Advice on horses grazing fertilised fields

[applestroodle]

I am looking for some advice, the farmer is wanting to fertilise the field that I keep my horses in in the next couple of weeks. It is a 13 acre hilly field, there will be about 60 sheep coming in to at the end of the feb beginning of march till nov time. The field has been well grazed by sheep for a number of years so grass is not lush.
I am little concerned abt my horses will they be ok being grazed on fertilized grazing? I unfortunately do not have the option to move them but could fence a corner of for them. I am concerned abt my welsh section d possibly getting laminitis, she is not fat, worked 5 times a week and both her and my other horse (a retired eventer) come in most days for a couple of hours. Any info or advice be gratefully appreciated. thanks

 

[scotsmare]

Depends on the fertilizer but general advice is that you should wait 2 - 3 weeks before grazing on them.

 

[ceva]

Hi, It depends on fertilizer being used, where I was before the farmer used horse friendly fertilizer so we just put the horses out after he had finished no problem, but I use a organic one but usually wait 2/3 weeks or after rain before putting horse back in, or I fence half off and do alternate bits of the field.
hope that helps.

 

[alison247]

we used 20/20 fertilizer every other year and kept our ponies off the fields for no LESS than six weeks which it states on the bag.
It used to turn the grass yellow until it was well washed in by the rain,so it was strong enough to burn the grass.
I would advice caution.
Can you ask the farmer to leave 1 acre and fence it off?

 

[applestroodle]

Thank you everyone for your quick replies, yes i think i will fence a bit of to be on the safe side. I live in scotland so i am sure we will get plenty of rain but better to be on the safe side. thanks again

 

[SNORKEY]

Please please be careful I lost the best pony ever due to fertilised land, it was only 3 acres but my cob was used to ruff grazzing (200 acres of it!) and the fertilised land was too much, I did'nt think too cut out his hard feed, which I should of done instead of just cutting it down a bit, he got very bad laminitis and he'd never had it before.
Fence off a bit of the field and ride them every day and cut out your cobs feed.

 

[PeterNatt]

Please be aware that the fertilizer will migrated through the soil to surrounding areas.

 

[yeeharider]

its the nitrate level on the fertiliser that is the concern best keeping off 10-14 days and hope for rain to wash it in

 

[Hippona]

We usually stay off for 14 days.....I dont feed our good do-ers at all when the grass is good, apart from a haynet at night.....

 

[tanyaporter]

We leave ours off of a minimum of 14 days too after it's been fertilised .