It all began with me wondering how much horse manure I shovel each day. So armed with a fish scale (a scale with a handle and a hook used for weighing fish), I filled a few buckets with manure tonight, subtracted the weight of the bucket and discovered that I shovel around 30 pounds of horse manure daily for my 1,000-pound horse, Moonshine. Tomorrow I’ll measure our 1,200-pound horse, Valentine. So just for fun, here are some other measurements to help put things into perspective. Remember, this is for my horse Moonshine only:

Output (manure only)

30 lbs. daily
900 lbs. monthly (almost half a ton)
10,950 lbs. annually (almost 5.5 tons)

*note: this is manure that’s about half a day old. As it dries, I’d guess the weight drops dramatically. Also note this only covers manure inside her stall, where she spends 8-10 hours a day.

Input (food and water)

80 lbs. water daily (10 gallons) or 29,200 lbs. annually (3,650 gallons/14.6 tons)
10 lbs. hay daily or 3,650 lbs. annually (almost 2 tons)
1.5 lbs. oats daily or 548 lbs. annually

*note: hay figure does not include hay fed in pasture. Grazing on grass not included. Does include water consumed in pasture.

Wow, so I’m shoveling about 5.5 tons a year in manure. Horse chores provide good exercise! As my biceps grow I’m looking forward to answering the question “wow, what’s your secret?” with “horse manure!”.