Any Other Broke Horse Owners Out There? (merged)

Jay-Jay_4

lol yeah but livery yards are hard work when someone else manages the fields and farmers fertilize which is no good if you've got a laminitic. Turnout is limited in winter, you have to answer to everyone else, people pinch your stuff, women are b1tchy.... etc etc etc...!


It's nice being the boss isn't it?
(we don't have any of the same stuff as you, we have three shelters and two wheelbarrows ....it's 'low-tech' )

cornerclose

Jay-Jay wrote:

lol yeah but livery yards are hard work when someone else manages the fields and farmers fertilize which is no good if you've got a laminitic. Turnout is limited in winter, you have to answer to everyone else, people pinch your stuff, women are b1tchy.... etc etc etc...!


It's nice being the boss isn't it?
(we don't have any of the same stuff as you, we have three shelters and two wheelbarrows ....it's 'low-tech' )

Depends on what you want from your horses. My 2 dressage horses cost around £70/week each at full livery (including farrier), but for that I get the use of indoor and outdoor arenas, 24 hour expert supervision, fortnightly farrier visits (and he will come and put a shoe back on if needed), fortnightly vet visits free of callout charge...and I don't have to worry if I want a day or two away somewhere. On site lessons, transport to shows available, friends to ride out with... it depends which side of the coin you look at.

Horses are not money-saving-friendly, but I would rather go short myself than compromise them.

Things you can do (as well as put into practise as many of the ideas on this site as you can):
Keep your horse warm with lots of rugs, and don't clip unless absolutely necessary - warm horses eat less.
Make sure your horse is regularly wormed - ditto.
Don't use lots of expensive supplements as most horses don't need them (unless recommended by vet or farrier). They can also cancel each other out.
Don't feed 3 large feeds a day full of "calming" additives (I know someone who does this and complains her horses are always fizzy). Unless they are working really hard or are old, bad doers etc, one feed a day and ad lib hay/haylage should be plenty. If you need to add condition feed a little vegetable oil and consider probiotics (Suregrow is cheaper than Blue Chip).
Local horse sales often have a tack auction attached - you can get a leather bridle for about £5. They often sell clothes, rugs etc too. (and you'd be surprised what junk you can sell for a couple of quid).
Sawmills and timber yards sometimes sell bags of sawdust cheaply which can be mixed with shavings to make them go further.
Latex tear mender (for leather) will mend rugs (including outdoor ones) to save on repair bills.
If your horse has lots of exclusions on his insurance consider ditching the policy, but cover yourself for public liability by joining the BHS (gold membership £49) which covers you if any horse you own injures someone. Put the money you would have spent into a bank account just in case, and collect the interest.

Jay-Jay_4

cornerclose wrote:

Depends on what you want from your horses. My 2 dressage horses cost around £70/week each at full livery (including farrier), but for that I get the use of indoor and outdoor arenas, 24 hour expert supervision, fortnightly farrier visits (and he will come and put a shoe back on if needed), fortnightly vet visits free of callout charge...and I don't have to worry if I want a day or two away somewhere. On site lessons, transport to shows available, friends to ride out with... it depends which side of the coin you look at.

Oh yes I agree it's (scuse the pun..) horses for courses.

We (my Mum and I) have two dressage horses and my daughters pony, they cost £6 each in the field. We don't personally need 24 hour supervision as we've owned horses for 18 years and as far as supervision of the horses at night; my sister's house is at the entrance to the field and she keeps her eye on things. The farrier comes when we phone him as does the vet (but we very rarely need the vet), we own a trailer and we have a short, pleasant hack to our lessons in an indoor or outdoor school. We ride together and if one of us goes away the other one is there.

The downside is no electricity and no running water but for a saving of £64 per horse per week it's a compromise we're happy to make.

cornerclose

Sounds like you are a) not the average horse owner, and b) very lucky!

[Deleted User]

Cornerclose what do you mean by lucky?

We make our own luck.

My large happy and very healthy cob had grass livery 5 min walk from my house and in a field on the side of the lane to and from the village. She was the village pet and everyone looked out for her. Good field, good watchful farmer, homemade hay. Farrier as needed on a phone call. Vet once in 10 years. Lots of lanes and bridle paths. Stable in our garden with a fieldguard rubber (springy and draining) floor

1/2 mile ride to lessons. Cost of grass tack £8

edited:
this was the same regime and cost when we had one eventing horse and also a thoroughbred. Both competition-winning horses. Both rugged and in at night. Lots of hay, short feed only when needed. Result calm and amenable horses

Xenomorhic

Ha ha, have you all seen my sig line?!! :rolleyes:

I am NOT an owner, not yet, but I am a passionate horse lover and have ridden for a few years now- when I wasn't riding, I wanted to ride!

Horses constitute the biggest expense in my life at the moment. I'm at college doing stages prep- 160 a course- that's roughly every 3 months.

Got an extra cost at the moment- Riding and Road Safety prep and exam at about 70 quid total.

I ride in lessons twice a week- 17:00 a time but I'm about to go to a new trainer for private lessons- 25:00 a time, but she's meant to be good!

College and lesson stables are far away so that's where all my petrol goes! I'd guess about 12 quid a week is on trekking to yards or college.

I am very lucky in that I get to ride a gorgeous little Highland Pony for her owner about twice a week at the moment, maybe more in the summer. She's so cute! I don't pay towards her but I help out on the yard, a great deal.

Horse owning can be done on the cheap but costs can also hit the stratosphere. Just like horse buying- you can go under a grand or way way over 50,000! It's scary!

Horses are money pits, so I'm trying to get into a strong position financially before I take one on.

Xenomorhic

On the above note you say you have HorseS, are any of them possibly share material? You could have someone over to ride your horse and pay a small contribution to their care.

Obviously they'd need insurance, but they're not all inexperienced kids looking for this opportunity. I'm 25 and ridden for several years and a friend of mine rode since she was 11 on a loan pony and now wants a share, she's 26.

Jay-Jay_4

cornerclose wrote:

Sounds like you are a) not the average horse owner, and b) very lucky!

I'm certainly not average .... lucky? no. I've been on livery yards, moved around different places but ultimately it was my Mum that arranged to rent a field and she built the shelters herself because she wanted the horses to live out yet have 24 hr access to shelter, a bed, hay and water.

Xenomorphic wrote:

On the above note you say you have HorseS, are any of them possibly share material? You could have someone over to ride your horse and pay a small contribution to their care.

We've been asked if we'll share but one is a rescue whothinks he's a stallion and is a one woman horse (my Mum's the one woman ... though I'm hoping to jump him later in the year) and the other is a !!!!!! (mine) who does flying changes in gallop then drops his shoulder to chuck you off :rolleyes: I wouldn't trust anyone else on him. The little pony is as much a field companion as a show pony but he's my daughters and woe betide anyone else who wants to ride him :rolleyes:

On the insurance subject, the cheapest isn't always the best. E&L have a shocking reputation so even though they're cheap...avoid!!! I'm with Petplan and believe they're excellent at paying out.

cornerclose

kittie wrote:

Cornerclose what do you mean by lucky?

We make our own luck.

I mean lucky to have a suitable place available and the backup to make it work.
Don't misunderstand me, I consider I am lucky to be able to keep my horses where they are. It is worth every penny. I am just saying that (like me) some people do not live within supervising distance of a suitable field for horses, like me they live alone with nobody to help them. Maybe they work full time and haven't time to muck out or keep an eye on things.
In my part of Yorkshire farriers are like gold dust. The best ones are not taking on new customers and many won't turn out to put one shoe on. Ours is great.
As for the vet question, you can't always prevent problems. I lost a horse through sinusitis caused by 2 broken teeth, yet his teeth had been checked regularly by a horse dentist. He was fully insured for vet fees, but I ended up forking out the best part of £2000 and he was insured for death but they wouldn't pay because he died due to an excluded condition. There was nothing I could have done to prevent any of it except to have him shot before the insurance ran out, which I refused to do.
One other small point - is it wise to advise horse owners generally to set up on their own in order to save money? Many do not have the experience or knowledge and could end up in a real mess.

Jay-Jay_4

cornerclose wrote:

One other small point - is it wise to advise horse owners generally to set up on their own in order to save money? Many do not have the experience or knowledge and could end up in a real mess.

I'm not advising inexperienced owners to set up on their own in order to save money, I'm just saying that that's what we've done.

People think that owning horses is eliteist and only something that very well off people do. It can be and we all know that the sky is the limit when it comes to competing and showing but not everyone has to spend huge amounts of money to own a horse or pony. If you already have experience with horses and some common sense then what's wrong with doing things differently?

What I would say is that we have owned at least one horse/pony for the last 18 years. We prefer our animals to live out as we believe it's healthier and we are extremely confident with our animals. Our arrangement is moneysaving and suits us down to the ground.

Like I said.... horses for courses