What things would you like for your yard?

blitznbobs

blitznbobs

Well-Known Member
Joined
19 June 2010
Messages
6,840
Location
Cheshire
Visit site
I have an idea formulating but I have to be quite vague but I’m looking for inspiration...

This is especially for those who work on livery yards but also for everyone else

What thing would be nice to have on your yard that you don’t have?

Hope this isn’t too vague to get a response cos I’m a bit stumped for some ideas
 
Our yard has good facilities but I'd love a turnout area for horses recovering on box rest or for when the field becomes a mud bath after prolonged heavy rain.
I'd also like a large clock visible on the yard for those dark winter mornings when every second counts. When your hands are mucky, taking your phone out of your pocket is a pain.m
 
Decent arena surface. Well maintained all weather gate ways. Enough forage. General good maintenance of facilities. A yard owner who is "present" and on top of any social or horse care issues.

A reasonable effort made for biosecurity. A variety of turnout options for those with special needs animals and a bad weather turn out option if the fields can't cope.

Good hacking options but that's difficult to control.

Tie up places. Sensible washing down options ( just a well placed hose, drain and tie up ring would be marvellous thanks!)

All things I didn't realise were lovely until I haven't had them! Apart from the turnout options things... that's just a favourite day dream of mine.
 
Hot water. for washing horses but also makes tack cleaning easier.
Washing machine. Had an industrial one at last place which was SO useful.
Indoor school!

Everything else is pretty much as I would choose - loads of hard standing, no mud, daily TO, good lighting, nice surface, sensible YO.
 
Having worked on both pro & livery yards here and there and been a livery myself for too many years some of the things that spring to mind, that if I had a big lottery win I would do that work.

Solarium room - a converted stable with heat lamps in the roof. The horse could go in loose. Made a very useful space especially when physios etc wanted to work on the horse naked mid winter. You could also bath under the lamps.

Cross tie areas right by the tack room. Saved miles of lugging tack and kit about.

Holding boxes in the gateways of each field, hardcored. Very useful for group turnout.

Crewe barn instead of stabling, so much nicer for the majority of horses.

Treadmill with variable incline .... super for fittening.

Large muck trailer that got backed into a pit - you just tipped your wheelbarrow over the top of the back wall. No stacking, pushing or extra effort required. Saved hours.
 
A track system not just for barefoot horses. (You didn't say how realistic this had to be!) Even a temporary one made from electric fencing in a grassy field would do.

An open barn with free access for horses so they can be out all year round but take refuge from the weather if they wish.

All weather gallop, preferably on a hill for interval training

An undercover tie up point for farrier, physio etc visits.

Somewhere to wash horses (like PF, I didn't realise how much difference this would make not having it. We have only 2 tie rings on the whole yard, 1 is right next to the stable of a horse on box rest so can't really be used. We have an ancient hosepipe that has a million kinks in it and no drain so you get told off for flooding the yard if you bath etc - despite checking leg washing, bathing etc was ok before moving there)

School with a nice surface. Why do people dump rubber on nice sand surfaces so it becomes unusable because it's so deep?!
 
A barn leading onto a track. We have some grass free turnout in the school but they dont tend to move about much in it. I'd also like better water pressure, ours is awful and a pain for everything from hosing off to filling buckets!
 
Mains electricity
An undercover area for grooming, farrier, vet, etc
Mats or road scalpings in the gateways
A secure tack/feed room (not a shed which is all I've got) with proper alarms
Mains powered security lights and cameras
Plumbed in water troughs
The foot path to be fenced off properly rather than PITA electric fences
An all weather school
A landlord prepared to admit the stable buildings are on their last legs and to do something about it

OMG what a moaning old git I sound! The place I'm in is pretty nice, but we are definitely at the lower end in terms of facilities and maintenance.
 
Liveries that take care of things.
I had friends who purpose built a yard. It had a huge school, wash box, toilets , toilets, washing machine, you were not charged for your trailer, individual paddocks, you could buy hay in.
I think they just about everything they could and liveries would leave the place in a mess.
I would not have liveries.
 
Our yard is marvellous and has many great points but my wish at the moment would be water to all the fields - lugging containers constantly does my back in! In the summer it's constant as they drink loads and are furthest from the water and in the winter the route to our field gets boggy so a barrow full of containers is hard work!
 
Decent and safe menage, safe gates and a paved yard. Easy access to water and a secure place to store belongings. My fantasy items are dressage mirrors and an on site farm ride!
 
Oh yes. Even a short circular farm ride would be so useful. One yard I was on just had a half mile loop/figure 8 of hard-core track that was over grown with grass. It wasn't exactly inspiring hacking but it meant I'd you didn't fancy dealing with the roads and you'd already schooled too much that week you could just go for a little potter about. Because it was a figure 8 you could vary it a bit. And because of the hard-core underneath you could use it all winter. And it was alright for a trot. In summer their were grassy bits you could pop a short canter on too.

The rest of the yard was bloody awful! Lol. But that little farm ride was small but perfectly formed!
 
Current yard is fab. 3 all weather schools, 2 outdoor and 1 indoor, XC fields (ideal for hacking too without the jumping) 4 bridlepaths straight from the yard, onsite shows, Horse walker and Solarium. So if I could I'd add a surfaced gallop track and I'd add a an outside part of the stable so useful when they have to stay in. Horse can have the door open and wonder in and out on a small matted area.
 
The only thing I can think of that I would change about my yard is the arena, it doesn't get any attention and is really deep in places so I just refuse to ride in there now and only ever hack or ride in fields in the summer. Fortunately we are local to a few yards with nice arenas that we can either hire or have a lesson in and that keeps me happy, or I just box out and hire one at a venue.
Less realistically I would love arena mirrors, warm water wash, solarium, professional gallop track and water treadmill but don't think I'll be getting any of that for the current £100 a month per horse.
We are located at the bottom of a valley so we are spoiled with hills for fitness and strength work but it does mean it gets quite wet when it rains. Nothing we can do about that though but we do have a turnout pen so horses get some time to mooch around outside everyday regardless of weather in the winter.
 
My old yard had a muck trailer cut into the hill so you just tipped the barrow over the edge and it was so much easier and quicker. No ramps or forking it up. Current yard is totally flat though so there wouldn't be anywhere to do it.
 
Most recent yard, and the one I would likely return to when I'm in the horse game again, Couple of things,
Solarium, a roof on the washbox- and hot water, then in general a bit of TLC about the place lick of paint (used to happen every year but then there was a marriage breakdown so stuff got left). And the turnout needs rethinking, winter field turns into a bog and needs more hardcore in the gateway, and the summer paddocks are MEANT to be poo picked by liveries but end up not being by at least 50% of the owners so a poo scooper machine would be nice! Plus a whole field in winter which could be used for extra turnout is left standing because they're too lazy to move any of the portable XC jumps.
 
A barn leading onto a track, with multiple grass level and surface options.

A decent arena surface and a nice straight canter track (that I can shoot on without killing anyone).

No other people.
 
I want to be on ihatework’s yard please! Also like LB’s idea of a little space outside the stable.

We have a solarium area. Seems popular on here but it’s actually not used very often. It’s open though, in between two stables with a gate behind, so I suspect that’s the reason why it’s not used more often.
 
Agree a covered area for grooming/washing/farrier would be handy. As would a barn/track/pea gravel area. Maybe water piped to all the fields too, but think it might freeze unless it was underground.

I've got a washing machine, auto drinkers, good area for cold washing and access to lots of hot water nearby, loads of storage (esp. for rugs), an area for soaking haynets beside the hay barn and next to the stables, a decent, floodlit arena that adjoins the yard, I can turnout via the arena as well which is really useful in winter when it's icy.
 
I actually pretty much like my yard just as it it. Already have a heated rug room and heated tack room and wouldn’t want to do without those. Would like hot running water in the tack room though. We could also do with an undercover well lit spacious area for farrier and other treatment as we don’t now and if the weather is really bad the farrier has to cancel.

If I were being greedy -

Solarium with hot running water for bathing and clipping
Heated troughs
Small paddock/ pens for injuries or restricted grazing
Heated Tea room with kettles and microwave and comfy chairs
Hay steamer
Utility room with industrial size washing machine
Ideally for the horses I’d like a barn type arrangement with areas that can be closed off as stables if need leading out to lovely fields where they can live all year coming and going as they please.
Better flood lit arena and ideally an indoor school.
A canter/ gallop track would be nice and a cross-country course
 
On-site catering (restaurant/pizzeria/bar). Where I have my lessons, there is a kitchenette area at the back of the schoolroom, but nobody uses it any more, and I don't know if the appliances work. It has been used in the past, though. The management runs another riding centre in the same town, but just ponies there, and it has on-site catering, and I've eaten in there a few times with my instructors.
 
We are currently without a loo as building work going on and miss that. Also like somewhere other than stable or tackroom to get changed after riding if going straight off to meeting or catch a train. On the horse side, was at yard with solarium and miss that as very useful for drying off after bathing. And with the rubbish weather at present definitely want an indoor school.....!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top