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Elite Veteran
Posts: 672
  
| I recently moved to a new place and while I love it, I am trying to figure out the best way to keep the pens clean. I currently have some in stalls/runs that I clean out in the AM & PM, the other horses are in a dry lot during the day and let out to pasture at night. How do you keep your larger lots clean? It is too big of a lot and with 4 horses there is no way that I would have time to pick it every day.
Just wondering how everyone keeps set ups like this clean as I am starting to get anxiety as the sh!t piles up!! |
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  That's White "Man" to You
Posts: 5515
| Hire a 12 year old at $3/day. Best money I spend each month. |
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Elite Veteran
Posts: 1079
| My horses are kept up near the barn on a round bale during the winter months (inside over night). We use the skidsteer to clean the area out every time we put out a new bale - so every 25 days or so. Keeps it pretty neat over all. We pile it all way out and dispose of it via manure spreader and a neighbors field come spring. |
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Elite Veteran
Posts: 612
| My husband uses the loader bucket and the blade on the tractor to clean our pens every few months. |
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Married to a Louie Lover
Posts: 3303
| We use our skid loader as well to scrape our runs and lots |
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Elite Veteran
Posts: 672
| I wish I was close enough to hire a kid to clean! What do you do after scraping it with the skidsteer/tractor? Pile it up or move it to a location a ways off? Right now I am just making piles as I haven't set a location for a big manure pile yet. I can scrape the pens with a tractor bucket so will be doing that, or trying too.. I am not very handy with it!! |
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 Too Skinny
Posts: 8009
Location: LA Lower Alabama | My mare poos in stud piles so I just have a four wheeler and cart when they are in the small lot and get a good back burn going. |
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| veintiocho - 2016-11-28 4:46 PM
I wish I was close enough to hire a kid to clean! What do you do after scraping it with the skidsteer/tractor? Pile it up or move it to a location a ways off? Right now I am just making piles as I haven't set a location for a big manure pile yet. I can scrape the pens with a tractor bucket so will be doing that, or trying too.. I am not very handy with it!!
Take a loaded bucket out to poor spots or low spots in your pasture ..
shake the bucket to unload it in small piles in a straight line ...
and then put bucket on the ground and run backwards to spread the
manure out over a larger area ......
Otherwise ... buy you a hundred chickens and let them be your manure
spreader ... lol |
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 Shelter Dog Lover
Posts: 10277
| Husband scrapes it out with the tractor or I go over it with our zero turn lawn mower set very low, mulches it to almost dust. |
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 Expert
Posts: 1584
Location: Central Texas | I don't clean the big pens. Since I don't have a tractor or skid steer or any kids around, I use two muck buckets on a wagon and get some serious excercise struggling to drag it through the sugar sand to dump it in the pasture.
I spent some time at a cutting horse barn that never cleaned their stalls with runs because they said that it made good bedding. Surprisingly, the pens seemed to be just fine. It was a barn with a raised roof and no walls in a warm climate, so there was no ammonia smell. |
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Expert
Posts: 1207
| My 3 are out on about 10/15 acres of pasture with a big barn to come in and out of at will. What I don't get is that they will come into the barn, poop and then go back out. I have seen them poop outside when they are a ways away from the barn but if they are close to the barn they will come inside to poop. So I pick on the weekends. I have two spots that I dump the manure on and eventually it will turn back into the best dirt ever!! |
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 Money Eating Baggage Owner
Posts: 9586
Location: Phoenix | The place where I keep my horse has a large dry lot turnout. We pull a light drag behind the 4 wheeler about 1-2x a week to break down the poo. |
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Married to a Louie Lover
Posts: 3303
| Right now we're composting ours for our garden. We also have a manure spreader and spread it on the pastures.
I've also been at barns that used a piece of chain link fence with weight on top (tires usually) behind a 4 wheeler to just drag over the piles and spread them out, it breaks down pretty quick at that point.
We don't scrape ours super often, more often in the spring and summer for fly control, but since they spend most of their time on pasture we still don't have to do it very often, I may try to keep the runs picked with a wheelbarrow next summer.
I too have watched all 4 of ours walk up from the pasture when they are close by to go in a run, poop, and go back out to the pasture. Makes me want to throw rocks at them, little sh*ts (pardon the pun) |
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 I hate cooking and cleaning
Posts: 3310
Location: Jersey Girl | Drag the fields. |
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 Concrete Queen
Posts: 1657
|  My chickens clean my pens for me. Haven't picked up a shovel in over four years.
Edited by Supernel8 2016-11-29 3:05 PM
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 Expert
Posts: 2674
Location: Silver Lake, MN | I am also a freak about this...I clean the dry lot and pens daily but I only have 2 so it's not too bad. In the winter when it freezes I have the SO come in with the skidloader and just scrape it since it freezes to the ground so quick. This year has been a mud hole...so I clean what I can outside and as it dries out can eventually get it all cleaned. We spread on our neighbors field. |
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Keeping pens clean