Straw or shavings for messy horse?

[GrumpyHero]

I'm having winter bedding problems!
My horse is quite messy, poo ends up in little bits all around the stable.
He's currently on shavings and every time he's in he seems to dig up the wee patches! I hate it! I only take the wee out once a week otherwise I'd be putting 2/3 bags a week down!
He has been on straw before, but when I moved stables I switched to shavings thinking he'd be cleaner.

Old stable was much smaller/darker with a rubbish view than new stable, so he used to eat a lot of his bed (even with a full hay net in..) so I'd be putting a couple of bales down a week. So maybe with new stable (can see lots and lots of horses, more light in the day and bigger stable for him) he might be better on straw?

I'm considering swapping back to straw.. pros are its only £2.50 a bale whereas the shavings I'm buying atm are £6.50 a bale so i could do nearly 3 bales of straw for 1x bag of shavings. I love the smell of shavings but I also like that with straw he has emergency food if he's *starving*

Arrgggghhhh. Please help me *facepalm*

 

[NativePonyLover]

As long as they have a constant access to water, eating straw IMHO does them little harm ( providing they aren't eating masses and masses). After all, it's often recommended for laminitis as a low cal alternative to hay.

I prefer straw as my horse is quite dirty & wet - with a base of chopped straw (but you could use shavings, wood pellets etc) helps absorbency. With the price of straw, it means it's still cost effective even if I need to take lots if bedding out every day ... I couldn't afford to do that with shavings!

 

[Oddjob's Wife]

My boy is messy too and was on shavings until recently. I mucked out thoroughly every day (always do anyway) and it wasn't the wet that was the problem so much as needing a sieve to get poo out. Since being on straw, poo is MUCH easier as he doesn't tread it in to the bedding, and I haven't needed to take much wet straw out each day either. It's proving much quicker to muck out and more economical. The downside is that the floor gets very wet (much wetter than I remember from being on straw years ago) and even leaving the bed up all day to air, it's been quite humid so it's not drying completely.

Strangely, my boy doesn't seem to 'get' straw - I have no evidence that he's lying down on it yet - I'm wondering if he doesn't like it This also may be part of the reason that his bed is cleaner to do anyway!

I tried straw with shavings underneath years ago and would never do so again - the shavings got mixed up with the straw and became horrible to get the wet out.

I guess it doesn't hurt to try - you can always revert back to shavings if not.

Good luck with making things easier for yourself, whatever you do.

 

[NellRosk]

My 2 were on straw and it was a nightmare how messy and disgusting they both were but now I'm on rubber mats and a deep litter hemp/ shavings bed they are so much cleaner. I leave all the wet in and take poo out every day and top up with half or 1 bag a week (usually half) after a while the wee base builds up so I just skim the top layer off and cover again with clean. Honestly so quick and easy to muck out, would never go back to straw.