For those with ther own yards..

slumdog

slumdog

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As I mentioned in my post yesterday I've been offered a fantastic yard of my own. It's like a dream and I'm so excited! My parents had their own place when I was a kid but I just wanted to ask a few questions to get as many opinions and ideas as possible.
Firstly, hay and straw. When do you purchase it for the coming winter and how much would be best to bulk buy for two horses for the winter. (Generally speaking, and hoping we don't have a 9 month winter again!) I currently have hay supplied and we weigh haynets from the huge haylage bales so not really sure what I'm using in small bales.
Secondly, resting and rotating fields, I will have 3 paddocks and I don't want to end up with either too much grass or not enough, do you do move them on sort of a cycle or do you just move them when it's looking a bit sparse?
Thirdly, harrowing the school, is it needed to be done regularly? If so, how often?
Finally, there's a chicken pen so we want some chickens! Has anyone else got chickens for eggs? Are they worth having lol!

I know I sound totally clueless but I'm not, honest lol, I have an idea of the answers already and I have friends and my parents to ask but I just want to know as many different ways of doing things as possible in case there's something I've not though of :)

Did I mention I'm excited! Haha
 
The only one I can answer myself is about chickens. We have them, they are great and although I get sad and despondant every time the fox kills one, I wouldn't be without them. Hybrids are what we have here, marans, speckeldy and black rock. Funny little things. Watch out for red mite and worms. They love to forage and will clear a small area quickly, ours are allowed to free roam, as much as possible. But we do have to watch out for bird of prey round here.

My partner does all the land maintenance and rotation. We rotate to keep grass down though here :D so slightly the opposite to you!
 
I have a good supplier, but not much storage space so I get deliveries every week/ fortnight as I need.
I have 3 paddocks.'..the smaller one I use as a trash paddock over winter and I alternate the other two the rest of the year.
I don't have a school :( but I have the option of hiring one locally.

Do it....you won't regret it, although it can be hard work at times :)
 
Firstly congratulations on being offered a yard of your own.

Chickens are great and you'll never want to eat supermarket eggs again! Just make sure the enclosure is truly fox proof.

Do you have good storage for your hay/straw? It is usually cheaper to buy in bulk. I tend to buy large hay bales in the autumn and my supplier delivers them as needed. As a guide I would estimate that you would want to budget for a minimum of two small bales per horse per week.

I harrow my school at least once a week with approx 3 horses using it daily max. A quad bike or something similar is definitely money well spent.

It would be worth getting some electric tape fencing, plastic posts and an energiser as you may well end up with too much grass in the summer. Depending on your acreage you might want to invest in a topper or alternatively find some to do it for you. I don't have a rigid timetable for rotating my fields but go by how they and the horses are looking.

It is great having your own pace but don't underestimate the amount of time that will be taken up with yard and field maintenance.
 
slumdog said:
As I mentioned in my post yesterday I've been offered a fantastic yard of my own. It's like a dream and I'm so excited! My parents had their own place when I was a kid but I just wanted to ask a few questions to get as many opinions and ideas as possible.
Firstly, hay and straw. When do you purchase it for the coming winter and how much would be best to bulk buy for two horses for the winter. (Generally speaking, and hoping we don't have a 9 month winter again!) I currently have hay supplied and we weigh haynets from the huge haylage bales so not really sure what I'm using in small bales. We make hay and store it in a big garage-sized barn and an old lorry container painted to match and last year sold a bit too. Straw we usually acquire 3/4 times a year, we have to have small bales as the hay takes up too much space to fit a big bale in and the amount we get depends on space too- we have 2-3 suppliers we will call on because small bales aren't always that easy to get.
Secondly, resting and rotating fields, I will have 3 paddocks and I don't want to end up with either too much grass or not enough, do you do move them on sort of a cycle or do you just move them when it's looking a bit sparse?

we used to have 4 x 1acreish paddocks, 3 used in turn all winter and the 4th strip grazed in summer while the 3 were used for hay (its one big field that we split with tape). Now we have a track round the outside of the big field in summer and make hay off the middle and the extra acre and this winter they have grazed all of the areas in turn as it was quite so wet.

Thirdly, harrowing the school, is it needed to be done regularly? If so, how often? don't have one :(
Finally, there's a chicken pen so we want some chickens! Has anyone else got chickens for eggs? Are they worth having lol!

I know I sound totally clueless but I'm not, honest lol, I have an idea of the answers already and I have friends and my parents to ask but I just want to know as many different ways of doing things as possible in case there's something I've not though of :)

Did I mention I'm excited! Haha
Click to expand...

enjoy it :D
 
Thank you for all your replies. It's hay and straw I'm most bothered about, I don't want to end up running out in the middle of next winter! I will have reasonable storage so I think I'm just going to buy a few bales a month now the boys are out full time. The other option is not to use straw and to use shavings or another absorbent type of bedding?

Ohh I've just thought of another question, cheap jumps! I'm not going to have any jumps and those plasticy ones are very expensive! Would it be cheapest to send my oh off to make some? Any tips for DIY jumps?
 
DIY jumps are very easy, but fairly expensive too. Best looking out for bits and bobs to make them (safely!) from reclamation yards etc (think poles and drums etc)
 
As long as your access is ok to your hay/straw barn throughout winter, if you've got to drive across the field when it's wet it's going to make a mess so buy in when it's dry. A large bale was only lasting me 2 weeks in the winter feeding 3 horses.
I rotate my horses every 2 weeks to a clean paddock, this also helps stop any worm cycle. I was told any animal shouldn't hear the church bells more than twice in a paddock!
As for jumps there is a fantastic place opposite Gaydon car museum ( see youre in the midlands) that makes x country jumps and show jumps, cant remember what they're called but if you google jumps & Gaydon it come up. Family business and really well made and I think it was about £250 for a set of 5 jumps.

Good luck with the yard! My most valuable possession is my stihl blower! Never have to sweep up and it takes a few mins just to blow the yard up and brilliant for cobwebs!
 
my best/scariest fillers are from the temporary road signs they put up (corrugated plastic) when they do resurfacing- 2 nailed to an old pole = about 2'3 filler :D
 
Sound like you are going to have fun :D

I get hay off the field from local farmer in the summer, straight into barn, usually planning xyz amount for this one & abc amount for that one - plus 20% over. Farmer will usually set aside another 25% of my overall buy, just in case - and if I dont need it then local feed merchant gets 1st dibs.
This is usually about right each year unless I change the equine dynamics in the yard :o That 20% has seen me clear till late autumn some year, sometimes till xmas, sometimes it goes for a box-rest person in early summer.

Bedding - I get a good amount delivered in middle of summer, usually a good price for bulk delivery, only top up once (possibly twice) in late winter or early spring, depending on how long Fuzzies have been in.

Fields? at clock change time in October, they go into the winter paddock & strip graze/mow this for up to a month before coming in (or come in when I get fed up of poo-picking both ends of the day in the dark :rolleyes: ). They will stay in this paddock right through till at least late Feb, still in at night & out there in day with hay by then.
Feb/March we move to spring paddock, then alternate back & forwards between this & 2/3 other smaller summer paddocks till late autumn again - this gives the winter paddock a good 6+ months to pick up & be strip grazed once again in the autumn till grass down & they then come in at night again.....
Winter paddock (if its lucky & weather is right) usually gets harrowed after they come out. I try to keep the worst of the weeds at bay, but also poo-pick daily for all the paddocks as only takes 5 - 10 mins or so if done so often, also not a problem then to leave it over for a day or so if going out :)

Best mate harrows her school on a weekly basis, its rides beautifully & has been down over 10 years :)

Hope you enjoy it all :cool:
 
I have two horses on my own yard. In winter we use three to four large haylage bales a week (horses are on haylage day and night then, as turned out on hardcore paddock during winter). If using small bales, this equates to 1.5 to 1.75 small haybales a day.

Straw wise, I have one really clean horse, one quite dirty horse. I use about three bales a week of straw when the horses are in at night. We used to use shavings but it was so much more expensive and the muck heap was bigger, and didn't rot down as well.

Schools do need harrowing regularly. How often depends on the surface really.

Rotating fields - yes I would use one and play it by ear. We have one for winter use that is nearest to the stables and the least muddy, and one for mid summer as it has a stream in it and so water supply is sorted.. Other than that, we use/top as we need to. This year we have sheep on too.

Hens - we have twelve in a run behind our stables and have so many eggs we sell a box a day. Ours are ex-battery rescue hens, and lay really well - even in winter (we have two non-rescue hens that stop laying in winter). We have never had a fox take a hen, our wire is dug into the ground about six inches down. We did, however have a stoat get in last autumn and kill one. Hens are really easy to keep and they are the only pets we have that pay their own way (selling eggs easily pays for their food).
 
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