A 1,000 pound horse creates 50 pounds of manure a day, or 8 tons a year. Good Grief! Managing manure is an environmental hot button in densely populated western Washington, with housing developments, fragile streams and wetlands. While manure loses some of the "ick" factor when you spend lots of time around horses (what's the big deal?) it really IS a big deal, and relentless daily cleaning of stalls and paddocks is the difference between a sweet smelling healthy barn, and well... the opposite. I've seen both in my visits to many boarding stables over the years.
Because of the long commuting times, I've always kept Sizzle in "full-care board." This means that her stall was cleaned daily, she was fed hay, grain, clean water and was turned out in a paddock or pasture during the day. At my new barn, I now have the option to clean her stall myself, as many times a week as I care to. Great idea! I love barn work, and and can also save a few dollars a day on my board payment.
I have new appreciation for the hard-working folks who've cleaned my stall without complaint over the years. Just like people, there are two kinds of horses: neat or messy. Sizzle likes to walk circles in her stall all night, stamping her manure into quarter sized pieces and pushing her bedding up the stall walls. 45 dusty minutes into my first stall cleaning, I was wondering if I still had the energy to take a ride afterward? Stay tuned.
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