Rubber mats - straw or shavings??

[Bebe]

I'm awaiting the delivery of rubber mats for Bebe's stable (we're into week 7 now, beginning to wonder if I imagined ordering them) and am wondering which type of bedding would work best with them. I'm mainly thinking of the disgusting mess that the horses on the yard with mats and shavings beds make of their fur and rugs. Bebe is bad enough at the moment without having pools of urine to bathe in.

Some people I know have mentioned using straw but I'm not sure if it would work. Does anyone have any experience of using this with mats? Does it make for a cleaner horse? I assume you just sweep the whole of the layer out along with the poo, tidy up your banks and then put a new layer of straw in the middle?

Thanks
Amanda

[CarolineR]

As you know Karl & I will be fortunate enough to have our boys with us full time when we move and working full time we have done a lot of research into the best beds to put down, and have decided upon the following
Rubber Mating acorss the whole stables, that will be professionally fitted and sealed.
We are then putting the boys on Flax bedding

We have chosen Flax as opposed to Sawdust, for a nmber of reasons.

It does not pack into the hooves, nor does it pack down solid when wet

If wet, will dry very quickly and not stick to rugs and tails like shavings do.

Ease to clean out the Stable, just pick the poo daily and lift the bed once a week to remove all wet from urine and wash down matting.

It composts down a lot quicker and easier than straw or shavings.

However, we are only able to do this because of the drainage and level of the floors and the fact that the matting will be a very close fit squarely to the walls.

I hope this helps, it will also depend on how long she is in for, as our boys will be out 12-16 hours a day, so the beds will not really get too messy as they only really come in to sleep, feed, and be groomed for a few hours.

Where we are the minute some of the horses are on shavings, and one in particular makes a real mess every day, as he is in from 3.30 pm right through to 8-9 the following day, he gets bored and shuffles around everywhere.

I hope this gives you a bit of help. Once we moved, and if yoi haven't got your bed down yet, if you want to come over and see how we are getting on with Flax.

[Bebe]

Hi Caroline

Thanks for your reply. Flax bedding sounds like it would work well, do you mind telling me where I could get hold of some to try and also how much a bale/bag costs?

I've just started keeping Bebe in 2 days a week in an attempt to save grazing (at yard owners instructions), although if we have a dry spell she'l be back out 13 or so hours a day every day. Her stable is an odd shape at the front so I've opted to just lay mats to the front of the stable where it squares off, an area 11' square. Her water bucket and hay are placed in the oddly shaped bit so she doesn't lie in the part that won't be matted and doesn't usually have bedding there. Other than that one small space the mats will be flush to the wall (providing Adrian makes a good job of laying them!) and sealed.

Thanks
Amanda

[Hail]

Bebe and Carloine

Where did you buy your mats from and what make are they.

I am buying some mats after Christmas for 2 stables and there seems to be quite a lot of choice!!

Hail

[Catherine]

I've got rubber mats in all my boxes, and have shavings in all but one, which is a huge foaling box and currently has a very "productive" 16.3hh mare and 14hh foal in, on straw. My lot are in between about 6-30 pm and 8.30 am.

What you use depends very much on how messy your horse is. I much prefer shavings - too poor to dare trying a hemp bed! - and the mare and foal will have shavings when they are eventually separated. Personally, for my lot, I think it's a nonsense just to use a sprinkle of shavings, as both the horses and rugs get plastered in poos and wees and, frankly, stink. I know a top class dressage rider who uses rubber mats and absolutely nothing else. Her whole yard pongs to high heaven, and her horses are constantly having to be bathed for competitions - no fun in this cold weather. I wonder people ever go near her in the supermarket, as whenever I go to her yard (rarely) my husband says I whiff badly when I come back! :D

I have the shavings at about 4 inches deep in the middle, still making banks, and remove all droppings and the pee every day. My horses are all big, and leaving the pee in just means I end up losing more shavings in the long run, as they stir things up a bit.

As for using straw, I put a very thin layer of shavings down on the mats and then make a proper straw bed as normal on top. Removing droppings is easy, but I've found it doesn't matter what type of straw you use - wheat/oat/barley - it's flippin' awful sweeping it when wet across a nobbly rubber surface. The shavings create a sort of soak-up for the pee, like a nappy liner - and are much easier to sweep and shovel up. I remove the droppings and clear the wet material from the flat part of the bed on a daily basis, and then move the banks and clear under them every three days.

Hope this helps somehow!

[Bebe]

Thanks for the info Catherine.

I think for the moment I might just stick to shavings and see how we go. She's on a plain shavings bed at the moment and some weeks I get away with just buying a couple of bags of shavings a week (£2.25 a bag so not too bad), others I'll need 4 depending on how messy she's been. I'm hoping that with mats once the initial banks, etc have gone down I'll be able to buy 2 bags every week.

I do want a decent bed in the middle of the stable and will bank the sides. A couple of the horses on the yard Bebe is at have just a sprinkle of shavings on the back part of the stable and their rugs are always wet and smelly and it also looks disgusting after about 2 mins of them being in there.

Hail, I ordered my mats from Equisure as out of all the samples I got I liked their stockmats the best. However, I was told upon ordering that delivery would be 4-5 weeks (which seemed a long time even then) and we're now almost to week 7 (will be exactly 7 weeks on Tuesday) and they still haven't arrived. I'm a bit annoyed to say the least. It's a good job a plain old shavings bed did the trick to stop my mare coughing at night otherwise we'd be in trouble - the mats were ordered to cut down on dust to help get rid of the cough.

Amanda

[JudeH]

Hi
I've got rubber matting from Equisure and they're brill. I sealed the mats with mastick to keep anything on the top of the mats and not running through the joins onto the floor underneath. I've got two 16.1hh boys and one is really dirty. I only use a small pile of shavings where they pee and no banks at all. The clean horse only pee's on the shavings and then poo's around the back of the stable. Takes me 5 mins to muck out daily. Granted his rug gets a little dirty over time but that's easy to wash. The dirty horse (and he's really really dirty) pee's on the shavings, poo's everywhere and then trails it all round the mats but it still only takes 10 mins or so to muck out as opposed to 3/4 hour that it used to take. He doesn't lie down often in his stable, he would rather lie down outside in the mud but he did that when he was on a full shavings bed as well so I don't think it's the mats that put him off as he has lay down sometimes. I use approx 1 bale of shavings per week between them whereas before I used to use approx 2 - 3 per week.

Hope this helps. I think everybody's different and you just have to try things and see what's best and easiest for you while still being good for the horses.

[Wally]

I have used Peat moss, shavings and straw. I have to say I prefer shavings, (can't get flax here)

[Mossy]

I have to say I am not impressed with hemp at all. The aim is that you don't remove it until it goes red. Fine if your horse poos in discrete piles and keeps a tidy stable. In my experience the whole lot gets mashed into a s****y mess and stinks to high heaven but is too expensive to shift as basic hygeine and nose requires. Give me shavings any day. - I would add I say this having just spent an hour and a half today cleaning Conn's box. She is deep littered on shavings and gets the basics done every day but cleaned from top to bottom weekly. Matting is no good as she will not lie down on anything les than six inches thick [Princess and the Pea perhaps]
I use mats at work and am not impressed. Perhaps professionally installed sealed rubber floors would be better. The mats seem to collect all the gunk underneath them but are too heavy to lift as needed so the result is a smelly mess. Sorry to be so blunt

[liz--y]

we use shavings on top of rubber matting on are yard and at collage. one horse at the yard where my pony is uses papper and rubber mating

[Yann]

All the horses at Brimington are on mats and either shavings or shredded paper. They also spread some fine sawdust on the mat before spreading the shavings to help catch the wet, though that sort of thing might not help Bebe's coughing. It does seem to help though, the mats always sweep up well. The smaller horses get an inch or so of shavings on the mat, the bigger and older ones get a bit more. I usually end up adding up to a maximum of half a bale of shavings per new bed. The horses seem to stay pretty clean, but I think they are skipped out quite regularly during the day.
Most of the mats finish short of the hay / water area too.

[Spydgal]

Before anyone goes and buys mats which can work out expensive, shop around for other methods. My friend got two mats from a well known british equine catalogue which worked out at £120 (they were quite big) but very hard and very heavy to move around to clean under etc.
We then got hold of an industrial catalogue from a company which had loads of different materials for builders, health and safety etc - including thick rubber on a roll for £50. We did 3 large stables for the same cost as two of those mats and is brilliant stuff.

[CarolineR]

Hi Be BE,

Apologises for the delay in replying, we are getting everything, including fitting from Belvoir Horse Feeds.

Please note that Flax is not Hemp, as I would never put a horse on hemp, as there is a danger of them eating it and there have been reported cases of compated colic being induced if on a hemp bed.

The Flax bales are in 25KG bags and cost approximately £5 a bale, but we are buying in bulk and have the storage space to keep them.

From the initial advices our 30 bales is going to be enough to last our boys through to the Spring, including putting down the original bed with 3-4 full bales being used.

If, when you come over to see us at our new place, you like the flax beds, then I am sure we can store them for you as we have plently of room to do so, or sort somthing out anyway.

Hope this helps.

[KarlR]

Hi Amanda,

Further to what Caroline's just said...

It seems very likely that we will get the Belvoir rubber mats and have them fitted. They charge about £40 each for fitting, but will seal them - they say that it isn't necessary, but I'm not so sure - I'd rather have a completely sealed surface personally.

I did ring around a couple of other places including CWG who resell the stockmats. CWG tell me that there is such demand that they can't get them - apparently the local depot has 200 on back order and wouldn't expect to be able to supply any until next year! I also know that Kraiburg (http://www.kraiburg.co.uk/) do very nice mats and have them in stock if you get fed up of waiting although both Belvoir and Kraiburg are a little more expensive.

I'm not so sure that we'll use as little as they say, but we're going to try the flax anyway - if it doesn't work out then we'll have to blend it with shavings or something like that until it's used up. It sounds very good though and we wanted something a little more compostable than shavings since we'll probably be responsible for getting them disposed of if they don't rot down! Also, I tend to find that shavings gets jammed into hooves too easily and flax is supposedly better for this.

We'll let you know how we get on, and as Caroline says you are of course very welcome to visit once we're settled - I'm sure Yann will offer you a lift! :)

P.S. If I'd waited 7 weeks for Equisure I'd be making their lives a misery by now!! :)

P.P.S. £2.25 sounds very cheap - are they normal sized bags - most folks seem to charge around £5-6 for DE shavings. (Except our livery yard who charge £7! :rolleyes: )

[Bebe]

Thanks for everyone's replies.

The mats turned up on Monday and have been down since that evening. I'm using shavings for the moment as they're easy to get hold of and will see how we go. So far Bebe has stayed reasonably clean, not much worse than she usually gets (she does like to sleep on her poo regardless of the bedding she's on). Mucking out is much easier and Adrian (hubby) even did it yesterday which means it must be okay as he usually disappears come mucking out time.

Re: Equisure, it wasn't really their fault. The mats went off to the delivery company (Apex) on time but then Apex left them in a corner of the depot and forgot about them for 2 weeks. When they did turn up on Monday I was supposed to have been contacted and told but wasn't so when they couldn't find anyone to take delivery they just slung the mats over the yard gate! I did make Equisure's life a bit of a misery though, got to the point where they knew my voice over the phone.

The £2.25 bags are ones our yard owner has bagged up from shavings she buys in bulk. 2 bags are almost the equivalent of a vacuum packed bale but the quality varies so I'm going to buy bales from the local feed shop.

So, we'll see how we go on shavings for the moment. Flax sounds nice but I'm really limited on storage space so that might rule it out.

Thanks again
Amanda

[KarlR]

I'm glad you got them in the end anyway - it's just as well no-one else on the yard needed any mats - what a delivery company!!

Let us know how you get on!

[Speedy]

You're probably well into your routine now, so hope it's going well. I've used rubber mats for two years. I found that straw didn't do the job and the mats became really slippy. I use a product which is a mixture of chopped straw and shavings called Sundown. I put down about an inch on the floor and small banks around the sides. When she wees, the straw part of the bedding drains the urine to the bottom and you can't even see on the surface where she has been! Haven't managed to stop her lying on her poo's but really impressed with the urine bit - she never smells of urine and she always goes in the same spot. It's really easy to muck out and I use less than a bale a week.

[PaulandRuth]

Hi Bebe, I've two horses and have fitted rubber matting to both their stables.......... it's brill.
I prefer shavings to straw and find with the matting down, use less depth, making for quicker mucking out.

The stables appear warmer and does save on time.

I lift the matting twice a year and wash off and then Jeyes fluid the floor,leave to dry and re-fit.

Which matting did you choose? I used Equimat who delivered within 3 days of order and even supplied some good sized off cuts, as my stables are slightly oversized.


Let me know how you get on.


Regards

Paul

[KarlR]

We have just had our mats fitted by Belvoir. Originally I thought that £40 per stable for fitting was expensive, but they have done a stunning job and were there for about 4 hours (2 stables, 12x14'ish). Every seam has been bonded and all the little nooks in the stables had pieces cut to fit them. Very impressive.

We've also now got a stack of eucalyptus impregnated flax bedding to lay on Saturday so I'll let you know how we get on - we're moving the horses in on Sunday (via Nottingham Horse Transport as always).

[KarlR]

Paul! Oh my goodness - we have the same animated icon! That's like turning up to Ascot with the same hat! :eek:

[Bebe]

I used Equisure for the mats, Apex delivered them (useless) and I fitted them myself. Other people on the yard have had mats fitted by pro's and have said they can't tell the difference between their stables and mine (I'm quite proud of the job actually). I haven't sealed them simply because we're on a livery yard and I want to be able to take the mats with me. The stable drains really well anyway so I'll just take them up once or twice a year and disinfect under them. The seams are really tight and so far it doesn't seem like anything has gotten down between them.

I'm using shavings and am happy with them. I only get through half a big bale (£5) a week and that's with nice big banks. Bebe isn't as mucky with the mats as she was before, which is really nice!

Thanks for all the help
Amanda

[KarlR]

Caroline and I have just moved into the new property.

Our beds have only been down for a few days (using flax), but it's already clear that it's a great improvement over straw.

At the moment I can't see what usage will be, but I'll post and say when we've been in for a few weeks.

[fizz21]

have straw into them