those of you who bed with straw...

[skyy]

Do you attempt to pick through it or do you just strip the stall everyday?

[scribbles]

straw usually holds the poops together better than shavings, and you can find the wet spot the same as you can with shavings, a thorough cleaning every day is all we do. you do have to add some more straw every day tho, which you dont really have to do with shavings.

[Holly Hill Farm]

I save what I can but usually end up taking out about 1/2 to 2/3 each day. I try not to bed too heavily as they have rubber mats.
The straw I can save goes to the mess spots and the fresh goes to the spots they don't wet in.

[Tamara in TN]

Do you attempt to pick through it or do you just strip the stall everyday?



the best way to deal with straw is to pick it every hour....

yep or as close as you can get :)

[starkissed]

no way do I strip the stall! yikes what a waste.
We don't have mats and each stall probably has 1 bale in it at any given time.
The horses are in the stalls for about 5-10 hours a day, depending on the weather and my schedule.

When I clean them usually take out 1/4-1/3 of the bedding and rake in the old but clean straw into the wet areas. Then shake in about 3 flakes of fresh straw. There is a magic amount of straw to use. Too much and its wasteful and takes forever to sift through. Too little and nothing absorbs.

If the horses are IN during the night, stalls are waaaay messier and usually have to take out at least half of the bedding.

I personally really like using straw. I lot of people are straw haters but mucking really isnt that much more difficult than shavings, I'd say comparable

[DressageFancy]

I remember reading a study somewhere (mind blank as to where???) that horses bedded on straw will lie down and rest better than horses bedded on shavings.
I have always bedded on straw, but, recently started spreading some shavings (about 1/4 bale) on the wet areas under the straw. I find the shavings really soak up the wet (kinda drawing the wet down through the straw) and since the poop clumps easily on the straw all I have to do is pick the poop and rake the straw aside to get the wet shavings. Then I add a little more shavings to the wet area and add about 3 flakes more of straw. I'm using lots less straw over all now and the stalls are just as deeply bedded (with straw) as before.

[Creaghgal]

just strip the stall everyday?

You ARE crazy! Straw is the color of gold. You go through it strand by strand. If you go back far enough through history you will find that people laid the wet straw out to dry in the sun then put it back in.

just strip the stall everyday?

:lol::lol::lol::lol:

[awm]

You ARE crazy! Straw is the color of gold. You go through it strand by strand. If you go back far enough through history you will find that people laid the wet straw out to dry in the sun then put it back in.
:lol::lol::lol::lol:

Back in the 60's & 70's, working for my Granny,
we took out only the poop & the really wet stuff, left the damp straw banked up to dry! She'd go thru checking the spreader & tell us to fish out *that good straw*!
The now-dry straw went down on the floor to become the really wet stuff the next day!
Oh, the good old days!!!!!!!!!!!!

[JSwan]

I don't use straw anymore but when I was a kid it was all we used. We even used to roll the straw at the door so horses wouldn't kick it out into the aisle.

We'd pick out the big stuff and wet spot and bank the damp stuff and bring down fresh straw from the banked edges. Stripping wasn't done that often and the stalls never stank.

A friend still uses straw and chooses to use pelleted bedding on the pee spot - covering it with straw.

[jse]

We use straw and I can honestly say I used to hate it with a passion but now I wouldn't use anything else.
It's easy to clean and like someone else said, the horses rest better and lay down more in it. And from what I've heard it's warmer in the winter.
We don't strip the stall every day, we maybe add a half bale to each stall and strip once a month just to let the mats air out really good. The best horses for straw stalls are stallions that poop in one spot! We have one now who poops and pees right in the middle of his stall, cleanest stall EVER!

[Daydream Believer]

I love straw. I use it for broodmares and when I have foals in a stall. I hate shavings with a passion...nasty dusty particles of wood...UGH. I find that cleaning a straw stall takes about half as long as cleaning a shavings stall. I just got done mucking out a barn full of shavings stalls a little bit ago and I hate having to sift through all that dang bedding to find hidden poop. Don't even get me started on a stir-n-mix mare we have that pulverizes her poop into little bits and buries them. I just may put her back on straw...she's a PITA to muck after.

How to muck straw quickly and easily: I pick out the piles on top...and as someone pointed out, they rarely get mixed in nearly as much as with shavings. Then I work in a clockwise direction raking back all "good" straw to the walls leaving wet and soiled straw in the pee spot or middle. When done sorting the bedding, I pick up the middle in two or three forkfulls and the stall is done. I generally use "Stall Dry" in the pee spot and with our dirt floors do not need to use anything else. For the unusually wet horse, I will use a tiny bit of shavings sometimes in the pee spot...but that is unusual. We leave the stalls open to air out also when the horses are out. I pull the old straw to the middle and new straw along the walls and you have a fresh dust free stall that I would sleep in. You couldn't pay me to sleep in a shavings stall! I'd itch and have particles of wood inside my clothes in no time. I do truly believe that most horses prefer straw to rest in also and it is warmer for the babies to nest in.

[rodawn]

Holy dynamo... I never strip a stall unless it is just before and after birthing out a mare for sterilization purposes, and/or I'm doing my twice yearly rubber mat scrub down.

Straw stall cleaning involves a lot of sifting. You sift the good straw away from the wet/soiled straw.

I always choose a clean part of the stall, and work from there. I pull the clean straw off and away from poops and scope up poops first. Then I pull off all the top straw over top of wet spots. The truly wet straw that needs to come out is what has changed color to dark brown, even a reddish tone, and that is what you pull out. The slightly damp straw covering the wet spot doesn't need to be pulled out. It will air dry and actually absorbs moisture better the second time around. this is the beauty about straw is that it allows all moisture to get right to the floor, keeping the top layer dry, thus the horse is warmer when it lays down on top of it.

By the time I'm done, all the clean straw is all stacked up against one wall, and the floor is scraped clean of all wet and the rubber mats are swept clear. There should not be puddles. If there are puddles, your floor needs fixing. I leave the floor open to air out during the day, putting down deodarizer, and then just before bringing the horses in, I spread the straw back over the floor.

Practice makes perfect - I can clean a straw stall in less time than a shavings stall. This includes dumping buckets, scrubbing feed tubs, cleaning auto-waterers, and general inspection of the stall for damage.

If you do it right, you should only go through one small square bale of straw per stall per week, but you will go through more with youngsters because they tend to be restless in a stall. Done correctly, your barn will not smell of ammonia at all.

I love straw bedding and that's the only thing I will use. It is environmentally better because it is easily replenished each year, it composts very quickly for spreading/feeding pastures, and it is warmer for the horses when they lay down. I had a boarding facility a few years ago and had 50 horses in my care. The barn never smelled of ammonia.

I read an interesting article published in Europe that they have found gases released by urine soaked shavings are carcinogenic as they found an extremely high incidence of lung cancer in barn workers who dealt with shavings beddings. The shavings might smell "cleaner" but the deodarizing effect is only temporary. The minute shavings come into contact with urine, there is a chemical reaction producing a toxic, odorless gas. With straw, if you smell ammonia, you're not effectively cleaning your stall and it is your warning signal to make corrections. I haven't read anything about a followup study.

:D

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=2225422&l=0f44a3b921&id=678301486

[jse]

Holy dynamo... I never strip a stall unless it is just before and after birthing out a mare for sterilization purposes, and/or I'm doing my twice yearly rubber mat scrub down.

Straw stall cleaning involves a lot of sifting. You sift the good straw away from the wet/soiled straw.

I always choose a clean part of the stall, and work from there. I pull the clean straw off and away from poops and scope up poops first. Then I pull off all the top straw over top of wet spots. The truly wet straw that needs to come out is what has changed color to dark brown, even a reddish tone, and that is what you pull out. The slightly damp straw covering the wet spot doesn't need to be pulled out. It will air dry and actually absorbs moisture better the second time around. this is the beauty about straw is that it allows all moisture to get right to the floor, keeping the top layer dry, thus the horse is warmer when it lays down on top of it.

By the time I'm done, all the clean straw is all stacked up against one wall, and the floor is scraped clean of all wet and the rubber mats are swept clear. There should not be puddles. If there are puddles, your floor needs fixing. I leave the floor open to air out during the day, putting down deodarizer, and then just before bringing the horses in, I spread the straw back over the floor.

Practice makes perfect - I can clean a straw stall in less time than a shavings stall. This includes dumping buckets, scrubbing feed tubs, cleaning auto-waterers, and general inspection of the stall for damage.

If you do it right, you should only go through one small square bale of straw per stall per week, but you will go through more with youngsters because they tend to be restless in a stall. Done correctly, your barn will not smell of ammonia at all.

I love straw bedding and that's the only thing I will use. It is environmentally better because it is easily replenished each year, it composts very quickly for spreading/feeding pastures, and it is warmer for the horses when they lay down. I had a boarding facility a few years ago and had 50 horses in my care. The barn never smelled of ammonia.

I read an interesting article published in Europe that they have found gases released by urine soaked shavings are carcinogenic as they found an extremely high incidence of lung cancer in barn workers who dealt with shavings beddings. The shavings might smell "cleaner" but the deodarizing effect is only temporary. The minute shavings come into contact with urine, there is a chemical reaction producing a toxic, odorless gas. With straw, if you smell ammonia, you're not effectively cleaning your stall and it is your warning signal to make corrections. I haven't read anything about a followup study.

:D

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=2225422&l=0f44a3b921&id=678301486

Have to add that if you aren't anywhere that you can spread you can call your local mushroom farmer and they will typically come pick up muck piles for free! (Another great thing about straw!)

[yellowbritches]

OMG! I miss straw...hmm, wonder if I should tell the boss to cancel the American Wood Fibers order and let's go back to straw! My luck, my horse would be allergic!

Anyway, I clean straw VERY much the same way I clean shavings. Throw the bed up against the wall, poo rolls out. Pick out the poo, the wet spot. If the horse is particularly messy, I'll leave the clean bedding up for a few hours and let the floor dry (usually with some PDZ on it). Pull it all down, make a big, deep fluffy bed, big deep, cushy banks, throw maybe shake out a few flakes to freshen it up, and fight the desperate urge to take a nap in the nice, clean, fluffy bed. :yes: I NEVER get that urge with shavings. :no:

I miss straw....