10 Steps to Mucking Out Your Stable

If your horse spends time in a stall through any part of the day, ‘mucking out’ is essential. Unclean stalls cause a number of problems for both you and your hoofed friend. Urine saturated bedding can be dangerous for your horse as they will breathe in large volumes of ammonia, manure covered stalls attract insects and cause issues with hoofs such as thrush and it generally creates an unpleasant environment for both you and your horse.

Cleaning should be a daily task! It will rarely take longer than 20 minutes to give the stalls a quick clean. Remember, the longer you leave your mobile stables between cleaning, the longer it will take.

Essential Tools for Mucking Out Your Stable

• Wheelbarrow
• Shaving Fork
• Pitchfork
• Broad Shovel
• Broom
• Suitable Gloves
• Rubber Boots

1. Dress Properly

Mucking out stables is an unavoidably messy job. Wearing gloves will prevent blisters from using tools and promote general hygiene throughout the work. The stitching on riding boots is likely to erode if often exposed to urine, save yourself some time and money by swapping to rubber boots before getting stuck in.

2. Prepare the Stall

The best time to muck out a stall is when your horse is out
in the paddock exercising, however, if this isn’t possible then move your horse
over to a clean stall while you work.

Then remove any hay, water buckets and mangers in order to avoid contamination and keep you from knocking anything over.

3. Sift Manure

Remove all of the large and obvious manure from stall by
sifting the shavings through a shaving fork before depositing the manure into
your wheelbarrow.

It’s better to make more trips to the manure pile than stacking the wheelbarrow high, nobody wants to have to clean up manure twice.

4. Remove Wet Shavings

It’s likely your horse urinates in a similar place within the stall, if this is the case simply isolate the area by scraping away any clean shavings and scoop the wet shavings into your wheelbarrow. If not, lightly scrape the shavings to one side of the stall, any wet shavings will be left behind.

5. Take Out Remaining Manure

Create a bank on one side of the stall with the remaining clean shavings. Then begin sifting through the bank with your shavings fork. This will cause any remaining manure to roll down and easily be removed. Once complete you will need to pick any remaining manure out by hand (don’t worry, there shouldn’t be much left).

6. Sweep and Dry

Sweep the rest of the stall (leaving the bank of clean shavings). Then leave the floor to dry and air out for a while, this will help in further removing any urine and stopping ammonia irritation.

7. Add New Shavings

Split open a new bale of shavings (if necessary), use your pitchfork to loosen the bale as they are often tightly packed before tipping them on to the stable floor.

8. Loosen and Spread Shavings

Use your pitchfork to fluff and spread the shavings around the stall, keeping it even to make it as comfortable as possible for your horse.

9. Replace Water and Food

Replace any hay, water buckets or mangers that you removed, as well as any toys that may have been in the stall initially.

10. Clean Doorway and Yard

Make sure to clean the entry point to your stable, this is especially important if you are fully boarding your horse. Then clear any potential spillages in the yard before storing your tools away in a neat and safe place.

About Highfield Equestrian – We are experts in the manufacture and erection of premium quality timber stables, equestrian arenas, mobile field shelters and DIY Stables.