[Small Farmer]

It's been said that you don't know someone until you have them as a houseguest.  Our experience is that you don't know them until they're a livery.


Friends of ours were defrauded by their business partner and lost their house.  We offered them our annexe at half the market rent and a lot of inconvenience for six months while they sorted themselves out.  Two and a half years later they're still here but will be gone by Xmas.


All went well - really very well - until we let them bring their horse onto our small yard at less than cost.  Like I said they are friends and we've known them and their horse for years.  But she's almost completely ignorant when it comes to horses.  She won't listen to advice either from OH (HND equine management) or other livery (an AI) so makes up her own theory for each problem. 


The horse started being aggressive and she lost her nerve handling him, while he attacked the other horses and trampled our AI friend.  We suggested colic or ulcers and wanted to call the vet but she fed him Aloe Vera though it was clear that he was all bunched up.  Finally we insisted on driving him to the vet hospital where they diagnosed ulcers and cleared it up inside a fortnight.  Pity he was in pain for six months.  Pity he went through last winter with his ribs showing because she wouldn't feed him enough despite we were smuggling scoops of beet into his feed every day.  Perhaps we should have been more confrontational but you don't like to do that and he wasn't exactly a welfare case.


I could go on but she's decided her perfectly rideable horse with a few health management issues should be retired.  So he's gone to a grass livery at a price which says the operator will be bust within the year.  The lorry driver watching him trotting up from the paddock said "why's he being retired?".  Says it all really.


People are odd....

[honeyend]

We bought a new place last year and I have a barn which my dear husband put me some nice stables in thinking I would get someone to rent it as a whole with some acreage, not too fussed about the money just wanted someone else about as I am on mine own most of the time.
 I had a procession of what I would only call a bit inadequate turn up, one women told me she was coming then said she'd had all her ponies put down 3 days before she was due to come. In the end I got suckered by someone who left owing about £600 and a lot of grief. I would never do livery again. I am a women but all of these odd balls were women of a certain age, I can do decide if they have nothing to do better with their time, or they just lack total insight in their behaviour.
 

[lachlanandmarcus]

I have 4 stables and 40 acres of grass, but no liveries just me. Mainly because I've seen at our old yard how hard work it is for relatively little return, and I'm not the tough resilient type who could deal with people if I felt they weren't looking after their horses.


So I would only have a livery if it was a friend whose care of their horse I'd observed over a long period, and I would probably do it on a share duties basis to free each other up.


Anyway two of the stables have my nags in them and I've just filled a third with two sheepdogs :-))))

[Roxy]

I had a livery on for a neighbour.  She would forget the rent, then pay a lump sum 3 months later.  Her youngster was aggressive, with people. I suggested we feed at the same time morning and night, to avoid horse fall outs.  One evening her horse lashed out and caught her ribs breaking them.  She then blamed my ponies.  I suggested politely that seeing as her horse was not good round people, and I had to go in that field, it was maybe time she moved her.  I said there was no rush, knowing liveries are hard to find.  What did she do? Went next door, rented the 7 acre field for her one horse, and then smiled over the fence as if to say "look at all my grass!" I was rather livid, as I wanted that field, but really was just glad to be rid of her loony horse.  Put me off liveries after that.

[shygirl]

its true - never mix business and pleasure.
we had close friends, our kids literally lived at each others houses, and the kids adored the ponies that we bred.
the mum kept asking me for a pony but money was tight. in the end i said they could have a pony and pay weekly.
needless to say we never got paid the pony moved yards and we dont see them at all.
money gone, friendship gone. never again.

[Hevxxx99]

Indeed! Written agreements are a must even with friends I think, just to clarify things. I both bought and sold a horse in similar circumstances and it worked out fine, I'm very glad to say. Same with liveries.

Having been both a livery and a landowner having everything in writing takes away any misunderstandings.  Doesn't help with badly mannered horses or people, but does help.  I had two field liveries that were theoretically DIY, but I ended up doing everything most of the time, for sporadic payment, from daily winter feeding to holding the horse for the vet and farrier as I wouldn't see them suffer. I even ended up paying for and giving one, a pregnant mare, essential supplementary feed as she was turning into skin and bone and I couldn't stand by and do nothing when the owner never even bothered to come and see her.  I learnt from these and since then, I've added it into the agreement, that I will feed hay daily when I feed mine (it stops fighting etc if they're in together), look them over at the same time and charge a little for other services, like holding for farrier etc, but put it in writing.  My most recent livery was lovely: helpful and friendly and always paid up on time.  Sadly she moved out of the area, but she said she had never been at a place that was so nice. *smug smile*

As a livery, I've had my horses brought in when I've asked for them to stay out (arthritis), had them shut in without food for 48 hours when I've asked (and paid) for them to be fed and turned out, had them moved into different fields with strange and sometimes aggressive horses when I haven't been present and (I suspect) had them ridden by the yardowner's friends without my consent.

I'm happy having my own land and only my horses on it at the moment, but would take on another livery under the same arrangement.

[sabrina]

I once let a friend of mine keep her 2 horses with me for next to nothing. Nightmare. Fences were wrecked and she was never away from the place or her friends. I had enough when she refused to stop hand feeding my youngster who almost took my thumb off one day when I went to bring him in from the field. A lot of pain for me and the loss of a friend.

[Small Farmer]

We failed to learn from other people's mistakes.  We used to keep our horses on an 18 horse livery yard run, not very well, by a local farmer.  He closed it down just as we were moving our horses to our own yard so we weren't closely involved.  It turned out that 4 of the liveries were doing a mixture of unpleasant things including bullying and harassment of the staff - and our friend was one of them.

She's as happy as a pig in sh*t now she's got rid to the horse to a cheapo yard an hour's drive away she found on the web.  Bet she never visits and he last no more than six months before needing to be put down for some spurious reason.

Stupid thing is another farmer friend asked our advice on taking liveries.  We advised him to get it in writing and gave him some examples we'd found - but not used ourselves.  He's enforced the rules with an iron hand from the start and had no problems whatsoever.

Anyway to celebrate her departure our Redwings rescue pony came first in the mountain and moorlands at the local pony show while OHs 28 yo hunter came 4th in the veterans beaten only by a 22yo and some ponies.  Perhaps there should be a vintage class because the judge was clearly taken aback by his age and condition.