Sand school etiquette

[pocket]

I stable my horse at a large livery yard and generally ride during the day, so have the luxury of schooling during the day. However, my shift patterns have changed and I tend to finish work at 4pm and get to the yard at around 5pm.

Since October, I've not had much oppertunity to ride due to an op, weather and lameness, plus the school was completely flooded and no one was able to ride for about a month! After much TLC from the YO the school is ridable again, jumping was stopped, but now that the surface is good again, the children have been given the go ahead to jump, so, they are making up for lost time and the jumps are out most evenings.

This is becoming a problem as those that are trying to school have to cram into one end of the school and canter is impossible. One day as I was riding, poles and jump wings were dragged into the school as I was trying to canter the long side......I was not happy!!

How do other yards manage school access? Do you have allocated times for jumping etc? I just feel its a little unfair when people are tying to school after work and the jumps come out night after night and then again all day at the weekends? Any advice? Rota etc?

 

[PucciNPoni]

That's a hard one cos assuming everyone pays the same amount of livery, everyone should have the same access to the facilities. Can you "book" the school for half hour or an hour or whatever you need? You could always say you are willing to share, but just want a time with no jumps?

We have an indoor arena that gets REALLY busy in the winter time and we book it for lessons. The other night I went in (just getting back in the saddle after five months out on a borrowed horse) and there was already three horses in and they were doing some pony club games practice. I just joined in, even though the horse I was riding is more dressage schooled, it's always good to ride in company. And aside from the jumping, we just joined in the games (was tempted to put the mare's gp saddle on tho and have a go at the juming games too tho!!!). It certainly breaks the monotony of just day to day schooling but I can totally empathise with you. We sometimes will have the school arranged so we can practice tests or whatever and then someone wants to come in and lunge....argh! And our school isn't big enough to do both.

 

[Helen000]

At my yard no jumping is allowed at 'peak hours' so between 5pm and 7pm.
Seems to work well.

 

[Shay]

Our yard is mainly jumping anyway so our problem was that the one dressage rider used to put the jumps away. I'm afraid our solution was to build a second school!

 

[Elliep25]

are they jumping whilst you're in the school/just building jumps. Either way I'd be rather annoyed! As others have said can you not have a rota? Best of luck, ellie xxx

 

[floradora09]

Tricky one, in the winter our yard books slots in the school, which seems to work well, and we're not really allowed to jump on school as surface not up to it. However in summer we set up a small course of jumps in the 'jumping field' which also has some dressage markers out. Generally the rule for this is that those jumping have to stay out of the way of the people schooling.

Maybe if your school was big enough you could come to some sort of arrangement like this? xx

 

[CBFan]

I think it's a common problem across many yards and IMO it comes down to a lack of manners and consideration for others. We have a diary in which we can book out the school and if I was in your situation night after night I'd be inclided to book it for half an hour or so a couple of evenings a week (nothing too excessive) for DRESSAGE SCHOOLING and make a note next to it that you have no problem with sharing the school but no jumping during this time please... then if someone starts to set up jumps while you're in there you have every right to say 'excuse me, would you mind waiting til I'm done'

Alternatively sugest that you alternate jumping and flatwork through the week... OR you could just go up a little later in the evenings when all the little b*****s are at home doing their homework! ;o)... believe me, it is so much more relaxing!

 

[chunklovescooks]

We are just told to ask the person in the school if its OK, if its not we just wait until they are finished.

If they really annoy you, just tell them to wait!

S

 

[aimeejay]

We have to 'book' in when we want to ride for aslong as we want and in that time you can put up a jump but you have to put it away during your time slot, it works out fine for us all, never had any problems with it

 

[LadyRascasse]

at my yard we are mostly jumping but if you want the jumps out or away you do it yourself. we tend to ride on our own unless we ask each other. everyone is very courtesious of each other and it works well, you need to have you YO implementing it other wise it becomes a bit of a free-for-all. i would have a sit down with your YO and encourage anyone else with similar issues to do the same.

 

[Vikki89]

There is only 5 of us that ride where i am but we all tend to ride in the evening and weekends. If someone is in there we ask if it is ok to go in too or just wait till they come out. If jumps are put up and someone is waiting to go in then we ask if the next person is jumping, if not the jumps are taken down, if yes then then the last person to use them takes them down. Sometimes people forget so we just take them down before we go in if we don't want to jump.
No yard rules about it really its just what we usually do.

 

[Luci07]

Have a chat to your YO and suggest a rota - its not fair on those who want to school to always be second place behind the children jumping and I can't see why they jump every night? no one jumps in our school at "peak" times anyway. Its selfish - whereas several people can school in a 20 x 40, someone jumping makes life pretty tricky! Weekends for us are different and school is normally booked for lessons anyway, but you can check the book/hack.

 

[bushbaby28]

I used to have exactly the same problem at my yard and I hated riding in there while they were out because the sight of them hyper my horse up and I couldn't get anything useful out of him. Then on the other hand was the annoying aspect of people spending 30 mins putting jumps up, an hour riding and then another half an hour putting them away, meaning the school was booked up for the whole evening!

What we did the previous year was to have a jumping paddock- there was a small field next to the school that had the jumps permanently set out. Could you do that at all?

 

[skint1]

Until a few weeks ago we had never been on a big yard I never realised there was an etiquette to setting up jumps!

 

[sbsmiths]

We have a booking sheet at our yard so people can book half hour slots or if you're having a lesson you can book 1 hr. If you want to use the jumps you put up and put away when you've finished and if somebody wants to come in they ask if you mind - it's up to you if you allow them. Everybody's generally respectful of the system. I know what you mean about "school" time - my daughter's at school so we tend to book slots later in the evening rather than immediately after school. We also have a jumping paddock so it works quite well.

 

[arwenplusone]

we have a booking system at our yard, whereby everyone can book a slot for a lesson and a slot for a 'practice' at peak times, but only two sessions per horse per week (to stop people booking it every night at the same time)

We didn't used to have the system at all but all the kids wanted in at the same time after school and it got a bit heated between some of the liveries.

During the week I ride at 6am so I always have the school to myself. I usually then book a weekend am slot if I want to jump but I state on the booking that that's what I'll be doing.

It works pretty well on our yard

 

[arwenplusone]

I should say also, we don't have the jumps up in the arena. if you want them you get tem out & put them away when you are done. simples

 

[ofcourseyoucan]

i have 22 horses on my yard and you can book the school for sole use or lessons, but not regularly at peak times, the odd one off is ok booked well in advance. i have an unwritten casual rule no more than 3 horses in menage at one time, and to be courteous to other users. jumps live in the middle and whoever puts them up puts them back, and if non jumpers are using school then no jumps on the track. works well here and all my liveries are nice to each other. there isnt really any reason why one cant do flat when another is jumping as long as you pass left to left and are considerate to the other user. gets the horses used to faster moving ones in the same space. good practice for the shows when everyone is out for themselves.

 

[TequilaMist]

Our yard is moving to new facilties(yay)this has become a topic of conversation already.Some folk think if someone lungeing and they go into school then lunger should get out imo they were there first so don't think thats fair.
Do think numbers in school at one time need to be limited if everyone pileing in.Used to ride with 'jumper' in school they just used to shout 'coming to cross' or whichever jump was up usually 2 at most then knew where to avoid/stop.
Actually found dressagers worse to ride with esp the good ones as you would try and guess where they where going as they came round corber then they would do lateral move across school and when on a lazy cob was hard to move quickly out of way usually landed right in their way!!

 

[pocket]

Thank you to everyone who has responded, have suggested to the YO that at peak times there should be no jumping and perhaps in the summer a designated jumping paddock.

The proof of my argument about jumping at night came to a head last night when a child fell off because horse was spooked due to poor lighting whilst jumping, my horse spooked at the same mounting block as it was in the shaddow's and not easily seen, I was doing sitting trot at the time!!! Ralph went buck, leap and fart all at the same time, LOL!

I'm sure it will be sorted?