Daily turnout a legal requirement

[Goldenstar]

The problem with laws is framing them sensibly because the law and common sense are different things .

Caring for horses is very often about weighing up various choices and deciding which set of choices is the least bad .
An example is the last time we had severe snow in this valley it was once in fifty year event and lasted from November to February .
The snow got to the tops of the fences , I took the view from day one that this had the signs of a freak weather event and turned the horses out from day 1 my judgement was it was going to be like this for a long time and I did not want them standing in and then having to go out .
So they went out everyday together for two and a half hours this was how long it took us to do the yard and shovel snow etc etc. That decision was based on my feeling about the weather and the horses I had I knew they knew enough about life not to go crackers and I knew I could not guarantee that if they where in for a fortnight first .
Some one else could have done it differently with different horses in just as well thought out way for example I contemplated individual turnout but decided that the group would be happier with a chance to interact .
We even turned them out without rugs ( all clipped ) on bright days and they all groomed each other .
We quickly worked out 2 and half ours was the sweet spot on time after that they wanted in and got cross with each other .

Prescriptive laws can work against animal welfare if they are not framed sensibly but then the laws can be so loosely framed that they don’t actually help at all .
Its not an easy thing to get right .

 

[stangs]

There used to be a riding school, called Claremont, on West 89th St. and Amsterdam Ave, on the Upper West Side of NYC. It was in an old tenement building. The indoor arena, at the bottom, had huge columns in the middle. The horses went up and down ramps to get from their stables to the ground floor, and they often did it unsupervised. The grooms would get them tacked up and send them on their way, then they'd appear at the entrance to the indoor. I hired one out once and rode the two long blocks from there to Central Park. Then you could have a proper canter around the gallop tracks in the park, after navigating Upper West Side traffic, of course. The horses were cool. So bombproof. Obviously they got zero turnout and lived in the middle of bloody Manhattan, and you could make an argument that their welfare would have been better if they were not living on West 89th and Amsterdam. But they were still cool. They're gone now -- developers bought out the building, because Manhattan.

I love hearing about horses in cities. I love the fact that stables existed and exist within London, that until recently you'd find Welsh stallions tucked away under Westway, and that you can see the most gorgeous drafts if you know the City Mounted Police's route, that every mews and Stables Way is the only remnant of where hundreds of horses would have once lived. I love it even though I know horses in London did and continue to receive little turnout. It brings me both sorrow and joy to visit suburbs where you've got a cart in the front garden and stables in the back. I treat the Old Southern Railway Stables like an annual pilgrimage, and I signed petitions for it to not get demolished, even though I know in my heart that it's not an ethical place to be keeping horses in this day and age.

It's difficult trying to wrestle with the love for horses in the city, and equestrianism's urban history, whilst also knowing how difficult it is to maintain acceptable welfare standards in cities.

 

[conniegirl]

Totally agree. In our area you would need 5-6 acres per horse to have any chance of all year round turnout. 25 horses in yard - do the arithmetic. People need to be realistic. Unless horse owners are able and willing to pay the sort of prices that a commercial yard would need to charge if they had access to that amount of land, it can't be done.

And yet round me an acre per horse is loads.
Our yard has roughly an acre of grazing per horse but it is well managed. This year we have far far to much grass. The yard owner is having to cut about half of it for hay and i’ve had to start strip grazing my pony as he was about to explode from the sheer amount of grass.

We turnout all year round we had 3 days last winter where they had to stay in and that was because the track to the field was like an ice rink and it took time to make it safe. Even then they all got an hour or so each day either in the school or the all weather turn are out we have.

 

[Landcruiser]

Röwer & Rüb pens - Flexible and with many equipment details

Röwer & Rüb pens adapt to your requirements and even grow with you. Read more about the wealth of detail in Röwer & Rüb pens.

www.roewer-rueb.de

These type of pens were pretty standard in Germany when I lived there (which was a pretty long time ago), I presume that's still the case. They are not perfect, but they double the available space for each horse and allow them to be outside and to socialise with the neighbours. The place I went in Crete a coupe of years ago had similar. I don't know why they aren't more of a thing here, especially in places where turnout is limited or (I can hardly bear to type it) non existent. The surface I saw most was smooth aggregate or sand for the pens.

 

[paddy555]

Röwer & Rüb pens - Flexible and with many equipment details

Röwer & Rüb pens adapt to your requirements and even grow with you. Read more about the wealth of detail in Röwer & Rüb pens.

www.roewer-rueb.de

These type of pens were pretty standard in Germany when I lived there (which was a pretty long time ago), I presume that's still the case. They are not perfect, but they double the available space for each horse and allow them to be outside and to socialise with the neighbours. The place I went in Crete a coupe of years ago had similar. I don't know why they aren't more of a thing here, especially in places where turnout is limited or (I can hardly bear to type it) non existent. The surface I saw most was smooth aggregate or sand for the pens.

hadn't seen them before so thanks for posting.
They are small and no doubt very expensive however the idea is excellent. With a little imagination the principle could improve the lot of horses stabled for long periods.
On a row of loose boxes for example the stable doors could alternate between the back the front of the boxes so the turnout pen will be double in size.
The pens could come out further so in a 12 ft box the pen could be 12 x 24 or even larger. It could have sand or woodchip if freezing is a worry so the horse can roll.

With better design of stabling this would be easy to install, in many cases if would be easy enough to add on and would not require turnout use of the school and would improve the lives of stabled horses considerably.

It would be easy to say the pens in the link are small, they are. However they double the horse's stable size. So if they are small then the stable without them is almost minute.

 

[TheMule]

Röwer & Rüb pens - Flexible and with many equipment details

Röwer & Rüb pens adapt to your requirements and even grow with you. Read more about the wealth of detail in Röwer & Rüb pens.

www.roewer-rueb.de

These type of pens were pretty standard in Germany when I lived there (which was a pretty long time ago), I presume that's still the case. They are not perfect, but they double the available space for each horse and allow them to be outside and to socialise with the neighbours. The place I went in Crete a coupe of years ago had similar. I don't know why they aren't more of a thing here, especially in places where turnout is limited or (I can hardly bear to type it) non existent. The surface I saw most was smooth aggregate or sand for the pens.

I totally agree- some places need to think outside the box (excuse the pun!) and these are a really easy way of giving a horse a bit more of a sense of freedom

 

[Landcruiser]

The pens could come out further so in a 12 ft box the pen could be 12 x 24 or even larger. It could have sand or woodchip if freezing is a worry so the horse can roll.

The Crete place had horses doubling up, 2 horses to a large double size pen and 2 stables open, per pair. They had built them all themselves, using scafolding type poles. In Germany I saw "extended" pens, at least double size.

 

[Landcruiser]

Facilities

www.midlandshorsearenas.co.uk

These people do a nice simple design (which would be pretty easy to copy!)

 

[paddy555]

The Crete place had horses doubling up, 2 horses to a large double size pen and 2 stables open, per pair. They had built them all themselves, using scafolding type poles. In Germany I saw "extended" pens, at least double size.

Facilities

www.midlandshorsearenas.co.uk

These people do a nice simple design (which would be pretty easy to copy!)

both excellent ideas and so simple.

I loved the doubling up. I did this with a 16hh rescue stallion and his yearling 14hh son. I found them in a single stable the stallion standing looking after his offspring who was lying down.

 

[YourValentine]

Röwer & Rüb pens - Flexible and with many equipment details

Röwer & Rüb pens adapt to your requirements and even grow with you. Read more about the wealth of detail in Röwer & Rüb pens.

www.roewer-rueb.de

These type of pens were pretty standard in Germany when I lived there (which was a pretty long time ago), I presume that's still the case. They are not perfect, but they double the available space for each horse and allow them to be outside and to socialise with the neighbours. The place I went in Crete a coupe of years ago had similar. I don't know why they aren't more of a thing here, especially in places where turnout is limited or (I can hardly bear to type it) non existent. The surface I saw most was smooth aggregate or sand for the pens.

This sort of set up is pretty common in Australia as well.