Saturday, July 4, 2009

If anyone will know the answer to this...

...one of my readers will!

Has anyone come up with a better solution for maintaining the stall of a stall-walking Thoroughbred? Is there some newly-invented bedding I haven't tried? I have a very cute 24 year old OTTB mare who unfortunately walks circles and turns even the cleanest stall into a wet, filthy disaster. You can't even pick it by the time she's done, because she's got everything broken down and mixed together. I pick my stalls AM and PM and it doesn't help that much. She pees and walks and smooshes! Not only does it make me crazy since I love seeing my horses in immaculately clean, fresh stalls, but sheesh, it's expensive.

Is there any solution other than - I'll beat you smart-asses to it - a bale of straw? I hate cleaning straw. My lower back hates cleaning straw. She's currently on rubber mats with 3-4 bags of pelleted bedding, pre-soaked, on top of that, and she is trashing it. She goes out about 12 hours a day but is separated in a stall for now because she's eating alfalfa pellet mush to fatten up.

I would love to hear your ideas and if there's no solution, well, let's just commiserate about whether we have horses OR PIGS!

(Yes, considering I'd like to find an adopter for this mare, marketing FAIL. But hey, at least I'm honest! She is sweet, quiet, doesn't know how to pin her ears and pretty darn sound even if she does snap, crackle and pop when she moves. But she is NOT neat!)