Straw is the best bedding

Rowreach said:
This is all very well if you live somewhere that you can buy straw. There isn't any round here!
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Move here! You know you want to :D

Sadly there seems to be, to my uneducated eye, a surfeit of the stuff. Fields with many bales left standing. A farmer friend says not enough demand so farmers aren't bringing it in. They'll have to do something with it at some point though.
 
I’d love to bed mine back on straw but it does reek or rather I end up reeking! Plus storage could be a problem here but the main reason is he eats practically the whole new bale I’ll have put down! After a couple of years of straw, I changed to shavings but agree its very tempting to go back to straw...
 
Rowreach said:
This is all very well if you live somewhere that you can buy straw. There isn't any round here!
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Is it due to poor weather or is the straw being burned in Biomass? A few years ago there was a local shortage of straw for bedding cattle as it was being used in biomass burning.
My shavings have been creeping up in price the last couple of years, we were told it was due to biomass burning. This month Bedmax has shot up by a £1, the average price now is between £9-£10 a bale, I just can't afford it. Thank goodness there is a local surplus of straw that is being sold cheaply.
 
We just can't get and store good quality straw for bedding, so ours are on shavings, although I do prefer straw and it rots down more quickly, ime.

I am another who can't bear seeing horses on tiny beds. Any stable is a small space for an equine, so imo, the bed should cover the whole floor and be sufficiently deep to be comfortable., I can't bear seeing a few shavings sprinkled about on mats, or only half the floor covered by bedding. I don't think I've ever had a horse who wouldn't have scuffed the bed about onto the bare floor anyway.
 
I hate shavings love straw althoough mine live out now but when I looked after a yard with mine on straw and the others on shaving on frosty mornings the shavings beds were frozen solid and the straw ones were always still warm. Having said that the smell from straw can be mitigated by either a thin layer of dry wood pellets or shavings. Honestly though I think shavings smell far worse if not mucked out to the floor daily and beds left up as you would with straw
 
I've got my two on straw, although they are out most of the time so don't use their stables a lot. I like straw as it creates such a nice, thick bed and I think it's better for my oldie when she does come in, as she isn't used to standing in so gets stiff. At least the straw cushions her joints. She's not lying down though, and she always used to in the stable. I can't work out if it's because she's not used to being in over night so has got out of the habit of her nightly snooze (the 4 nights they've spent in this week are the only nights they've been stabled in the last four years). Or she is less keen to lie down now because of her arthritis (she is 26). I keep making her bed thicker in the hopes that it will entice her to lie down! She still rolls in the field, so obviously can get up and down.

If I had them stabled all the time though I think my preference would be shavings. The way the straw smell clings to you is a bit much for me!
 
Leo Walker said:
Straw smells no matter how well the bed is kept. Its not absorbent and the ammonia runs through it. Thats where the smell comes from. Even lifting and drying the whole bad daily still means it smells and it transfers to you. Anything more absorbent like pellets will absorb the ammonia and theres no smell.
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Not if you put wood pellets under it. Literally never smells Or clings (except for when you dig them out!)
 
HBB said:
Is it due to poor weather or is the straw being burned in Biomass? A few years ago there was a local shortage of straw for bedding cattle as it was being used in biomass burning.
My shavings have been creeping up in price the last couple of years, we were told it was due to biomass burning. This month Bedmax has shot up by a £1, the average price now is between £9-£10 a bale, I just can't afford it. Thank goodness there is a local surplus of straw that is being sold cheaply.
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There are no crops grown round here, we are all grassland or mountain. Any straw has to be brought up from the South. Cattle are kept on concrete slats :( If they are very lucky some farmers put rubber strips on the slats, and some houses have a mixture of sawdust and lime dusted on them. We do have a well know wood pellet producer a couple of miles away, so most horses are on pellets or shavings. My neighbour has just put in an extra £2 million of plant for producing more shavings, so there is clearly a big demand.

I do miss the days of lovely big straw beds and a proper muck heap.
 
There was a research paper a few years ago that found that the ammonia levels in stables with straw beds usually exceed the EU safe working levels for atmospheric ammonia, and were very high in airborne dust and fungal spores. Shavings beds had significantly lower levels of all three, and remained within 'safe' working limits The study only compared beds of single-material composition (so straw beds versus savings beds etc) so presumably the results would be better for straw beds with a shavings or pellets base- maybe this would be the best compromise between what is best for the horse's health and what they prefer/meeting their behavioural needs. As they lie of hard earth in the wild (or when living out) it is interesting that some of them show such strong preferences for bed type when kept in.
 
I bed on straw too mainly so there is always something for my pony to eat. I accept this means I have to shower change and wash my hair after mucking out so I can smell like a person not a farm.
 
HappyHollyDays said:
Michen how often do you dig out the wood pellets? I like to fully muck out every day but I am assuming you have to deep litter with pellets.
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Probably about once a week. Using a bag a week but he’s a super wet horse. The straw. Stays totally dry, so just take out poo and re fluff bed etc but I do still keep it v deep which helps a lot. Works really well but he never kicks his poo- piles are always immaculate!
 
I am sure when the research was done that said straw beds were better all the welfare issues were also considered and it still came back as best. Having said that the amount to dust that comes off bales of shavings is quite horrendous. I hate shaving they alway look mucky and take hours to much out
When using pellets under straw i used to muck out the bed and llift the bed to one wall sweep out the wet pellets leave the bed/floor to dry sprinkle where the floor had been wet with a few pellets possibly about a litres worth then relay the bed on top. next time the bed was lifted to a different wall and so on
10 to 15 miutes a day to do a stable
 
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I like straw for the comfiness, but not on it's own from the smell point of view. Also not with a wet ,box walking, poo machine. I'm afraid I went to mats with wood pellets, not a big bed as livery charged £7.50 a bag. we weren't allowed shavings. ideally he would have been out 24/7 365, but not easy to find a yard suitable.
 
Michen said:
Love straw. Only with wood pellets under it though otherwise super stinky. This is a proper straw bed fit for a princess pony!!! Think often people don’t have the beds thick enough.
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This is exactly what I’ve been doing for the past few weeks and I’m a total convert. My lad isn’t very wet so I just put a few handfuls in the 2 places where he pees, the pellets last me 3-4 days and just stops the wet from running all over the bed as he’s on rubber mats too. But the lack of smell is amazing!

Also, pets at home do wood pellets as cat litter in a bigger bag than most and for cheaper and I think they’re better than the Verdo ones I first tried!
 
I have literally tried most types of bedding, straw with a shaving base is probably the best. One of mine eats 3/4 of a bale of hay and he’s really wet and messy. When using shavings I was putting in at least half a bale a day and was costing a fortune.
 
My two horses already spend half their time in lying down as it is - if they wanted to spend any more time lying down I'd have to give up turning them out!

Arty spends 6+ hours a night lay down, but I've never tried her on straw so don't know the comparison. I think people tend to make more generous beds on straw than they do with either shavings or wood pellets. Arty's bed covers the whole stable floor and is a good 6" deep - it's like walking on a mattress
 
Thanks Michen, My shavings beds are very deep but Bailey is messy and DP eats anything that isn’t battened down, hence the shavings. I have already had one acute colic episode from DP this month and I just don’t think I can put him on straw so I think I am going to put the Bailsman on straw and keep DP on shavings.
 
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