Today, I want to give you a little sneak peek on how I prepare to go out of town with having the horses, so that I was able to leave them for five months for the summer.
Part of the equation is a wonderful team and the other part of the equation is great instruction. So we’re going to dive into the great instructions today.
How I Prepare for a Farm Sitter
First, I’m going to get the horses started eating, get started on chores, and then we’ll get going with the instructions.
I’m going to walk through a little bit on how I laid out my tour instructions. So I have them posted on a bulletin board in the barn with a few different sections.
Now, these instructions are for the summer. I have not changed them over to winter yet because I haven’t left this winter, although I do think it’s great to have up to date instructions out at all times, just in case you have an emergency situation and you’re not able to do chores.
But for now, we’re going to walk through the summer and what everybody had to take care of while I was away for five months this summer.
Have a Step-by-Step Instruction Guide
The first section up here is the basic instructions. These are step by step instructions on how to do chores.
They’re not super in-depth. I’ll get into where I keep my in-depth instructions later.
But this is just for somebody who sort of knows what they’re doing to be able to glance up and set up.
So for me, number one is to catch the horses. Our horses don’t eat in stalls. We don’t have enough stalls for all the horses, so I end up tying them up to the fence and feeding them their grain individually that way.
Number two is to feed the grain, so scoop all the grain in the bins and feed them the grain. Then notice I do not see in the amounts on this sheet. I just say feed grade.
Number three is picking the manure so, while they’re eating, you’re out there picking manure.
Number four is check the water. We have a 100 gallon stock tank that we like to keep full if it’s below a third of the way, I always say fill it up. In the winter, I try to keep it even more full than that.
And number five is release the horses. Once they’re finished eating, untie them and put everything away. So that’s sort of the basic overview on that sheet.
Color Coordinated Feed Chart From the Bag to the Bin
Now, if we go to the next sheet, this is the feed chart. This is where all of the instructions are on the amounts everybody gets per horse.
I always go in the order of the pecking order. So up at the top is Joe. Joe gets one scoop of senior glow in the morning, one scoop of senior glow in the evening.
Now, a couple of things to notice about my feed that chart. The types of feed are color coordinated. So you have your Senior Glo in blue and Low Starch in red.
Now, the feed bins that hold the feed are also labeled Senior Glo in blue and Low Starch and red and the bags of feed. That way if you have to fill the feed bins, the Senior Glo bag is blue and the Low Starch bag is red. I always try to keep everything as simple as possible and as organized as possible to eliminate the sticks.
And you’ll also notice down the side, each horse has a color. All of those horses have that name tag on with their color on their feed bin and on their blanket.
Next, I have the cat instructions which are super simple. They just get some food and make sure their water is filled.
Final Checklist with Your Most Important ‘Don’t Forget’ Items
And then you have a final checklist before you leave. These are the top four most important things that I want checked before somebody leaves after doing chores.
Number one, making sure all the gates are closed and latched and that their safety clip is in place. Nobody wants the horses getting out while you are out of town.
Number two is turn off all the lights. This one’s really easy to forget, but you don’t want to waste that much electricity, so lights go off.
For Long Term or Tag Team Farm Sitters, Have a Chore Calendar
Number three is the mark chores as complete on the calendar. Now, I don’t do this typically when I am just having a weekend farm sitter.
But this summer, when I was gone for so long and we had so many different people helping with chores, I wanted to make sure that we had a way to mark down that chores had been done so that if my parents came out later in the day or somebody else came out to ride, that they could see whether or not the horses are set.
So we have a calendar that’s hanging on the wall and each day is marked with the name of the person who’s assigned to do chores that day, and they can check it off as soon as they’re done.
All right so the last one is to make sure the doors are in the right position. We have two doors that we have to think about here in the barn. We have our big roll up garage door and we have our small dutch door over here.
All right, moving down. We have our next little list. This is what I sort of call the alert sheet or the notification sheet. Basically, this sheet changes depending on the time of year.
We also have a picture of our team down here just for fun because they’re awesome. I am so thankful to each and every one of them for everything they did this summer.
And then we have our emergency contact information. This includes my number, my parents number, my vet’s number.
And that’s sort of it for the board.
Have an In-Depth Chore Instruction Sheet to Cover the Unexpected Questions
So I also have this binder for in-depth tour instruction.
The board offers a really quick overview and most of the time they’re sufficient, but in the binder I had the contact information for everybody who was on the horse care team this summer, a copy of the summer rules and then detailed instructions about how to take care of everyone.
If somebody is really confused, they can read through this and pretty much figure it out.
I had a section for problem solving, so this is like, what if the horses get out? What if the horses have a scratch? What if the cats aren’t home at night when I would need to lock them up?
And then on this side, I had an in-depth chart on how to wean the horses onto pasture.
And then the last little part here, I had a little buying guide for my parents who were in charge of purchasing all of the horse feed and cat food and dog food.
Then over here was just a little outline for the girls who were riding, and that was just going through some of the individual training things that I think each horse needs to work on.
Wrapping Things Up
So I hope this gives you a little bit of insight on how I organize things when I have to be out of town for a weekend or a week or five months and gives you a little bit of a guide for when you are creating your own chore instructions, whether you have a big farm, a few horses, or even just a dog or cats.
All right, everyone, thanks for following along. I hope you had an absolutely wonderful Christmas and that you have a great New Year’s celebration this upcoming week. I will see you again next Sunday.
