Straw- with or without mats?

[holeymoley]

I'm sure this has been covered before inside a thread but I can't find it. Looking for a wider opinion out of interest.

I have one on straw with a sawdust base and no mats. Other one is on straw with sawdust base and full mats(all flush together so no gaps). I appreciate both are different horses but more or less the same size, relatively clean and tidy, yet matted one seems to be wetter. Non-matted one even if he pees at the front of the bed, seems to dry up nice and quickly on the concrete. Are mats totally a waste of time with straw? Interested to hear experiences. I would rather be on straw/shavings but unfortunately our stables seem to condensate any time there's some moisture in the air .

 

[splashgirl45]

I found it better to just put a mat at the front of the box so they aren’t standing on concrete but just straw on 2/3rds of the box so they wee on that. Mats are good with shavings or similar that can absorb the wee

 

[Honey08]

I use straw with mats. I primarily have them so that no matter how much they dig or scuff beds up they can’t scrape hocks on the floor. But I’ve also found that water buckets don’t freeze as quickly on rubber mats, so that’s a bonus too.

 

[MuddyMonster]

I have EVA mats, then a wood pellets base & a deep straw bed.

I only have mine under the bed though as I prefer to leave the front of the stable mat-free.

 

[poiuytrewq]

I have mats with straw but this is only because we don’t have a concrete base. We put stone, rolled it, put mats and stables on top.
They are well fitting with no gaps or movement.
At one of the yards I work on they have mats on concrete, not fitted and straw and imo it’s absolutely rancid.
If I had concrete floors I’d definitely just bed right up to the front, or almost and put a mat by the door as Splashgirl said.

 

[splashgirl45]

I have EVA mats, then a wood pellets base & a deep straw bed.

I only have mine under the bed though as I prefer to leave the front of the stable mat-free.

That’s interesting, opposite to me , why do you leave the concrete bare at the front?

 

[MuddyMonster]

That’s interesting, opposite to me , why do you leave the concrete bare at the front?

A few reasons. Mainly I've find most mats are more likely to slippery in wet than the actual floor. I think it can potentially give feet a better chance to dry out properly too. Unless you get them fitted I've found it's hard to get the front mats to stay in place too without other mats and you end up with bedding, wee and water under the mats - I've done 5+ yard moves with my mats, so even if I cut it to size in one stable chances are it won't fit another on the next move.

It's a bit redundant in my case as I have a big straw bed so there's only a small gap for water buckets really - I don't want to add potential extra pressure on front feet by half standing on a deep bed and half not.

But if I had a part-bed, part-non bedded stable I'd prefer to leave it mat free