Wood pellets - any good for a box walker?

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myhorsefred

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Am just about to order my winter bedding and am considering trying Liverpool Wood Pellets for the first time. I've never used wood pellets before.

One of my horses is a bit of a box walker. Not a vice as such, just very sociable character. He has a groom over either side wall with my other two horses stabled next to him, and then goes to the front of his stable for his hay, so in the morning there is a nice circle he has trodden in! lol. I don't want to raise the height of the walls to stop them grooming each other, as I think its quite nice for them.

Anyway, would you say wood pellets would work for a horse who tends to mash his bed up? does the bed need to remain undisturbed as much as possible?

thanks all
 
I found that the wet bits were quite hard to get without wasting loads of bedding as it doesn't clump together the same way shavings seem to. So if you have a horse that walks around in its box a lot the wet might just get mixed in even more. But in terms of getting actual muck out when mucking out they are super easy to do and you don't waste any bedding doing that bit :)
 
Well, IMHO in the long run, you're saving money and time with pellets. I find so long as your stable isn't too small they'll move away from the pooh clumps if they can. Mine has mashed woodchip poo in the morning (divy twonk tb chestnut mare with seasons from hell), but only in half the stable on the rubber matting not the actual main bed, which scrapes off easily with a shovel and once scraped ,if you add a bit of clean stuff over the wet, leave it a few seconds, you can just brush it back as it absorbs completely any wet on the rubber:)
 
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When wet, they are quite heavy and don't move much. I would think they'd be the best option for a box walker, particularly when used with rubber matts as they are held better this way. I had a horse on box rest for Laminitis with 18 inches of deep bed wall to wall--- the mare used to stand at the door, and then back up and create this huge hole at the door and a bank at the wall behind her. I started putting wood pellets there and that helped lots.

I didn't make the whole bed wood pellet, but a good 4 inches at the bottom with shavings on top....worked great for deep littering. While I don't have to do a lami bed this year (touch wood) I will do a smaller version of it this winter for ease of use.
 
I use LWP and my boy wanders around all the time and is pretty messy and wet. The base stays pretty stable once its got a bit of wet in it and you just scoop the poo off the top, I dig out the wet in the middle once a week and stick a new bag in. I would never go back to shavings.
 
we used them last year, and Tom is a paddler (not so much box walking as obsessive compulsive nosiness!). Once the bed was set up and settled it barely moved, just had a little bit of it that got mashed and removed daily. much much much cheaper and easier to do than anything else we've tried.
 
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