Boarding your Horse - Boarding Stable & Equestrian Facilities

If you are looking to own a horse and don’t want to avoid some of the responsibilities involved with keeping a horse at home, then boarding your horse is a good option.
If you look around your area, you’ll find places near by where you can board your horse. There are also those who have a horse or two & welcome the opportunity to board a horse on their property to help pay for bills, hay & supplies. They may also ask you help take care of their horses when they are away in exchange for a discount on your board for that month. You can find these type of people through the internet or classified ads. You can also drive around and ask people that might be in your neighborhood that keep horses.

Here’s some words of wisdom, be careful when selecting a place to board your horse. You may find that the care and treatment horses get at certain horse boarding facilities varies, and my not be suitable and up to your standards. You want your horse to be treated like you would treat him. So make sure you ask a lot of questions, such as how they feed, handle and care for their horses. Observe the horses that are there and see how they are kept. Are they well fed and look healthy? Do they look like they are well treated? Are the grounds clean? If you happen to see some folks that board there ask them a few questions as well and see if they are satisfied with the facility.

Good thing to keep in mind is that boarding cost varies considerably. So do the services provided. For example you may find horse boarding facilities that provide an indoor or covered arena, keep horses in stalls or stalls with paddocks, clean everyday or every other day, provide bedding, hay twice a day, provide grooming and exercise daily, administer medicine as needed, and supply feeds or supplements.
Another facility may only keep horses in a pasture or paddock with a shed, feed hay twice a day, and you’ll have the responsibility of grooming, feeding supplements, giving medicine to your horse, exercising your horse etc….

There are many solutions and equestrian boarding facilities to board your horse. It all depends on you what’s comfortable for you and your horse and what you can afford.

Also Read Article

Average cost for horse & expenses for horses - The cost of owning horses in the suburbs

Feeding your horse grass hay & Other varieties of hay

Feeding your horse grass hay is the standard feed for horses today. You will need hay pretty much all year round, especially in the winter months. Unless you use a complete pellet feed. If you’re going to feed hay in the winter then you need to make sure your store enough up to get you through, depending on how many horses you have. Feeding hay will help to conserve your limited supply of pasture in the summer months. Depending on where you live, hay can cost less than feeding pellets. And if you cant find good hay then you might want to consider a complete pellet feed.

Good grass hay or pasture is all you really need to keep your horse or horses healthy and in shape. Unless you are doing some hard ranch work or showing your horse then you’ll want to consider a supplement with the hay. There are several other varieties of hay, Alfalfa which has the highest in protein, oat hay, rye hay, coastal hay, timothy hay, and bermuda grass hay to name a few.

Finding good grass hay is not always easy to find. When buying good hay you need to be able to identify it. Good quality horse hay should be leafy; fine stemmed and not overly dry, most of the nutrients are in the leaves. The hay on the inside of the bale should be bright green in color, the greener the better. Green hay is high in protein & vitamins. Be careful with feeding hays such as alfalfa and clover, they are very high in protein and to much can cause your horse to become sick. It is best to purchase an alfalfa grass mix. Good hay should be free of dust mold and weeds. It should not have a musty or moldy odor either. There should be no excessive moisture to cause overheating or spoilage.

You can purchase hay by the bale at your local feed store or from a local hay grower. Buying hay from the local feed store can be a bit expensive depending on how many horses you have and the quality may not be as good. You can also purchase your hay every 6 months or for the year. It is best to feed the current years hay than last years hay.

Lastly make sure you store your hay in a high dry & cool area free from moisture so that your supply won’t mold. If you feed moldy hay to your horse it can cause your horse to get sick and colic.


View My Article:

"Do You Really Want a Horse? Pleasures of Owning a Horse"

Do you really want a horse? Part2 - Horse keeping responsibilities & maintenance

You’ve heard about the pleasures of horse ownership, but what about the other side of the coin. Let’s look at some other considerations while you decide if you really want a horse.

A horse must have hay and water & the stall or paddock must be cleaned 365 days of the year if you are planning to keep a horse at home. This can be very confining should you decide to you decide to go away for the weekend or take a months vacation. Who’s going to take care of your horse? If you have horse friends or family, then you should be able to make arrangements. If not you may have to find boarding your horse somewhere.

Lets also take into consideration there’s always work to be done, feeding, buying and hauling bedding, feed, hay, and other supplies especially if you have more than one horse. Then you have watering, fixing fences, repairing the barn, mowing weeds, and disposing of manure. These are all jobs that require some muscle, some that aren’t very pleasant, and some downright despicable. Though you can organize your work in such a way that it will only take a couple minutes each day to care for your horse or horses.

Will horse odors create a nuisance with your neighbors? Will a paddock an eye sore?
Also if you keep a horse in a residential or suburban area it can be a hazard, especially to curious children wanting to feed, pet, and ride your horse. These situations can be serious problems, if you have a horse that has a bad habit of biting and kicking. Even the gentlest horse can kick if startled or step on someone or run them over. To avoid this problem make sure you have good fencing and gates that can be easily opened or accessed. Its also a good idea to get some liability insurance for your horse property.

If you haven't read Part one of this segment please read now!
Do you really want a horse? - Pleasures of Owning a Horse

Fly control for horses Tips on effective fly control for horses

Effective fly control for horses requires a lot of attention in the suburbs as opposed to a farm or agricultural community. Because of the many neighbors, who are likely to be bothered by the flies. There are many different ways you can control this particular problem. I’ll just share with you a few.

Flies will be attracted to your stable even if you keep it clean. But the cleaner it is the fewer flies you will have. You can hang old fashioned fly paper or fly traps, where your horses can’t get to them. You can also use fly baits but be careful to keep them out of reach of horses and children. If you have can afford it, it would be a good idea to invest in a fly insecticide misting system for your barn or stable. It’s harmless to your horses and will keep the fly problem down significantly. There are also bags and water traps that work pretty good I like to place a mixture of water and vinegar in them with a lil vegetable oil. Another good ides is t feed your horses a fly feed larvicide. It’s a feed supplement that contains a larvicide & can be fed to your horses daily, to prevent development of flies in manure. For best results start feeding it to your horse early in the spring before the flies appear and continue feeding until the beginning of winter.

Also use fly sprays and repellents on your horses. You can even make your own fly spray and repellent and save a lil money, because buying fly spray can be costly depending on your situation, area and how many horses you have. I usually mix a lil apple vinegar, baby oil, and fabric softener in a spray bottle. I’ve been doing this for years and it has worked great. Just be sure that if you are going to ride your horse, don’t spray it on your horse until after you have saddled him or else you may find your saddle sliding if you have sprayed his back, due to the baby oil. There are many other natural remedies to making a horse fly repellent just look around the internet. Do forget to use a good fly blanket & a fly mask to keep your horse from being irritated.

What you should do with all that horse manure? - Horse manure recycling & disposal

Disposing of horse manure and soiled bedding is a necessary chore, which need not be time consuming depending on how many horse you have. Further more the horse manure can be turned in to a valuable asset, thus converting a problem into a lucrative opportunity.

Horse manure is considered to be one of the best natural fertilizers because it is high in nitrogen and contains variable organic matter & trace minerals.
Once horse manure is manure is collected, you have several different options. It can be hauled away, immediately spread across your pasture, or dumped into a compost pile to later be sold or distributed.
Composting:
(A mixture that consists largely of decayed organic matter and is used for fertilizing and conditioning land, a dark, pleasant smelling soil)
is the usual method for horse manure recycling & disposal. If you compost your horse manure it doesn’t have to be hauled away everyday.

If you don’t have the room or equipment to use the first two methods then you can have your horse’s manure hauled away by a collection company or a gardening company. You can also offer it to neighbors to use in their gardens, or you can make and advertisement in your area for free manure.