What are the barmiest yard rules you've had to put up with...

Oh lemme think... Erm bathing with buckets only absolutely no using the hosepipe even if you offer to pay for the water (but the trough in your field that's been leaking for a month and is creating its own bog in the middle of summer... yeah that's fine by us), no strip grazing even when grass is insanely lush, all requests for services must be sent via text message. Went to view a few places where you must be able to fit in exactly with their routine or "it upsets the horses" (I work frigging shifts goddam it!), no outside instructors was a rule at a few I went to as well. Have also had a ban on bringing own feed on, an all feed must be bought from the yard rule. Also had a rule against rubber matting at a few places... I think the one that tops them all is somewhere that I left after one day because they had a rule you couldn't turn out in the field when the ground was wet (not poached or boggy or underwater just wetness!)
 
i rent my own land and barn now- although do share some things with someone, but no crazy rules!
my friend was at a yard where she would get told off if there was any hay sprinkled outside her horses stable- he was eating it from the hay net, then looking over his door and dropping a bit. she would sweep morning and evening, but did not live there! A little bit of hay is hardly unusual around horses!
because she was always first up and last up she was expected to sweep the yard! all of it! plus do all the feeds (granted in stable blocks it is better to feed all together so some dont get stoppy due to having to wait- but this yard had about 20)
i was lucky that when i was at a livery yard they were flexible. when i changed jobs and was on DIY but needed to do horse at 6am i was allowed to unlock and do my horses, then lock up again.
 
'no pink wheel barrows allowed on the yard' after a certain livery (me) purchased one and apparantly mocked yo daughter as she was on the dole and wanted one

thats on another thread i did a few years ago lol.
 
I once looked at a yard that closed at 7pm weekdays and 5pm on Sundays. I don't think so.

Looked at another one which was closed Mondays. No liveries allowed at the yard on that day. Why? "The horses need a day off." Well, how about I give my horse days off when it suits *me.*

I did not move my horse to any of these places.

Then there was the crazy barn owner on Staten Island, NY, who had a barn rule that you must lead your horse in a stud chain. No matter how well behaved it is to lead. I asked why, my horse having super ground manners, and she said that if the horse spooked, the flat webbing halter wouldn't stop her. I blew off that barn rule.
 
Last edited:
The more threads like this I read, the more I love my yard.

We don't have rules. We're relied on for being adults and having common sense. It works.
 
More of a private yard which I ended up turning down after my visit.

She likes horses turned out at the same time as hers which is bang on 7am. Once her horse is in the field other horses cannot enter as hers goes nuts and tries to attack. So YOU have to head collar hers and bring it out to put it back in with hers. No winter turn out what so ever (I know this is normal for some but shocking for me) No daytime summer turn out as HER horse hates flies. Don't carry treats in your pocket when going into the field as her horse smells them and will tear your pockets open.

Oh and a grass livery I was on and left had 6 horses on 5 acres so no grass what so ever. Had to pay and feed hay all through summer and I had to fill the trough for 6 horses every other day because if I didn't do it, they went with out water! No one poo picked so you can picture what the field was like and often the gate was wide open where people forgot to lock it and the wind blew it open!
 
Last edited:
Yard owner, non horsey has opened a cafe overlooking the school, the cafe customers like watching us ride.........have coped with the gradual way the cafe is taking presidence over the horses including the picnic tables complete with umbrellas around the edge of the school ( has made for some intresting schooling sessions )
But now we can't park near the stables, have to carry the tack a fair distance to the car as can't kerp it on site, the car park we used to use is for the cafe only and now has to be a complete horse free area health and safety. Doesn't stop the cafe customers using our new parking area and using the walkway through the stables to get to the cafe, stopping of to fuss the horses on the way, not sure how this will work with health and safety if a horse gets loose!
Had enough now, a weeks notice is going in tonight we have been lucky enough to find a place for our six horses to go. Can't wait:)
 
alwaysbroke said:
Yard owner, non horsey has opened a cafe overlooking the school, the cafe customers like watching us ride.........have coped with the gradual way the cafe is taking presidence over the horses including the picnic tables complete with umbrellas around the edge of the school ( has made for some intresting schooling sessions )
But now we can't park near the stables, have to carry the tack a fair distance to the car as can't kerp it on site, the car park we used to use is for the cafe only and now has to be a complete horse free area health and safety. Doesn't stop the cafe customers using our new parking area and using the walkway through the stables to get to the cafe, stopping of to fuss the horses on the way, not sure how this will work with health and safety if a horse gets loose!
Had enough now, a weeks notice is going in tonight we have been lucky enough to find a place for our six horses to go. Can't wait:)
Click to expand...

Oh god that would be horrible! I'm not very confident when riding and still learning! I would hate people sat watching me. but in a strange twist I would enjoy sitting down for breakfast watching people practice for a comp lol
 
Oh yes, crazy yard rules...Years ago I was at a livery yard where the YO was gradually losing it to financial stress etc. She would, for example, decide when horses would need rug changes ('for welfare reasons') and liveries would often find on their bill that they had been charged for 26 rug changes in one week (explanation 'Sun came out so rug off, then cloudy and possible rain so rug back on, then warm and sunny again...etc) so you would turn up to the yard to find your horse in exactly the same rug as you left him but apparently having had several changes of outfit which you had to pay £2.00 for each one! She would try this trick with 'bringing in for the farrier'- he turned up unexpectedly so your horse would be brought in then sadly farrier would not have time to shoe/trim so horse back out again: bingo - £4 please!!

The other thing that really cracked us up was the fact that the hosepipe (for the one yard tap located deep inside a narrow, horse un-enterable building) was kept in a cupboard on the yard. To open the cupboard (or just look inside I guess) would cost 20p. You had to pay an extra £1 to get the hosepipe out and that gave you a strictly timed 10 minutes worth of use. If Y/O not there you couldn't have the key to the blessed cupboard anyway and as she hated all of her liveries with a passion she would frequently not bother answering the door for any requests like this. Sometimes, just to annoy the YO (a bit mean but we were well teed off) we would ask to just open the cupboard as many times as we could bear to, knowing that she probably wouldn't tot up all the different 20 pences that were owed.

For any real purpose we all just used buckets and buckets of water.

Yard failed to thrive as a business...!!
 
Was on one yard that did not allow tying up on the yard or using a hosepipe. Horses had to be washed using a bucket but could not be left unattended at all. Given that both the tap and the water tanks were in the yard but the only place we could tie up was a fair way around a corner, and that it took at least six buckets of water to get my horse's very thick tail even halfway clean, this was a royal PITA.

Everything kept moving around, so in the time I was there, the tack room, feed room, rug store and hay storage were all moved into vastly inferior spaces.

There was a white board which contained the new rules set every ten minutes - such as no brushing your horse in the field - and drove everyone mad. I lasted six months and then left, as did all the other liveries...
 
alwaysbroke said:
Yard owner, non horsey has opened a cafe overlooking the school, the cafe customers like watching us ride.........have coped with the gradual way the cafe is taking presidence over the horses including the picnic tables complete with umbrellas around the edge of the school ( has made for some intresting schooling sessions )
But now we can't park near the stables, have to carry the tack a fair distance to the car as can't kerp it on site, the car park we used to use is for the cafe only and now has to be a complete horse free area health and safety. Doesn't stop the cafe customers using our new parking area and using the walkway through the stables to get to the cafe, stopping of to fuss the horses on the way, not sure how this will work with health and safety if a horse gets loose!
Had enough now, a weeks notice is going in tonight we have been lucky enough to find a place for our six horses to go. Can't wait:)
Click to expand...

Wonder if YO has the necessary food handling and hygiene certificates???
 
moleskinsmum said:
Was on one yard that did not allow tying up on the yard or using a hosepipe. Horses had to be washed using a bucket but could not be left unattended at all. Given that both the tap and the water tanks were in the yard but the only place we could tie up was a fair way around a corner, and that it took at least six buckets of water to get my horse's very thick tail even halfway clean, this was a royal PITA.

Everything kept moving around, so in the time I was there, the tack room, feed room, rug store and hay storage were all moved into vastly inferior spaces.

There was a white board which contained the new rules set every ten minutes - such as no brushing your horse in the field - and drove everyone mad. I lasted six months and then left, as did all the other liveries...
Click to expand...

I do have some sympathies with the hosepipe ban. Its amazing how some people cheerfully use enough water to fill an olympic sized pool to wash their horses, feed buckets, whatever. My horse didn't like hosepipes so I would fill up two big black water containers, leave them in the sun to warm up then use a jug to add water to her. If she still needed a bit more then she had to put up with a few jugs of cold water. Where I work, I've lost count of the number of times I've gone into one of the bathrooms, or the kitchen on our floor and found a tap running at full blast. How can you not notice?
 
As DIY on a livery yard,
You got "free turnout" as part of DIY, but you had to pay to bring in, all horses had to be in by 3pm and no option of leaving the DIY horses (all in same field) out for owners to bring in.

Not allowed to bring in another persons horses as that was a cost livery yard could charge you for
 
alwaysbroke said:
Yard owner, non horsey has opened a cafe overlooking the school, the cafe customers like watching us ride.........have coped with the gradual way the cafe is taking presidence over the horses including the picnic tables complete with umbrellas around the edge of the school ( has made for some intresting schooling sessions )
But now we can't park near the stables, have to carry the tack a fair distance to the car as can't kerp it on site, the car park we used to use is for the cafe only and now has to be a complete horse free area health and safety. Doesn't stop the cafe customers using our new parking area and using the walkway through the stables to get to the cafe, stopping of to fuss the horses on the way, not sure how this will work with health and safety if a horse gets loose!
Had enough now, a weeks notice is going in tonight we have been lucky enough to find a place for our six horses to go. Can't wait:)
Click to expand...

I would love this ,
So good for the horses to learn to put up with stuff like this .
 
DIY yard where all horses had to be brought in and turned out at the same time together, not allowed to hose muddy legs downs but were allowed to wash out buckets with the hose
 
I was at a yard where the YO didn't ban hosepipes but just really didn't like us using them. So he'd go around and steal all the hosepipe connectors. The amount we spent on connectors before we realised what he was doing (and hid them instead) was astronomical.
 
One YO I knew had her own curly hosepipe which liveries weren't allowed to use, and same YO told off the father of a livery for turning up at the yard with a 5 o clock shadow. Another YO who was as mad as a box of frogs would feed apples to my horse then make ME get down on my hands and knees to scrub the slobber off the floor (????)
 
Wow, where to start with the old yard.

-Must ask advance permission from YO before putting on a rug of any kind, stable or turnout or sweatrug, failure to obtain permission meant she would remove the rug as soon as you left
-No hard feed on full livery
-ABSOLUTELY NO POO PICKING, manure was to be left to rot 'naturally'
-Concrete hard standing/tie up spot must be hosed after use

Needless to say, we're happier at the new yard which is run by a sane happy person.
 
No one on yard before 8am - not possible if you want to go anywhere and only applied to people YO was being awkward with.

YO demanding keys to everyone's feed stores

You must book the school (reasonable) - but anyone in YOs family who wants it can use it whether you've booked it or not and they will not share. So you never get the school.

Moans about a gelding mounting a tarty mare but insists they're turned out together.
 
palo1 said:
The other thing that really cracked us up was the fact that the hosepipe (for the one yard tap located deep inside a narrow, horse un-enterable building) was kept in a cupboard on the yard. To open the cupboard (or just look inside I guess) would cost 20p. You had to pay an extra £1 to get the hosepipe out and that gave you a strictly timed 10 minutes worth of use. If Y/O not there you couldn't have the key to the blessed cupboard anyway and as she hated all of her liveries with a passion she would frequently not bother answering the door for any requests like this. Sometimes, just to annoy the YO (a bit mean but we were well teed off) we would ask to just open the cupboard as many times as we could bear to, knowing that she probably wouldn't tot up all the different 20 pences that were owed.
Click to expand...

This is my favourite. 20p to open a cupboard. Could you not have brought your own hose?

Most "rules" have been, in my experience, just another way for the YO to make you pay for something else which normally should have been included in the livery.
 
I love reading all these posts about crazy yard rules!! Absolutely bonkers to me that there are people like this out there but at least I know some things to keep an eye out for when looking for a yard in future. Kudos to all of you who managed to put up with this for longer than a few weeks; I know I would not have been able to.
 
Roody2 said:
Yup, had that one - even when it was raining...
No bed down during the afternoons, my horse is one of the odd ones who will only wee when the bedding was down - so he would have to wait every day until beds were put down for a wee.
No horses in the school when the instructor was teaching, but YO wouldn't give any warning to when the lessons were booked.
Farrier told to tie up somewhere different every time he visited, even if yard was empty.
Horse accused of being a rig because he squealed with other horses tied up outside his stable.
Staff would turn out 4 at a time per person - even though they frequently lost them or horses ended up in kicking matches..
Click to expand...

If my horse wants her bed down, she will just drag it down - would love to see how that YO would cope with that.

The one yard I was on that did have times you weren't allowed on yard, you just had to let them know. ie. I'm working an early shift so this week I'll be down at 6am. That's fine!

Moleskinsmum said:
There was a white board which contained the new rules set every ten minutes - such as no brushing your horse in the field - and drove everyone mad. I lasted six months and then left, as did all the other liveries
Click to expand...
Wow, and this one wouldn't cope with me and my pony either as I clip her in the field, never mind brushing.

I've not been on any yards where they were mad rules but I'm glad I know what to ask any prospective YO.
-Is there a charge to open any cupboards?
-Am I allowed to use my own rugs?
-What day does my horse have off each week?
- Can I leave my horses dirty bedding on the muck heap?
-Does my wheelbarrow have to be a specific colour?
-Am I allowed to school and do circles in the arena?
-Will I need to hide my connector?
 
Bring your own hose? Certainly not!! It was a shame really as the yard was really quite decent in terms of facilities and hacking out and one particularly lovely member of staff that always dealt with everything really well. Just the Y/O who made things bad. It was once I felt that welfare issues started arising that I fled and thankfully never looked back. The yard no longer exists and the Y/O now longer has anything to do with horses. Best outcome really.
 
aintgotnohay said:
'no pink wheel barrows allowed on the yard' after a certain livery (me) purchased one and apparantly mocked yo daughter as she was on the dole and wanted one

thats on another thread i did a few years ago lol.
Click to expand...

Was this the one where they put the wheelbarrow on the roof full of water and you got soaked retrieving it?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top