YO's / YM's offering full / part livery service - question:

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Flicker

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What time are your last checks / last skips / last hay nets and water of an evening for your stabled horses?

The reason I ask is that at our yard (and a friend's yard offering the same sort of service) the part and full liveries are last done at 5pm of an evening and not seen again until 8am the following day. There is a bloke who does a last check at 10pm to make sure no horse is poorly or cast etc, but as far as hay is concerned, he does not top it up.

There are a few of us who are DIY and on several occasions I have had to top up the hay of the part-livery next door to my boy (with full consent of the owner I must add) because she is standing with not a scrap at 7pm. I have also had to uncast part and full livery horses, cut one out of its hay net, top up bone dry water buckets etc at night. I don't mind doing it because I won't see the horses suffer but did think that maybe I should not be doing it and it does raise insurance questions (not to mention the fact that the yard is having their service augmented by other paying clients).

I did casually mention to one of the staff that maybe they should stagger their shifts so that there was one late and one early person but was met with a blank stare.

Just wondering if this is standard service and what time is reasonable to expect last hay / water / health checks to be done on a yard.
 
As I live on site, have my own horses and am an insomniac (LOL:D) I do last checks, hay and water top ups at anywhere between 11pm and midnight. If I hear an unusual bang I will go and look later as well.
Horses are first seen in the morning at 8ish.
If I was to rely on staff, with nobody on site, I would probably expect them to be last seen at about 7-8pm
 
I had my own yard last year and lived on site so feeds hay etc was given out around 8pm, I also left a couple of loose flakes in a wheelbarrow on the yard so when I went to check them aorund 11pm I would split some between the ones with none left but generally they always had some left and were sound asleep at that point lol
 
The routine... dun dun duuuuuuuuuuuuun!

5am - morning feeds given

7am - horses turned out unless they are on box rest, and all boxes mucked out, hayed and watered

9am - yard swept and riding starts

1pm - any horses on box rest skipped out, hayed and watered again

5pm - any horses on box rest skipped out, hayed and watered again and given their evening feeds, evening feeds made up and left in boxes for horses who are turned out,

7pm - horses who are turned out are brought in, legs washed, feet picked out, rugs changed etc. and put to bed

11pm - late checks, all boxes skipped out, hayed and watered, and my big boy gets his last feed of the day!
 
At the moment, the majority of horses on our yard (including mine) have night time t/o and are in during the day, so YO is able to have a bit of a break, but when they are all stabled at night, which they will do when the weather starts to turn, the YO finishes at 8pm, and their final skipping out and top ups are started at 7.30pm.

I think 5pm for last feeds and water is too early. Do they have automatic water troughs?
They're going to be standing in a lot of poo as well by the morning.
 
We have automatic waterers in the stables and live on site so any noises are checked.
The staff's day runs from 8am-6pm and I wouldnt expect them to start earlier or work later, they work bl**dy hard as it is!!
Horses get their last hay at 5.30pm and a hard feed at 6, we have haybars so they get plenty and this keeps them going through the night.
 
Misinterpreted said:
Wow, my horse would like a late feed too! Are you on livery or do you keep them at home?
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They're at home currently, but soon to be moving to the livery yard I'm opening, so will still have the same routine.

I've always done horses like this... no idea why, it just works for me!

My boy NEEEEDS his late feed - he's such a poor doer that any opportunity to get something into him is snatched up!
 
I keep my horse at home , last check for hay and fresh water is about 9.30pm

although i do have cctv in my stables that is linked to the TV's in the house , so i can always see whats going on.
 
I have been on several very well run part/ full livery yards and they have automatic waterers and hay done at 5 pm. Staff start at 8 am. The manager normally checks them at 9 pm, but wont give more hay unless livery has asked and then charged for extra.

Have to say there were many times I came down to ride at 7 pm and my horse was out of haylage. Although they did have a straw bed to pick at. I think it would be better to have had hay nets put in later, but staff worked really hard on what is already a long day. Difficult one?
 
I keep my horses away from home, and with 4 kids, I cannot be running to and from the yard constantly. In the middle of winter, my horses can come in at 4 ish, and I will leave the yard at about 5pm....sometimes I don't get back till 9.30/10am the next day.....

They are fine!

They have sufficient hay to last them....(more often than not, they still have some left in the morning) and I have honestly never seen their buckets (or troughs!!) empty.

The girls are pretty clean, and their stables are big, so it is rare that they have ever trodden in their poo! The young boy is a bit more dirty, but his bed certainly isnt awful....

TBH, a horse could get it's leg caught 5 mins after the last person leaves regardless of what time that is. I take every precaution to ensure there is nothing they can hurt themselves on.

If the liveries are happy with the arrangement, I dont see anything wrong with it......
 
Yes, the full livery horses at our yard are left at 5pm on our yard. There are usually other liveries around until 8pm earliest, if there is a problem with any of the horses. The staff are there at 8 latest the next morning.

As for running out of hay/water... you get to know the horses routine, and give them an extra bucket if they run out, and give them ad lib hay if you want it to last til morning.

FYI I am just a livery at the yard (though part not full)
 
We used to do last hay and water between 5 and 6pm, and never had issues. Every horse had at least 2 water buckets (in case one was kicked over, as well as ensuring they had enough water), some of the bigger / thirstier ones had 3. If we noticed a horse with no water, or very little one morning, they would get an extra bucket in. With haynets, they all tended to have 2 large (as in heavy, whole section) nets. If they couldn't have ad lib hay, because of weight issues etc, they used to get small holed nets, inside another small holed net, to slow down their eating speed. Again, we had one or two that would have finished their nets by morning, they got an additional net so they were not without food.

If a horse is finished by 7pm, they either need to get more, or be slowed down, or both.

If horses are getting cast, they need better banks building, if they are getting caught in a haynet the staff need to be taught to tie up a net correctly.
 
tucked up by 6. checked again between 10 and midnight, topped up with hay if reg, skipped out. breakfast and hay by 7 am. out in fields again by 8 to half8. start fetcjing in about 4 to half 4. any strange noises in the night are heard and checked.
 
On our yard the YO's horses & any on livery are brought in about 7pm in summer and 5pm in winter. Late night check is done, but hay/water simply given enough when brought in to last them. So bigger haynets/water buckets. Surely your yard just needs to give more hay? My lot still have haylage each morning so it is possible to give enough to last all night!
 
TheMule said:
We have automatic waterers in the stables and live on site so any noises are checked.
The staff's day runs from 8am-6pm and I wouldnt expect them to start earlier or work later, they work bl**dy hard as it is!!
Horses get their last hay at 5.30pm and a hard feed at 6, we have haybars so they get plenty and this keeps them going through the night.
Click to expand...

I'd add to that, that when I've been house-sitting for this YO, as her house is right by the yard you can hear any unusual sounds at night very easily. The only time I've ever got up worrying about them when house-sitting is when I disturbed them late at night looking for the cat (she has a habit of getting locked in the tack room) - by 10.30pm they were all fast asleep, but after I'd been into the yard calling for the cat, the one who makes a habit of kicking his walls was upset enough at having his sleep disturbed that he spent the next two hours periodically kicking.

They have always been calm and quiet and have hay left in the mornings. Nothing wrong with leaving them IMO as long as they have hay and water to keep them going.
 
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