Any horse owners out there? I need help.

[duce50]

I have two important questions reference dry lot care and type of fencing.

First, I have a 90' X 90' dry lot that I need to tend to after it rains.. I have been thinking of buying a 4' box scraper to put behind the 7610 but I'm not sure that is what I need to smooth it out. Any comments would be great.

The second, is that I put up the fence for the dry lot and I used wood. I put 6x6's on the corners and gates, and 4x4' s on the rest. The problem that I anm seeing now is that the auger I used was a 6" and the 4x4's seem to be moving back and forth. I did use a tamp and thought I did a good job....but, I think that the next pastue I do will be with all 6x6's. I know that it will be more $ but if it works better......
And what are u using for rails??

 

[Z-Michigan]

Personally we use electric fence - hotwire or "electrobraid" rope, 3 strands, on a mix of 4" round posts and metal t-posts.

I think you can get your 4" posts to wiggle less if you go to each one with a trenching shovel or a dibble bar and compact the dirt at the base. Pouring in some sand before doing this may help too. Some people set posts in concrete but I think that is overkill for a horse fence.

As for tending the lot, I think an angle blade would be more practical for leveling it after rain, vs. the box scraper. Angle blades are generally better for leveling areas wider than your box scraper. Depending how level you want it, even a chain harrow may do a decent job. If you can post a pic that might be helpful.

 

[duce50]

Thanks Z, but the wife is shy about the electric. She does not want the boys to be scared/ shy about comming up to the fence. After repairing/retamping these **** post I might just hook up some juice anyways. I would love to post some pics but I dont know how to yet. I just want to knock the deep hoof prints out that are made from the rain. Some are deep enough one can twist an ankle (humans that is)

 

[Fjord]

Our dry lot (clay where we are) was always a mess in the spring and fall. Last fall when I finally got a tractor with a loader on it I scooped out about six inches of mud and replaced it with A-gravel . I didn't do the whole dry lot due to time and $ but the area I did was about 1/4 the size of your dry lot and this spring they had a nice firm place to stand that wasn't muddy at all.The gravel packs in very well and we havn't had any trouble with stones in their feet. The spot that's done is always where they choose to stand.I think the concept of digging out the mud and replacing it is good, but if you decide to try it just do a small area first and ask around for what the best fill would be. One drawback to the A-gravel is that when I scrape up the manure with my back blade I always collect a bit of gravel with it, but I'm just filling in a side hill with it for now so it doesn't matter. In our area most people use cedar posts for fencing although I imagine your 4x4 fence looks much nicer. We use wire fence sort of like page wire but with smaller squares. I put a line of electric fence along the top to stop them from wrecking the fence but they know where it is and aren't afraid to stick their heads over for a treat. A line of electric near the bottom would also be good to stop them from pushing the fence out to get at the grass on the other side but then it's a bit harder to keep the weeds out of it. Our fence is about 10 years old now and some of the posts are a little loose in the spring, but with the electric on the horses don't bother it. If I was doing it again I'd probably get some A-gravel to put in the holes as it will pack in way better than clay.I used to have a really good tamping bar but I lent it to somebody so now I just have an old sledgehammer head welded on to a T-stake which seems to work pretty well.You just have to start tamping right from the bottom as you fill up the hole.I guess your original question was about box blades of which I know nothing. Hope you get enough information to try something that works for you. Seems like people on this site have a wide range of ideas and experience and are always willing to help.
Good Luck.

 

[Mike120]

I set all of my corners and brace posts in concrete and use t-posts with vinyl covers for my line posts with four strands of electrobrade. My perimeter fence is vinyl with hot wire. Depending on the breed, you have around 1,200 pounds of fear cooped up. If they get scared they can walk right through a board fence and you'll likely have some serious vet bills. You want them to respect the fence. I've got over 6,000 feet of electric fence around horses and no injuries from the fence yet. They will come up to it but they won't touch it (except for a couple that seem to know when it's off). My old place had a couple of paddocks with board fences and I'll never do that again. Horses are born looking for ways to hurt themselves, non-electric fences just help them do it faster.

 

[GordNovo]

I find the 5ft s-tine cultivator does a nice job of ripping up the big clumps in the spring once it dries up a little, then smoothing out with the BB works extremely well. The scarifiers on the BB are too widely spaced to be as effective for this application.

Regarding the posts, in my opinion, a post pounder is the only way to go! I get 6" posts 8ft long and pound them about 3 to 3.5 feet. We did over 200 posts in our yard last summer when we installed 8 rotational grazing pastures throughout our 10 acre plot. The rental unit cost about $200 to rent for the weekend, and we got all 200 posts sunk in that time frame. It works out to about a $1 per post. With this system, you can also go high-tensile with 12guage wire and not worry about the posts pushing up as long as you anchor the corners.

Regarding the rails, we use 1/4" poly rope with interwoven stainless steel strands for conductivity on our 100X100 dry lot, 4 rows 18-12-12-12. We have 2 kids (5 and 8) who learned very quickly to respect the fence. When we first installed it, we all gathered round and took turns getting zapped so we all knew how it felt. Our reasoning was that we should probably do this in a supervised manner so we can be supportive of our kids the first time it happens (the kids wore runners and were semi-insulated so they got a 50% zap. My wife and I on the otherhand were barefoot... and we got zolted good ... I'm still recovering from some of the behavioural affects it's had on me) The rope costs a little more than wire, but a lot less than wood. It's a breeze to install and adjust when required. The 1/4" white rope gives good visibility for the horses and requires no annual painting and very little maintenance, plus it looks really nice and tidy. I'd show some pictures of our dry lot, but I don't have any on the PC I'm working on right now.

Check out www.premier1supplies.om for more info on the rope options.

Cheers!

G

 

[AllWaysBreakinSomething]

Some good feedback here.

Again I'll stress the tamping from the bottom. Most people pack the dirt on and then tamp from the top. Start by adding some dirt 4-5 inches even a little gravel or loose rocks you collected digging your way down and tamp, tamp, tamp till it feels like concrete. Add 4-5 inches again and repeat all the way to the top. Use a tamping bar or heavy blunt pole (shovel handle isn't enough weight)

I use the 6" round posts at corners and cross fencing between long runs. They are getting more expensive so I may switch to locust posts soon (we have them growing close to me in NC). Between the round posts I use T-Posts but I use the yellow caps that hold electric wire to keep them from getting speared. I've heard too many stories. The wire used at the base is field fencing, sometimes called hog wire. It's ok but some horse owners don't like it and prefer the smaller squares to keep the horses hocks from getting caught. Since I use a top strand of electric wire they don't paw at the fence much. I again would not use solid wire for the electric fence. I use the stranded stuff (I use the yellow as it matches the yellow post caps and easy to see) that will break it they get tangled in it.

Also I forgot to mention the field fencing works well on land that isn't level as the vertical strands are not welded which allows the fence to mold itself to hills and holes etc.

I don't have much of a suggestion for the dry area. I put a load of washout (removing large clumps) around the feeding area to fix the slippery mud. It's free at your local concrete plant if you haul it. It also contains lime (reduces worms etc). I would not recommend using gravel.

 

[shasta]

We have had fairly good luck using pipe pannels around the barn dry lot area. For footing I put in road base that is crowned for drainage. The pasture areas are fenced with Electrobraid . So far we haven't had many rainy season drainage problems. The Electrobraid seems to work well for the horses. It is easily seen and tough enough to stand up to several "bear attacks" . Our has been up about 8 years now and still looks new.

 

[riptides]

Got 1/2 cedar logs and oak for our dry pasture with clay/dirt mix. I drag it with a 6 foot york rake. previous house had bluestone for a dry pasture. I like the simple dirt method better.

Am finishing up a 4 acre pasture now with t-posts and metal mesh poly-tape. Will run hot this weekend. T-posts have caps with mesh connector and one other connector for two hot wires total. Previous house had 3-rail vinyl fencing.

Will give the T-posts their time and see if we like them. then maybe one day we either get rid of the horses, put vinyl fence back up, or die and leave it to someone else to figure out.

-Mike Z.