Rubber matting or deep litter

[JustAPony]

Just musing the benefits of each system and wondered what other people's thoughts and experiences are?

Currently deep litter throughout winter and clear it out in the spring. It takes a bit of time to bed down at the beginning but is pretty quick and easy to skip out once it is established.

I use a new bale of shavings every 10 days or so,more at the beginning,less at the end.

I'm wondering if rubber matting would make it quicker and easier to muck out. And if it would much more in the way of shavings. I'd still like to have a bit of bedding down,not keen on just having a sprinkling. One pony likes to pee in the stable so I don't know if that would be a factor..

Any thoughts? Thanks!

We have rubber matting AND thick beds - we skip out every day and do a full dig out once a week. I hate the thought of deep littering for a whole winter - surely it stinks of ammonia after a while? They’re mostly out 24/7 but two of them come in overnight.

Rubber matting is brilliant as long as it doesn’t lift. Nothing worse than squelchy matts with bedding and wee underneath.

I've got rubber mats and do a full muck out every day. I leave the bedding up in a corner so that any moisture is gone before I turn the beds down later in the day.
I can't stand deep litter. I had a livery that did a midnight flit and left a huge deep litter bed (after mentioning her name to another yard owner, apparently she was well known for doing this!). It took ages to dig out and had fungus growing in it 😲

I’ve done both and actually prefer deep litter with constant skip outs of poo. If I can catch a wee in a scoop brilliant, but just re top and bed and feet look good.

Matts are ok but I find rugs stink with skinny beds, and you need the expensive Mayo Mattress ones that don’t end up smooth and slippy.

Thank you.

I would need to look into matting in my stables. They don't have a slope in them so this might affect the potential accumulation of pee under the mats.

The deep litter is a bit of a pain to clear in spring but it just takes a few hours and a lot of wheelbarrows full! They don't smell at all and I've never found fungus growing in them. They actually look incredibly clean and comfortable. I keep them well topped up with shavings.

Shavings are obviously a lot more expensive than when I first started using them a million years ago! So I'm wondering about other options. I know there would be an initial outlay with matting but it might pay for itself over time. I'm not sure!

Have you considered aubiose? Needs a few bales to start, but fluffs up nicely and is easy to muck out.

I use aubiose for my messy gelding. Take the poo out every day and remove the wet every two weeks. Works perfectly

No, I thought it was just expensive shavings?
I'll look into it, thank you!

Its hemp. It ‘knits’ together to form a solid base.

@Pinkdaisie brilliant, thank you!

I love deep litter. Mine is on shavings, and once the first couple of weeks have passed, thd base settles into a sort of thick carpet, and the wee goes straight down, leaving the top lovely and dry. Like you @JustAPony J use less shavings as time goes by. It smells much nicer than when the bed is dug up every day. I dig mine up around 3 monthly, just so it doesn't become too much to deal with.

I used to have shavings on mats but found that every time my horse laid down or rolled the bed slipped on the mat and got all churned up and the wet was a lot worse than when the bed was just on top of the concrete floor. I just have the mats Infront of the stable door now and use them as a ridge to brush the bed behind.I deep litter wood pellets and wouldn't go back to shavings now. A tonne pallet of unbranded pellets from Whitehorse energy has lasted my 3 (16.2 warmblood and two 13.3 ponies) the entire winter, I have about 10 left from the 65 that were delivered in October. I will do the same thing next year, it was much less stressful and far, far cheaper than running to the feed shop every weekend.

I have mats and then deep litter on top. I don't leave it in all winter, I did once before I had mats but now I prefer to dig out every couple of months.

I know lots of people dig out weekly but I find that too frequent as I like the solid base to form.