Tuesday, April 14, 2015

Rant!

This is a rant about boarders. We never have boarders. Mostly because we are not a boarding facility. We train and own. End of story. If there is a non-owned horse at our place it's because they are paying a hefty day rate for us to break and train the horse for the track. Or in one instance we were training two horses in exchange for the use of an old man's bobcat to do work around the farm all summer.... and believe me we used the shit out of that machine. My person always says he hates boarders, that they always screw you over, that they are far more trouble than they are worth. You always always loose money.

Well, as most of you know, we have a temporary boarder at the farm. WHAT WERE WE THINKING? It's a long time friend and her horse needed somewhere to go for a couple months while she got back on her feet. The plan was that it was 99% self board. I'd bring the beast in and out occasionally and feed him. But since the show she's been there 2 or 3 times in 10 days. Doesn't call to check on him or anything. And she was supposed to be helping my person at the track every morning to help pay for hay and the pasture he's thoroughly wrecked by his constant galloping around. But every time we ask her to do something she has a fit and throws all the stuff she's done in our faces. Really we've hardly asked for enough to cover self-board, let alone full-board, which it practically is anyways. I am taking care of this horse every day, doing his hay and water and stall and turning him in and out. I don't have time to take care of a free horse. When we are breaking a baby we are getting paid for it. A hefty day rate. So, naturally, I'm peeved.

My friend with the little mare has left her horse at our farm for a couple of nights before on a couple of occasions and I never have to chase her down and remind her to take care of her horse or to do work around the barn to pay for the hay and pasture for the couple of days. She's there every day and does all the stalls (at the time there were 4 or 5 horses at the farm) and rakes the shedrow and levels it out and sweeps the feed and tack room and fills up all the outside and inside waters and sets the stalls for when I need to bring in. All without ever being asked. Never once have I had to say, hey can you do all this to work off your couple days of board. She just does it. Because she appreciates the fact that we are letting her horse camp out.

When you do someone a favor, like let their huge horse stay at your place for a couple months, you don't bitch when asked to do thing or help out, you bust your ass and do double what's asked without BEING ASKED. You show appreciation. You don't take advantage of hospitality. You don't leave the wheel barrel piled sky high when you clean the stall. And you don't leave your horse's shit all over the shedrow after you ride. You do whatever looks like might need doing because someone is helping you out and they didn't have to. Boarding a horse is not a little thing. It's a pretty damn big thing! And to not even call and say hey I'm not going to make it out there today or hey how's my horse doing today? Ugh. I'm so annoyed.

No more boarders. EVER. If Twister needs another horse on the farm so bad, we can go get another $500 sale barn horse and train it up and it can be my person's riding horse/Twister's buddy. It's a totally different matter to have a second horse you own as opposed to a free loading boarder. Especially a high maintenance boarder. When you say you'll work off your board, it's not the boarder's decision to decide when it is worked off. UGHHH!

I hate this freaking drama. This is why my person never wants boarders, no matter who they are. I was told yesterday you don't mix money and friendship. Well, I wish I'd heard that a month ago. Rant over. I'm so cranky about this.

4 comments:

  1. Yeah when I have my own property I will not be taking boarders! Hope yours is out soon... :)

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  2. sounds like a really crappy situation, and kinda shady too... good luck figuring it all out :(

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  3. I dislike boarders. I look at my friends, and see how they are wonderful boarders for people. When I stayed at my husband's parent's house, I basically turned into their boarding manager. We NEVER had people like my friends. The kind that take care of their horse and themselves. We had CRAZY people. The kind that had an affair at his parent's damn house in the barn. And used my stuff. And left kids unattended for hours. And then brought a BBQ over and invited people off of the street to come ride. NO. JUST NO. I want to shake your boarder. Shake her up real nice.

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    1. Thank you for commiserating! I've been talking to her today trying to work this out. My fiance works 20 hours a day. Literally. And he doesn't need to deal with this stress. And what stresses him stresses me. And why can't you and I have boarders like our awesome horse boarding friends? Is that SO MUCH TO ASK FOR?!?!?!?!

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