Setting up a new livery yard

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BlondeAmbition

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I was wondering whether people would mind giving me their opinions on things they would look for in a competition/livery yard?

We have recently acquired a property that we are planning to change into a competition yard, and would very much appreciate any advice or recommendations.

Currently, there are two barns which will be demolished and one of these areas will be a 60x20m rubber/sand arena and one will be around 20 stables (with tack room and haybarn).

The ideas I have had so far are as follows:

An area for farrier/vet which is under cover

An wash area for the horses with hot and cold water

Automatic waterers

Individual tackrooms, or ones that are shared between two owners

Individual turnout paddocks, or small groups no more than four horses

Toilet and changing facilities

Horsebox parking

CCTV to run to the house



Thank you for any input... it really is very much appreciated at this stage. This is the first time my family will have done anything like this, although I have owned horses on DIY livery for a long time and regularly compete two of them.
 
The individual tack room idea is great - but it will take up LOADS of room to do them for each stable.

Turnout paddocks - I'm not a big fan of individual ones unless theres a brilliant reason - I think they're better out in little groups.

Toilet and changing facilities - great idea - you could maybe add a shower? Horsebox parking is essential.

Farrier / vet area is a good idea - will certainly be appreciated.

Have you thought about a rug room / general storage area?

What about a closed off feed room (rather than bins all over the place)

Ultimately, you could spend millions on every horsey whim so you'll need to work out how much of a budget you have to do it all.

Good luck
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I can see you are going to be full before you open your gates! I am sure we could all cope with grazing only for the summer! :-)
 
A horse walker is always a good one - for those horses who are recovering from an injury and can't be turned out but have to have restrictive exercise....

At our yard we have individual tack rooms and it doesn't take up much space at all and they are a decent size.

A secure place for tack storage (alarmed etc) would be a good idea.
 
For the moment, I hope you won't mind if I keep the location a mystery
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We have recently moved into the area, therefore we are just finding our feet so to speak.

Rug room is a must... I get fed up of mine hanging wet in my stable or not drying at all. Thanks for that suggestion, it is not something I had considered.

The reason for individual tack rooms is that I have been on a big yard and I got sick of the bickering when people 'borrowed' things from each other. I thought if perhaps to liveries (or one if they have more than one horse) could share a tack room this would make life a bit more secure for them. I have also been on a yard where the tack room door (with 20+ expensive saddle in) was left open on several occasions. Well, if you do this in your own tack room, only your stuff will end up stolen
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I wasn't planning on big tack rooms, but enough room for some feed bins, shelving for rugs and supplements, and saddle racks (unless they bring tack lockers).

Do you think it is a good idea keeping yourself away from the liveries too? My horses would be kept in the stables with the others, but I was planning on having a completely separate feed/haylage/tack area for mine as I will be taking up five of the stables myself?
 
Hi I've just up a livery yard.

Ideas that people love-

Tack room with individual lockers....
they are 6"6' x 4' x 3' with shelves
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Horse walker, a must for a competition yard
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The stables with auto drinkers and grill windows inbetween and made of recycled plastic instead of wood....
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The bathroom with shower...
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Clients lounge...
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Solarium....
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The farriers love the undercover area
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If you ever want any advice just PM me! Good Luck
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[ QUOTE ]
I can see you are going to be full before you open your gates! I am sure we could all cope with grazing only for the summer! :-)

[/ QUOTE ]

Ha ha... I like you thinking
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Grazing wise things are a bit complicated... I would very much like to offer grazing all year around, but liveries would be expected not to turn out when it is too wet etc. I know horses churn up fields, people who expect to keep it green and as flat as a bowling green shouldn't have liveries
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But I do think there has to be some limits.

Any ideas on this? I was considering maybe two 'trash paddocks' with some sort of surface down, possibly just some cheapish sand (but properly drained).
 
If space is an issue at a yard I used to be at we had individual tack lockers, with a bar and hook for saddle and bridle and room underneath for bandages, boots, grroming kits etc.

Then a feed room which had like individual bunkers, a little like the salt ones, to keep feed, all lockable. There was a lockable chest outside each stable too to keep rugs in, though no one ever really bothered, they were handy mounting blocks though, meaning you didn't have to treck all the way round the back to use the purpose built one!
 
[ QUOTE ]
A horse walker is always a good one - for those horses who are recovering from an injury and can't be turned out but have to have restrictive exercise....

At our yard we have individual tack rooms and it doesn't take up much space at all and they are a decent size.

A secure place for tack storage (alarmed etc) would be a good idea.

[/ QUOTE ]

The only thing I am worried about with a horse walker is the fact it is a huge cost and then I would probably have to charge people to use it and I can't imagine that would be too popular, nor would it get used very often. It is something that could be added at a later date though if I felt it would be used. I am also worried about the affect on horses' joints using the walkers, I think I would try to look for one of those that has a more oval shape so it is not a constant circle (again... please add any thoughts on this
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)

The tack rooms could be alarmed, but not sure how this would work with a few liveries inning and outing all day, but CCTV would be run from the yard, tack room etc etc straight into the house.
 
It will get used, a LOT. Mine gets used all the time and will be even more in the winter.

Think mine was around £10k for everything.

Whats your situation with turnout? How many acres have you got?

If you have limited turnout in winter you will need a horse walker.
 
There are 18 acres in total of grazing land...

I think a walker may be a good investment, but I have never personally used one myself. Is it included in your livery price, or do people pay extra for this?
 
It's included in the livery, the walker I have a Kylix, runs on the same amount of energy one floodlight uses.

Before we got ours 2 months ago I'd never used one and I don't know how I managed without it!
 
LOL - we were at a yard temporarily a few years ago - their walker was one of the dinky three horse ones and had classy builders herras fencing round it. They used it every day though as they didn't have great turnout. It was included in the cost of the livery.
 
I do like the idea of individual tack storage areas, the only down side I can see with this is that is does limit the services you can offer your clients. If they are all DIY or come and ride their own horses regularly that would be fine, if you offer riding/schooling/exercising as part of a package, having to go into individual lockers or cupboards is going to become a complete pain for you very quickly.
 
[ QUOTE ]
Grazing wise things are a bit complicated... I would very much like to offer grazing all year around, but liveries would be expected not to turn out when it is too wet etc. I know horses churn up fields, people who expect to keep it green and as flat as a bowling green shouldn't have liveries
smile.gif
But I do think there has to be some limits.

Any ideas on this? I was considering maybe two 'trash paddocks' with some sort of surface down, possibly just some cheapish sand (but properly drained).

[/ QUOTE ]
Where I work (very smart part/full livery yard) we have mostly flat grazing that gets a bit waterlogged in winter, so directly behind the stables we have a grass pen and a sand pen for winter turnout. We tend not to use the grass pen so much as it'd still get trashed, but the sand pen is absolutely invaluable. It's only tiny but it's enough to keep the more neurotic ones slightly more sane in winter!
We also have a brand new farrier area in the middle of the yard, TBH I wasn't sure it'd work but it's absolutely brilliant. We have a huge four-bale hay soaker (obviously this would only really be workable if you had full/part liveries) with an electric winch in the roof of the end of the farrier area, it's really efficient for soaking vast quantities of hay. Don't forget though that some people are bound to want to soak hay, so you need to provide for them too as it can take up a lot of space.
 
I can see the issues of individual tack rooms, but I was thinking along the lines of perhaps a separate feed room, and just the tack and equipment for mucking out being in the lockers.

I think a trash paddock is definitely going to be a great help for those times when turnout really is not acceptable in winter... and I am hoping that liveries will respect that as in the past I have seen it work correctly.

As for hay soaking... I hadn't thought of that but an old bath (there will be one coming out of the house actually) would probably do for the number of people who would be on hay. I don't think I could spend a lot on this sort of facility until I knew that a lot of people would require soaked hay. A steamer could be an investment in this situation.
 
Hi Claire,
Just wondering who is responsible for poo picking the horsewalker on your yard ?
Sounds silly but I know they do end up full of muck at the end of each day.
 
Probably Claire
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Another thing I have been thinking about... would wooden stabling put you off or attract you? I have been in both wooden and concreted stables, and I can't say I have found a real difference in temperature between the two???
 
QR - please dont be too influenced by those saying you 'need' a horsewalker - the last competition yard I was at didnt have one, but had a large sand paddock that was used for turnout in the winter. YO quizzed the liveries on whether to build a horse walker, but almost without exception they prefered the horses having the freedom of the paddock, and I must say I agree with them. Only thing is of course make sure its well drained - sounds obvious but ours was like quicksand with too much rain - needed someone holding a safety rope for you to wade in and catch horses, in case you sunk and they had to pull you out!
 
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