- Horse inside stall, Photo from Flickr.com vw4ross
For anyone who has ever had horses, you know first hand about horse stall maintenance. It seems not matter how ‘horse proof’ we strive to make their surrounding, they always find a way to chew on something, kick a wall, or even groove the wood with horse size teeth prints. Once the weather is warmer there are some simple steps to turning your stable back into the horsey palace it once was when it was first built.
The first step is to get the stalls down to the bare floor. Whether that is a dirt floor, cement, or something else, in order to repair walls, the horse stall bottom must be ‘found’. The very most important thing to fix first is any rottenness in boards along the floor of the stall wall. The danger here is horses legs becoming trapped under the walls or doors and subsequently breaking a leg. For stalls lined with plywood, the boards should be cut back to where the wood is solid and not rotten. Cutting should be done from upright stud to upright stud on the wall. Then a new piece of plywood installed. When lumber such as 2×6′s or 2×10′s are used for the stall walls, then any boards that are rotten should be removed, once again, stud to stud. Screwing boards into place verses nailing make them easier to remove for repairs. If a board is rotten half way or a quarter of the way through the board, the whole board should be removed, not just part of it. This retains the strength board to board.
Another area of attention for board repair is under the water buckets or around the automatic waterers. These areas attract a lot of moisture and are more prone to rotting.
The final place for attention is wherever a horse has decided he is a beaver. Rotten wood and pine seem to attract horses the most. It is amazing to me how an animal as large as a horse can turn beaver in a second. The chewed boards should be removed and replaced. Painting Chew Stop can help repell horse mouths. Also covering areas with metal or wire can help. Also the use of oak boards is a great way to keep the horse teeth at bay. It really is rewarding to see your horse stalls back in top shape. And it is easy to think to yourself, “Boy, the more time the spend outside, the less time the old or young horse will spend inside destroying things!”
