Why is grass livery so hard to find?

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Zipzop

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And why is it seen as the cheap option by yard owners?

I'd pay more for full time turnout than having a stable, it's like gold dust.
 
Lands expensive and horse livery yards are often short on acreage .
If your short of acreage you need to protect it and keeping horses off the land in inclement weather is the easy way to do it.
 
probably because people are unkikely to want to pay anywhere from £40-£100 a week for all year grazing thats managed properly and not overstocked. any less and there are other things the land could be doing to bring in as much or more. grass livery is often not the cheap option that people seem to think it is especially when you get various people wnting different things like mares only or individual or pairs or group. then some want hard standing for the farrier and parking or storage space and access to a stable for emergencies etc so it ends up not being grass livery at all for the land owner
 
I'm with zip zop on this
A lot of horses can't be stable due to various reasons but decent grass livery is like hens teeth
I have now given up with Livery and am about to exchange on a small house with land finally no more livery woes for me
 
tessah said:
I'm with zip zop on this
A lot of horses can't be stable due to various reasons but decent grass livery is like hens teeth
I have now given up with Livery and am about to exchange on a small house with land finally no more livery woes for me
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Maybe no more livery woes but you are heading for livery owner's woes where there is no-one to blame but yourself for poor grass, broken fences, hay shortages etc and where you have to fend off all the potential liveries who expect, for a pittance, to make use of and abuse the facilities that you spend so much time and money maintaining :-)
 
I would pay full livery prices for really good full grass livery. I'm another one that doesn't understand why it's not more widely offered, I really do think people would pay for it.
 
jemima*askin said:
Maybe no more livery woes but you are heading for livery owner's woes where there is no-one to blame but yourself for poor grass, broken fences, hay shortages etc and where you have to fend off all the potential liveries who expect, for a pittance, to make use of and abuse the facilities that you spend so much time and money maintaining :-)
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I am laughing at this because I was that person once I had no idea how much work and cost it was going to be owning my own place .
In fact when I hear what people pay for livery I can't see where the profit is .
 
I've got plenty :) No-one round here seems to want it, they seem to prefer spick and span yards with rubber matting American Barn stabling and all mod cons.
 
jemima*askin said:
Maybe no more livery woes but you are heading for livery owner's woes where there is no-one to blame but yourself for poor grass, broken fences, hay shortages etc and where you have to fend off all the potential liveries who expect, for a pittance, to make use of and abuse the facilities that you spend so much time and money maintaining :-)
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Haha nice try but no I am definitely not setting up a livery yard just want some peace and quiet and manage my horses how I want
I appreciate then I have to organise everything but I tend to do that anyway and I know it is not going to be cheaper at least not in the beginning when I have to set it up
 
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JillA said:
I've got plenty :) No-one round here seems to want it, they seem to prefer spick and span yards with rubber matting American Barn stabling and all mod cons.
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Eugghhhh no! I want mine to be a joyous, muddy, messy, hairy horse - after all that is what he came into the world to be!

So sad that we are not closer! :(
 
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A lot of people aren't prepared to pay much for it. I have a very small grass livery yard, and only take full liveries. I have good facilities (2 schools/hard standing pens, and fantastic hacking, and I charge a fair whack more than people expect to pay for grass livery, but the horses are all looked after as if they were my own. I could take on more if I had more acreage, but I don't actually want to. I'd rather keep it small and personal, and only take people I like, and horses that will fit in.
 
Zipzop said:
And why is it seen as the cheap option by yard owners?

I'd pay more for full time turnout than having a stable, it's like gold dust.
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I know we have this problem people don't want to pay for grass livery round here well they don't want to pay real prices ! We charge £250 a month grass livery including twice daily feeding hay rug changes twice daily checks hundreds of acres including shelter and wood post and rail fencing
All any one does is moan it's expensive I think it's a great deal lol
To me it's horsey heaven we have 4 very happy herds
 
It's £25 aweek £35 with stable assisted if needed loads of grazing ether group or single turn out 3 good schools jumps tack room and small tea room toilet and shower and yet no one seams to want grass livery that's edinburgh area and probably has the most grazing for any yard in area
 
Holliehope said:
I know we have this problem people don't want to pay for grass livery round here well they don't want to pay real prices ! We charge £250 a month grass livery including twice daily feeding hay rug changes twice daily checks hundreds of acres including shelter and wood post and rail fencing
All any one does is moan it's expensive I think it's a great deal lol
To me it's horsey heaven we have 4 very happy herds
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Yes, I would happily pay this for grass livery as it's costs me more than this to keep him stabled over night when you add in bedding and hay costs. At least I'd have a happier horse which is the only goal in my opinion!
 
Zipzop said:
Yes, I would happily pay this for grass livery as it's costs me more than this to keep him stabled over night when you add in bedding and hay costs. At least I'd have a happier horse which is the only goal in my opinion!
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It's wise to teach your horse to be happy in the stable ,one day it might save his life .
 
Has no one noticed, land is expensive, in the south £10,000 an acre, if you can find it. To borrow money to buy land you have to have a business mortgage with higher interest costs. To make money on livery it virtually has to be factory farming unless its part of larger farm business where they are using the existing farm assets.
 
Its a lot harder to find these days but you could do what I did!

I spoke to my hay man, he now runs the farm where I used to keep my horse when I got her 14 yrs ago! she was there 5 yrs until the farmer died! it was a busy yard, mostly grass livery but some stables! when this farmer took it on he decided it was more hassel than it was worth running as a yard so one by one everyone left!! it was empty for a year or two and I was moving back to the area! the farmer was my hay supplier and knew my dad from the shooting world, so I asked him about one of the fields and he agreed to let me rent it privately, on the understanding that I didn't hassle him about the fencing etc! I do have 4 stables but I don't really use them as mine like to live out! he allowed me to take a fence down and use a barn next door to the field as a shelter! any time the fencing breaks I tend to get my dad to sort it!

Luckily my horses are very good/respectful of the fencing.

but you need to be able to visit your horses twice a day, every day or have someone reliable on hand for holiday cover etc!
 
Auslander said:
A lot of people aren't prepared to pay much for it. I have a very small grass livery yard, and only take full liveries. I have good facilities (2 schools/hard standing pens, and fantastic hacking, and I charge a fair whack more than people expect to pay for grass livery, but the horses are all looked after as if they were my own. I could take on more if I had more acreage, but I don't actually want to. I'd rather keep it small and personal, and only take people I like, and horses that will fit in.
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I just had someone decide to stay where she is on the basis of cost - horses have to be in at night from now until April, she has forgotten the extra travelling/bedding/hay (mine included home grown haylage).
 
People expect it to be the cheap easy option. Round here it's expected to be about £15 per week. When I was on a private yard and we were looking for another horse to live out with two retireds, not only was that what people expected to pay but they were surprised that it didn't include hay and daily checks.
 
Grass land for horses is valuable especially if it is well drained and fenced. In addition to that it requires regular maintenance such as daily poo picking, harrowing, over-seeding and trimming of the hedges. In addition a water supply and drainage is not cheap to install and water has to be paid for. So in reality a one acre field that has been recently seeded for grass and fenced properly will probably cost about £20,000 per acre in real money.
 
Goldenstar said:
I am laughing at this because I was that person once I had no idea how much work and cost it was going to be owning my own place .
In fact when I hear what people pay for livery I can't see where the profit is .
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Me too. I now rent 24 whole acres all to myself, 2 horses and 70 odd sheep currently for the price that DIY livery was but the costs of fencing and maintaining the land is just bleurrgghh !!!!!!!
 
Generally speaking there are more decent grass livery places in remote areas where land is cheap. If you have say 20 acres near a city (therefore suitable for more potential clients) it will have cost a lot to buy so you can make much more profit with top notch facilities, small paddocks and 30 horses on full livery than you ever could with 10 24/7 grass liveries. It's simply economics!
 
Grass livery is expensive where we are in the south east, but finding it is even harder ! luckily i moved my two to a great place where its solely grass livery, no facilities, the school is a mown area in a 10 acre feild,,,,, but we do have a max of 2 horses per 5 acre field, each field has a double field shelter with extended roof and drain pipes, our own water supply to each field , own area of hardstanding by our feilds and our own 12 by 12 storage sheds, i pay 250 a month for this and we rarely see the owners, hacking fab direct onto commons no road work and we have no time restrictions, i just couldn't afford to have 2 horses on part livery at 500 to 800 a month, land for sale is like gold dust round here, i looked at 3 acres they wanted 50k for it ! on a hill, no water supply and next to a busy main road, it got sold within 2 weeks , all livery ends up being a compromise i think you have to just find the one that suits your requirements best .
 
I regularly get people asking me whether I do grass livery on my spare fields, but they look immaculate because I keep other people's horses off them!
 
I am very lucky to have just found a superb grass livery, and yes it is going to be around £250 a month, but worth it for peace of mind for me. My horse is getting on, and his joints benefit from being out, but there are stables which they come into for feeding, and can be used for emergencies or really bad weather. Huge field with loads of natural shelter. Yard owner only takes one or two alongside her own, and the fields/fencing etc all look very well maintained. Very rare to find that sort of set up though.
 
Holliehope said:
I know we have this problem people don't want to pay for grass livery round here well they don't want to pay real prices ! We charge £250 a month grass livery including twice daily feeding hay rug changes twice daily checks hundreds of acres including shelter and wood post and rail fencing
All any one does is moan it's expensive I think it's a great deal lol
To me it's horsey heaven we have 4 very happy herds
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I would not be paying this for grass livery, i live and keep my horses about 1 mile from the city considered most expensive after London and pay no where near that to keep my 3 currently.
I would be less inclined to look after the land at that price and i would expect the facilities to be fantastic or have a superb rep/selling point at 280.
 
I've just moved mine to grass livery and in my area certainly grass livery yards are like hens teeth! There's plenty that will allow 24/7 summer turnout but there have only been 2 or 3 in the 20 odd-30 yards I viewed (yes really I am that picky!) that allowed this in winter. Sadly my tradeoff at the moment is that the fencing isn't brill, the ragwort is still in need of bringing in check and there's no arena. All these things are on the to do list so fingers crossed... I do at least have an emergency stable if needed and somewhere to tie up undercover if the weather's bad. I'm now paying around £100 per month for this including twice daily checks and it'll be a little more when there's hay in the field I think. I'd happily have paid double that for somewhere that still had the nice fields, lots of shelter and emergency stable available but that also had more facilities (eg indoor and outdoor arenas) and feeding and rug changes (although these are available where I am if I want them)
 
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