We do self care and have three horses. The barn feeds hay and checks waterers two times a day, but we have to clean our own stalls, grain, and blanket. We also travel fairly frequently. Today, I started scheduling for a trip away and saw Chasing the Dream's What Do question and I thought I'd share how we manage this.
In order to go away, I construct an elaborate schedule covering each day, each horse, riding, cleaning, and feeding. I then color code it, add everyone's contact information, and share it with everyone involved. I use a live google doc so that the participating people can update and exchange with each other without needing me since we sometimes go on trips that lack access to telecommunications.
S showing the bracelet we gave her to our horses
For the paid stall cleaner, there is an additional step of creating labelled ziploc baggies of their daily food and putting those in the shavings bin.
This is what the schedule looked like when we (briefly) had 4 horses and went on a 3 week destination wedding/honeymoon trip:
Yes, it's really this complicated, which is why I make color-coded charts.
While having this many people involved ups the complication factor, it actually lowers my worry factor. If one person gets sick, another person can take over, or worse case, they'll survive without grain and stalls cleaned for one day and another person will be doing it the next day. If it was just one person, I'd be worried all the time about that one person falling through.
When I can be reached by phone/media, my leasers keep me updated and send me pictures, which I always appreciate.
