How to get rid of urine smell in the barn?

Question

Any suggestions on how to help elimate the urine smell in the horse barn. I have tried straw which is a pain in the butt to clean up and today I took and turned over the dirt with a cultivator and sprinkled pelletized lime to help neutralize it. Any other suggestions? It's really awful.

Answer 1

Lime and wood shavings work very well. Fitted rubber mats (grated underneath). There is a product called "Stable Boy" that is good for stinky stalls.

Also, in the barn aisle, get a watering can and mix Dettol and water or Pine Oil and Water before you sweep. It makes things smell so much cleaner!

Answer 2

Lime, lime and more LIME..  also leave the floor exposed if you can.. wait till the last minute to put down bedding .

Answer 3

We usually use shavings and clean out the wet, then sprinkle lime down.

Answer 4

Urine (Ammonia) is caused by saturation of the stall flooring.  I assume your stall floor is dirt.

Working it up will not remove the urine smell, the dirt either needs to be replaced or built over to get rid of it.

I will digress a moment - by the time a human can smell the ammonia in a stall, the occupant equine has already sustained damage to their respiratory system - a smelly stall is VERY VERY bad.

The proper thing to do is to remove the bedding and dirt down to dry.  Then begin building the stall floor again with large gravel a few inches, then pea gravel a few inches, then sand a few inches, then probably 4-6 inches of sawdust or shaving for bedding.  The sawdust should be cleaned daily of piles and wet spots, then about every month, it should be stripped down to dry bedding and replaced.

An alternative might be something I saw last fall at an expo.  A gentleman had these plastic grids that locked together.  You put larger gravel underneath, flattened that gravel, then put the grid down and covered it with pea gravel or smaller gravel (not limestone), then leveled that to the top of the grid, then placed sane a few inches on top of it, then your bedding.  The grid makes it impossible for the horses' hooves to destroy the gravel bed meant for drainage.

The sand will allow whatever wet to pass through down through the gravel and away from the stall.  It is best, if at all possible to drain the bottom of the stall through a tile or trench with gravel to an outside location to pull it away from the stall.

Whatever you do, do not allow the horse to bed directly on the sand.  You must use shavings, or pelletized bedding or sawdust or something - if the horse consumes sand, you'll have problems there.

I personally just tore apart one of my stalls - I put gravel in the bottom, sand on top - then re-bedded with straw because that's all I had at the time - although it was not as bad as straw on the previous dirt, it was still a mess and the straw didn't absorb any urine, just let it pass through to the sand, which got soaked.

Now I bed with shavings or sawdust when I can get my hands on it and not only is it more healthy for the horse, it's a LOT easier to keep clean.  What used to take 6 wheelbarrow loads of wet, dirty straw after only 3-5 days trying to keep it clean, now only takes about half a load of dirty sawdust a day and once a week or week 1/2 to strip out now is only two loads at most.

Hope this helps - OH, the powdered lime, or some Stall Sweet will help also if you add it regularly between the flooring and bedding - and to let you know, although it was work, I re-prepared a stall about 14' x 18' for less than $150 by going to the local place to purchase a yard of pea gravel and a yard of sand, so it didn't cost hundreds to do it right.

Answer 5

I use hydrolyzed lime...it has the moisture removed so it is extremely absorbant and does an amazing job.  It comes in powder form...I'm not familiar with pelletized lime.  The hydrolized lime both soaks it up and neutralizes it.

Answer 6

use a clay base, then rubber stall mats, then shavings.. and when cleaning out, the area of the stall where the horse goes to the bathroom the most use a product called "stall dri" or even Lyme if you must, it helps kill the smell..

also, you can use the stall dri on any surface.. but the clay/mats/shavings it the easiest to clean and take care of.

Answer 7

Good housekeeping and turn your horses out.  Excess ammonia is very harmful to your horses' respiratory system.

Answer 8

We use shavings with rubber mats underneath. Clean all of the wet areas from the stalls daily, and to help with the smell, put kitty litter over the areas. (Make sure it sin't one of the dusty ones though)

Answer 9

Ok... I work in a stable and let me tell you there isn't nothing like urine stains and smell.... BUT I've got the perfect solution for you!!!! After all the different and price products I've tried... a friend of mine suggested me to use the floor detergent PINE SOL (lemon fragrance or the regular pine)... Dilute it in a bucket of warm water and use it everywhere... Smells good for days and it also disinfects (my horse loves it in his box). the pine fragrance also helps with flies (don't ask how, but it works and it's only few dollars!!! - the bottle lasts me for 1 month and the stable has 15 boxes that I PINE SOL clean once a week!). I hope it will help you!

Also is a very good idea to use sawdust (the blow away the dust before selling it which prevents horses to get allergies! it's easy to keep clean and it's not that expensive). When it's time to re-bed your horses box, use the detergent and let it dry, if you delute it with water there is no need  to rince the floors... let me know!

Answer 10

Amy S. is right!! use rubber matts and kitty litter.

Answer 11

SWEET PDZ

Answer 12

well i would put dray stall in the stalls then i would put rubber mats down when the stalls are dry. then i would bleach the stalls. that should get rid off most of the smell. but mainly let the stalls dry out before you put any other horse in it. well i hope i helped. Sabrina

Answer 13

I personally don't like straw (as bedding, but overall) because I feel that it only adds to the smell and makes mucking out incredibly difficult.  I would rather use shavings and get the nice woody/pine smell along with the fact that it makes life MUCH easier to muck out.  At the barn that I work at, we have rubber mats on the floor and every so often we pick a stall and take all of the shavings out, lift up the mats, shovel out the dirt underneath of the mats, put some Stall Dry down and let it air for a couple hours before putting the mats back and new shavings in.  I also like to use Pine Oil on the floors.  I will usually do stalls and sweep and then in a water can, I mix pine oil and water then sprinkle it down the aisleways for a fresh smell.