxes, there wouldn't be a problem but they just don't suit our boxes.

Now how do I tell OH that we've just wasted £400?!
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Anybody want some as good as new mats?!
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Have to say, I do like the principle that they are easy to just sweep out although you seem to use at least as much if not more bedding than before but I do still prefer my fluffy beds and I'm sure my old neds will be thinking I've lost my marbles and forgotten to put any decent bedding in!
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We use rubber mats without any problems, but it does depend on the drainage. At one yard wee would collect in a pool underneath because there was no slope for it to drain. We use a layer of shavings to catch the wee properly, and a big straw bed on top. Doesn't save us any time mucking out, as we do full muck out's every time but it is good to know the horses aren't standing on cold concrete floors etc in winter.

Have seen yards where they do just use a sprinking of shavings. The horses lie down - but their rugs always stink... Not for me that way, that's for sure.
 
I use mats with a proper bed, the reason I got them was because my mare is quite heavy and she was tending to end up on concrete however much bed I had. I don't really notice the mats and they don't seem to smell because the bedding soaks up the wee before it goes under them.
 
I use them with a normal bed on top. I do not use them to try and save on shavings and mucking out time I use them purely to give the horses legs something nicer to stand on. Even if you have your normal deep beds on top of concrete, a deep bed on top of rubber mats are always kinder on the legs.
 
I still have quite substantial beds over my matting, which covers most of the width of the stable. It isn't butted up to the sides but held in place by the shavings banks. I only have matting to provide another layer before the concrete so the beds are warmer
 
We use rubber matting with great success on my yard. All the boxes have them - and the time saved on mucking out has been tremendous.

Like you - it took a bit of experimentation to get it right. But essentially we seem to have adopted a routine that suits the individual horse. So for instance we have a heavyweight 18hh hunter that does like to have a lot of bedding otherwise he won't lie down or wee - so that's what he has. Other horses range from being messy or very clean, and we bed accordingly.

In all cases the wet is taken out daily - and most of the horses now live in Rambo's, so don't have wet, soggy stable rugs for the times we're not around to pick up the pee!

It took some getting used to - but I know my YO woulnd't be without them now!

The get disinfected with green glupe disinfectant weekly - which helsp keep them sweet smelling. We also try and catch wee whenever we can - and a few of the horses will wee on comand, so that helps.
 
I personally love a good old fashioned deep straw bed with huge banks - if it looks like I could sleep on it then its good enough for my horse. Every experience I've ever had of rubber matting is that your clothes, your rugs and your horse stinks!
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AND it all trasnfers to the car, the lorry etc etc.
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I can't be doing with the smell. So if I ever have a stable to use again I will only be using straw and lots of it.
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I love my rubber mattings, all the wee runs to the back of my stable so we leave about 15cm gap at the back and then place shavings in the gap and banks to absorb the wee. My mare has banks but no bed and is happy with that, though always use a summer sheet/ cheap rug on top as she doesn't get wee on her rugs but general droppings (as she would on normal bedding)
 
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The get disinfected with green glupe disinfectant weekly - which helsp keep them sweet smelling. We also try and catch wee whenever we can - and a few of the horses will wee on comand, so that helps.

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Now you see, I've always been brought up that you shouldn't have to do that, your stables should smell sweet naturally (which mine always used to do not being big headed,) and a scrub out was an occasional, say spring, summer and autumn, not a regular weekly thing.

Can I say thanks for all the replies; the forum keeps locking up and this is the first chance I've had to get on.

Another question though: which way up do you have your mats? Ours are channels to the top simply because it was easier for lining up and to help wet go where we wanted it to go, also much easier to sweep!
 
We treid a couple of solutions, the Green Gloop from Fieldguard removes some of the odour or you can buy stuff they sprinkle in cow cubicles that soaks up and deodorises urine, if you put some under the mats it does help a lot.
We gave up in a couple fo the boxes as ours have wierd draining angles too, and now just have them in front of the doors.
The plan with the new stables is spray/paint a strip in front of every door inside so the horses aren't standing on cold concrete. Not sure if that will work, I'll let you know.
The good thing is they do stop the cold coming up through the floor so on that basis work, but as I can't bear stinking rugs we will be using conventional bedding for ours.. they also hated lying down on them and one mare "told" the reiki lady she hated hers!
 
I was just going to post about matting as I have been offered some at a reasonable price today!

Dolly is on shavings. I skip out the top daily, and do a full muck out of everything twice a week. I get through 2 bales of hunter shavings a week. Her stable can get pretty messy as she drags the bed about a bit (never goes through to concrete though) and a lot of it ends up at the back. I was wondering if matting would be worth the money. Do you think I would still use as much shavings etc?

Forgot to add, she tends to poo and wee pretty much in the same spot in the middle of the stable.
 
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Now you see, I've always been brought up that you shouldn't have to do that, your stables should smell sweet naturally (which mine always used to do not being big headed,) and a scrub out was an occasional, say spring, summer and autumn, not a regular weekly thing.

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Actually ours do if I'm honest. It's just that sometimes if you have a particularly wet horse - you may just need the odd squirt just to freshen up..........
 
If the floor of your stables slopes the correct way then the wee will not pool under the mats & smell. I have no problem with the mats I put in about 3 years ago, stables is fresh & horse doesn't smell. I didn't buy to save time or shavings, I bought because no metter how thick a bed we had my lad managed to knock his hocks about. We don't have that problem now. Best money ever spent.
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I love my mats, my stables were cattle stalls and they have drainage from front to back. I have a 5" layer of shavings over the back half of the stables. The front is just the mats, I take the wet and the droppings out daily top up with at tubba bucket full of shavings. Once a week brush all shavings back and green gloop the mats. My stables are in a barn with a walk way but when other folk pop round for a chat they all comment on how nice the stables smell. Both my horse lay flat out at night and keep very clean. I use about two bales of shavings per week. I think the trick is to have enough shavings down to hold the wet I found just a scattering no good at all you need enough to soak up. Mucking out takes me 30mins to fully do both stables and one wheel barrow fits all that I take out from both stables.
 
I use a flax bedding on rubber matting, but have quite a deep bed at the back of the stable. The bedding is super absorbent and I only need to take out poo during the week. I lift it fully at the weekend. It doesn't smell. I do lift the matting about once a month and give it a good clean out.
 
I have one on a fully matted thick bed and one with mats at the front and semi deep litter at the back. I think a lot depends on what type of mats youve gone for and the type of shavings you use. The fully matted bed isnt sealed but the mats butt tight against each other and on good shavings (Hunter, anything else just doesnt seem to suck properly), the wee doesnt seep under dispite quite a fall on the stable floor.

I must admit my liking for mats is purely to make a softer floor surface, I still have deep beds on top, and I cant bring myself to have mats and a sprinkle of shavings and thats it!
 
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I use a flax bedding on rubber matting, but have quite a deep bed at the back of the stable. The bedding is super absorbent and I only need to take out poo during the week. I lift it fully at the weekend. It doesn't smell. I do lift the matting about once a month and give it a good clean out.

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That's part of the problem, our mats are so heavy I can't even move them let alone take them out to clean; it's at least a 2 man job, also because of the sizes of the boxes, there are lots of 'bits' to put back, bit like a jigsaw! To do that would very soon loose the appeal for my OH - and we both suffer from bad backs so that's not an option.

I think I'm just going to have to take out the right hand side mats so I can sweep out all the wet that accumalates that side and bed up as usual which knocks on the head the time and bed saving theory!
 
I love mine, and have seen the benefit immediately! I did however have the professionally fitted and sealed in, so nothing can get underneath them. It means that in the summer I can chuck half a bale of shavings down if he needs to stay in over night for an early comp start without needing a full bed, and it means he has no bald patches on his hocks as without mats he would go down to the concrete no matter how deep his bed was.

As he lies down quite happily in the field, I have no problem with him not having a deep bed as I figure the mats are about the same if not more giving than lying on a rock hard field in the middle of summer! I have used TO rugs as stable rugs on him for the whole time I've had him anyway, but even with just an inch or so of bedding and no rugs in the summer he had fewer stable stains and no 'wee' patches on his coat (and he was still lying down because I saw him!!).

So all in all a brilliant invention - and no smell!
 
I have mine cut up into easily carried "squares" but with jigsaw like bits cut into them so it is obvious which one fits into which. The only problem with doing it like this is that they do move and accumulate dirty bedding underneath. I probably wouldn't bother lifting them at all otherwise.

Friends of mine have very thick rubber which is designed never to need lifting and never to smell. I don't know much about it, all I know is that it cost £££££££!! LOL.
 
i never lift mine. i use them as a soft floor (no more scraped elbows or hocks etc) and put about 1/3 bed at the back, normal depth. i use Ecobed cardboard bedding, which is super-absorbent, warm, and doesn't break down to dust, unlike shavings.
there is no smell at all... as long as the mats aren't moved, the bacteria which smell can't get the oxygen they need to breed. the drainage in my barn is rubbish, it is a perfectly flat power-floated concrete floor, but it never smells at all.
this is the third yard i've built, and i've put rubber mats in every one, and sold them with the mats. wouldn't be without them, i even have them in the field shelters, to insulate the horses from the cold ground.
 
I'd never be without my rubber mats!! Although we have a compacted earth floor so drainage is excellent. We use auboise which is super absorbant and have no problems with smell at all. I tend to have a medium bed so it never gets too wet. When I have my mare on concrete floors even with a super thick bed she gets really puffy legs, on rubber mats she's fine.
 
I have rubber mats for my boy - full floor coverage fitted wall to wall, so they dont move and i have a big shavings bed so the wee is soaked up before it can go anywhere.
I use the mats to take a bit of strain off his legs, prevents him capping his hocks and its a lot warmer than concrete too!
They dont need pulling out and cleaning underneath as they are fittted nothing gets underneath them.
I couldnt be without them!
 
I also have rubber mats and i still put a decent size bed in though. One of my boys is very dirty but i still find he is cleaner this way!! I use small flake dust free shavings and my mats are fitted so nothing ever gets underneath and they drain ok too!!
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Rubber mats were already in my stable before I came to the yard. Never wanted them before but love them now! Couldn't be without them.

I put a thick woodchip bed over the rubber matts, and it drains forwards so I don't have the same awkward situation as you. If I were you I'd sell them!
 
They are meant to have the bobbles on top. If you have the channels on top they can get slippy when wet, so horses can slip when getting up/lying down.

Aquamax/Megazorb/Hemp bedding is best with mats as it's more absorbent. If you have a concrete floor, the concrete always absorbs some of the wet and the bed ends up less wet as a result, especially if you sweep it back and let the floor dry during the day. With mats, there's no soaking in so the bed will be wetter.

I had mats in a stable like yours, it sloped down to one side, but the door was in the middle at the front. I solved the problem by laying the mats with a 1ft gap at the bottom of the slope. On the mats, less bedding, in the gap, 'sacrifice' bedding that I knew would always need removing in the morning. I also used a powder which was designed to soak up extra wet, beneath the mats to soak up any accidental spillage. I forget its name, something like stablezone or similar.
 
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