What bedding would be best?

[dreambigpony]

Mare currently out 24/7 but looking for what bedding would be best when I bring her in over winter months.
I have had her in straw past 2 winters and loved it. Make nice deep bed and helps to dry her feathera. So cheap and easy to muck out however she will eat it and I worry she may get feather mites from it as well.
I won't be deep littering as I just don't like doing thst.
She is very messy, she won't poo in one place and she tends to trample it all down. I have had her on big flake shavings and also wood pellets. Hated the wood pellets as just didn't seem to work for her, bed never looked clean. Shavings were okay, not brilliant but worked better than the wood pellets however more expensive.
Any ideas??
Would go back on straw but I just don't like seeing her esting the bed...being a cob I have to watch her weight as it is! And I really don't want her to get feather mites.

 

[Deltic Blue]

I'm on flax bedding and I love it! So clean, dry and easy to muck out! Takes me 5 mins to muck out the stable.
I get it for £6.42 per bale, obviously more expensive than straw, but so much cleaner and smells less. I do deep litter though, so I only get through 1 bale a week, as everyone on my yard deep litters, as it's best for flax bedding so it's less likely to move about as much

My old pony used to eat her straw bed, so I changed her onto Bow Bed, cheaper than flax and just as clean.

 

[GirlFriday]

Straw is unlikely to make her fat and constant through put is good if achievable so I'd not worry about that unless things got desperate weight-wise.

Personally I'm not keen on the dustiness/lack of absorption of straw but I always thought it being available as a low calorie option when other forage ran out was a positive.

 

[Sukistokes2]

If she does well on straw i'd leave her on straw, use pig oil and sulphur to keep the mites away. If she hasn't had mites before , why should she get them now? Just get a nice barley or oat straw that's ok for her to eat. Might help keep her weight down munching on that instead of the hay.

 

[Exploding Chestnuts]

My worry with straw is the dust on the stalks, which can also include moulds, to me there is a world of difference between good bedding straw for horse and the other stuff which is best used for cattle bedding.
I used to water a bit of Jeyes fluid on the straw bedding of my horse with COPD, even if they don't eat it, they rifle thru every stalk to find a bit of grass.
I have used those big flakes and don't like them, but I always make walls, on top of EVA mats, when making the bed I put walls in middle and fresh shavings on walls.
Straw bedding always seems a bit smellier unless in a huge box, and on a daily basis I would want it all pushed up during the day to dry out, this is extra work of course.