Things going missing at yard

My stable at my folks has a wide cupboard built into the roof space and a loft ladder that folds up so that I could keep all my stuff up there ( no tack shed then) they are easy to build can be temporary so you can take it down when you leave if its livery just depends on your type of stable build. Can't help with the buckets or haynets though. I suppose with them you could have them fixed into place - design a bucket lock am sure there are loads of people out there that would love the same thing.

You could get a sign made up along the lines of 'my stable is not a shop, please buy your own!'
 
i've had alot of things go missing from outside my stable, i used to lock a box (from DIY store) but that even got wrenched off and broke my box just because they wanted to use my things.
horses getting tied up outside my stables and then kicking my boxes and leaving alot of mess outside is also another bug bear.

the funny thing is that most of the liveries (who would help themselves) make out that they would only use expensive stuff on their horses and look down their noses at me cos i refuse to spend lots of money on basic things yet it's my things they "borrow".
i did say one day that my pony had ring worm and that whoever borrowed my brushes had better watch themselves. funny enough the one livery had the vet out the next day for her horse for suspected ringworm..........my pony didn't have it!
 
Try buying the most hideously patterned/brightly coloured things you can get hold of. At least then if someone takes your things you'll be able to spot them a mile off.

This was happening to me and I got fed up of replacing my boys training wraps with sensible coloured ones, so I bought bright purple ones. Ok, they are pretty hideous and they don't match anything but the stealing stopped.

Also, as other people have said, write your name on everything and wrap brightly coloured electrical tape around shovel handles/bucket handles etc.
 
Thank you everyone for your advice! Some brilliant and very creative ideas. I have just gone and bought silver spray paint to spray the bottom of my buckets with and coloured rope to thread my hay nets with.

I have been pestering my YM for a while now about this and nothing has happened and have left several notices on the board in the tack room politely asking for people to return my things - with no success.

Have also bought little tags to attach to my head collars and lead ropes and tack.

Fingers crossed this should hopefully put a stop to it or at least so I can recover some of my things if they get 'borrowed' again.
 
Some of these stories are pretty shocking. What sort of yards are these, where some owners either can't or won't provide basic equipment ? Do they manage to provide good care for their horses or is everything done on a shoestring to the detriment of the horses welbeing ?
 
Orchardbeck said:
God, i'm so glad I keep my horses at home! I'd never have imagined it would be so bad at livery yards.
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I haven't been on a yard where belongings were stolen, most yards and the people are lovely but there are always some that aren't.
FWIW, I was more concerned about theft when I had the horses at my own place because of the times when I was away for a few days.
 
I don't think it's stealing in the true sense, it's just borrowing that never gets put back. I once found my feed scoop in a field at my last yard where someone had borrowed it to catch a difficult horse, put it down and forgotten about it.

Still annoying and has happened at all three yards I've been on.
 
I use a bicyle chain on my wheel barrow and a big box that's lockable from Lidles for all his supplements/ first aid kit/ boots etc as was getting fed up of people nicking my stuff esp the supplements given how expensive they were.

Fortunately the suspected culprit(s) have now left and have more approachable yo should it ever happen again but still keep box locked.
 
Havnt read all posts so not sure if this has been mentioned but is it possible that they have been taken by people not on the yard, and it is people from outside, maybe a different yard or people aiming to sell the items for the money? Just a thought as you mentioned they seemed to have vanished. We had some wheelbarrows taken by people who weren't at the yard and never found them
 
Love said:
Havnt read all posts so not sure if this has been mentioned but is it possible that they have been taken by people not on the yard, and it is people from outside, maybe a different yard or people aiming to sell the items for the money? Just a thought as you mentioned they seemed to have vanished. We had some wheelbarrows taken by people who weren't at the yard and never found them
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Seems to be small things, can't see someone getting into our tackroom, ignoring lots of lovely saddles and bridles and making off with a plastic bucket and a lungeline
 
There are certain things that seem to go missing at the yards i've been at

Headcollars and ropes, sometimes just the ropes
Hoof picks
lunge lines
Whips (schooling, lunge, short)
scoops
Spoons and mixers
haynets
buckets and bowls.

Wheelbarrows and mucking out tools go for a wander but are generally easily spotted and retrieved however prone to being broken.

All things that aren't very personal, you wouldn't use someone else's saddle as it wouldn't fit but it doesn't matter which lunge line you use, they are all relatively low value and easily picked up and forgotten.

Drives me mad and I'm actually moving to a private yard with a couple of friends so looking forward to leaving that behind.
 
I have her name on everything, tiger tape on all my tools and everything that is smaller is locked away. Very sad, but fed up with people helping themselves. I would lend anyone anything if they asked, please do not just help your B....y self.
 
Ginger_Nut said:
Can't believe the amount of stuff that gets "borrowed" at yards! Makes me glad mine are at home & my stuff is in my house, though I do have a couple of liveries but none of their stuff goes walkabout.
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I keep mine at home and you would think that things wouldn't go missing but they do!
It's not because someone's taking them though, it's because I lose things. I've lost goodness knows how many hoofpicks over the years.
 
My YO has a box in her office whereby everything that staff or liveries find which is unclaimed goes in there. Works a treat and means a lot of stuff which was put down in the wrong place still finds its rightful home! As I am not on a DIY I don't really have the problem but we did in the past with kit and things like canter spray missing. One person was so bad and so consistent that if livery a was missing something, she would just go to b's box to retrieve it! Livery b was considerably younger which might have had something to do with it but as her parents are generous it was annoying. Me? I created such an unholy stink when anything walked that I was then bypassed in the borrowing..! Livery b has gone... and there is no longer any problem with things walking!
 
We had a really odd family at my old yard, and the younger daughter must have been a kleptomaniac. One day one of the other liveries got fed up with having lost something else, marched into her tackroom and at the bottom of a bin was everyone's missing items. To give you an idea of how odd they were, the son used to try to chat up girls of only 10 or 11, and the klepto even nicked bedding out of her own older sister's stable .
 
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