Straw... Bed eating beastie!

[Queenbee]

All last winter and this summer I've been crowing over the fact that bedding costs me about £2.30 a week as I use big bale straw and bens quite an easy and clean muck out. However, a couple of months ago I found myself mucking out considerably less bedding than I'd put in the day before and this has continued. I had therefore, a sneaky suspicion that it was being eaten as dessert by the beast and low and behold a couple of weeks ago I found him with a gob full! Now on the whole, I don't mind him having a cheeky nibble, but he is a ganet, he normally has his hay on the floor in the winter but with the summer grass, he's had to revert to a small holed large haynet for the daytime... Problem is, no matter what I do, he eats it fast, much faster than I'd like and double netting doesn't seem to help... So when he turns to his bed he is just as sodding greedy. As a result he is now on bed rations, not too bad as he has rubber matting, but the plump thick straw bed has gone, and he has a much thinner one now, he still has a nibble at his bed but not so much as the quantity just isn't there.

I'm not so worried at the moment during the summer while he is in at day, but for the winter I do like him to have a big bed... I am hoping that come the winter, he will be on more hay and as a result less inclined to eat his bed, but if not, I'm going to have to do something, obviously if needs be, I will have to switch bedding, but am debating spraying it with something to see if that helps... I considered and disregarded jeys as I'm sure I've heard that someone's horse still ate it and got ill... That's such a Ben thing to do, I won't risk it. But I was thinking of something perhaps designed for anti cribbing, has anyone used this method? Did it work?

 

[Tnavas]

Buy yourself a 4-5litre pump spray and some Jeyes fluid. Dilute and spray over the bed. Using the pump spray applies a finer amount than the good old watering can we used to use.

Works really well at putting them off.

 

[Nugget La Poneh]

Jeyes is toxic, and not all horses are put off by it so will continue to consume the straw and the Jeyes.

Leave him to it, especially if barley or oat straw. It keeps the gut moving, and providing he has access to more water than normal, you shouldn't have an issue. It has less calories as well, so if you are concerned about weight, reduce the hay/feed ration.

The only issue you can sometimes have is sometimes the straw is not as well threshed as it could be, so you get quite a lot of grains. I found I could reduce the problem by shaking it up at the front, then forking the straw up on the bed and then the grains were swept out.

 

[Charlie007]

I wouldn't use jeyes either. One of mine eats his bed and the safest things I have found to work is mixing a bit of the old wet straw in. Not overly nice but it is only little bit and seems to put him off. I also mix the new bedding in well with the old.

 

[Queenbee]

I don't want to use jeyes... For the above reasons, that's why I was considering cribox, I don't mind him eating a bit of bedding but not the levels he will eat if left to his own devices... It's not safe. He has a large tub trug of fresh water a day but is only drinking half, he then goes and guzzles from the bath in the field as soon as he is out... Again, not happy letting him eat all he wants if that's his current attitude with water. I think I will do a cribox trial, if it doesn't work, then I will consider swapping