Okay heres one for everybody Rubber mats

I would only be afraid to invite her thinking she may try to bash you and make you look bad to others at the open house. If you do not think she will do this then, sure, invite her. As long as she does not try to make you look bad at your party.

Do whatever works for you. I have one stall with mats and the other three have stall skins. I use enough bedding to absorb urine and I clean all the wet spots and manure out daily. No smell, no marks on the horses. Two of my horses are out 24/7 with a run in shelter. They sleep on the ground. They couldn't care less about any "bedding quantity issues" that BO's may have. LOL

I assume you are referring to horses that are locked into a stall at night? My stalls have rubber mats and no bedding but my stalls do not have exterior doors and my horses just use them at free will to get out of the weather, avoid flies etc. I have them there to save on their legs/feet so they are not standing on concrete. My horse has never laid down in his stall and has never gone to the bathroom in his stall. He does all this outside :) that being said if I had to lock one up I would think the more bedding the better. Just to make it more comfortable. I don't think it would be a problem at all. But again it would also not be a problem IMO if the bedding wasnt quite that deep either. If you can afford to keep that much shaving on the floor I say that is wonderful and find it odd that someone would complain and say your boarders wouldnt like it? Sounds like you might just have a Negative Nelly on your hands lol Definitely no fun.

Okay let me refraise the 4 to 5 bags a week I only have to put in a bag The intial bedding starts off with 4 to 5 bags I only have to put bag in each stall per week if that. My horses are out more then in. Sorry for the miss conception.

TRR

Oh why oh why do I think she will show up and flap her all knowing lips at your prospective clients. You need to make your property off limits to her, in writing and registered. She will drive away any clients as they won't want to have to deal with her showing up, whenever.

We have rubber mats in front of the stalls and near our wash rack ut not inside the stalls (theyre inside/outside stalls so its pointless) but I love having my mats in front of the stalls it makes it sooo much easier to get the wheelbarrow around and it keeps it generally cleaner around. If I had a REAL barn (haha) I would definitely want some rubber mats and bedding. I agree I like to have a nice amount of bedding for my horses. But I can't really comment much because we just put sand in their stalls once a month.

But as for your friend. I personally wouldnt invite her to the open house just because if she's "all knowing" she may spread dissent throughout, plus if she got really pushy towards others they may just be dissuaded from coming to your barn if they feel that she would be a nuicance around....but that's just me.

Sounds nice ! Ranger.. you cracked me up .. soo funny !! Some people are only happy when they can make themselves feel better by telling others what is wrong . Makes a person just wanna scream or b slap em..

As long as you are not over-bedding and consuming precious resources unneccessarily from our planet, tell her to shut her pie hole.

Usually bedding is a by-product and I read somewhere that in my area there are more trees than there were 200 years ago.

I like a lot of bedding in the stall, period. Both of my horses lie down at night and they need the extra cushion. My mare is mostly white and the fewer shavings she has, the more stains she gets.

I just left a barn that did not have rubber mats, the horses were on wood floors. The old barn manager kept tons of shavings in the stalls and hardly ever had to any, it seems. My gelding only needed a new bag every other week or so, he had so much in there and always pooped on the one wall and peed on the other and slept in the middle. He left, and when the new guy came in we had like... nothing in there. It broke my heart to have the wood floor showing in the stalls, especially since in January, board had gone up $50 because "the price of shavings went up" so, where are the shavings, then?

I moved to a new barn, went from a 9x10 stall to a 15x18 (approx, it's not exactly square due to it being in an old dairy barn) with two windows, mats covering floor to floor, as well as banked up the walls, lots and lots of shavings :) Oh yes, and an oscillating fan to keep the buggies off! My mare is pretty sure she is in heaven or something like it.

Of course, I sleep on a pillow-top mattress with flannel sheets and a down comforter, all year round, so I am a fan of soft places to sleep ;)

My horse always has LOTS of bedding.. I can't say how many bags a week, because the stable takes care of that- but there's always about 20-30 cm of bedding in there.
I don't see why you would just have concrete/ rubber mats.An aquantance of mine has rediculously little bedding and it makes me really sad to see.. Especially living in a desert- just go pick up some sand and use that as bedding, even if money is tight.
If your horses are outside *all* (well not all, but pretty much) the time, I guess.. But then again, if your horse isn't using it much- you won't have to clean/change it much, so why not have bedding?
Especially here where it gets really hot, you can't keep horses outside for long periods of time- they need bedding sso they can comfortably lay down, pee, roll, etc.
Just my 2 cents :)
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