Grass in sand school. Would it be ok to turn out ?

[exracehorse]

As per title really. My Winter paddocks here in east Anglia are horrendous after sooo much rain on clay soil. They are on limited turnout. With ab lib hay. It’s depressing and giving me anxiety. Waking up at 2am! My sand schooling ring has some short grassy bits right around the outside. Up against the fence. Where the leveller can’t reach. It’s dry in there. And very appealing to use. My concern is the dreaded sand colic. As I know they will pick and pull the tufts up. Too high a risk ? Never known such a wet winter. Spring paddocks are too saturated. And those winter paddocks are trashed. Just don’t know what to do

 

[Tiddlypom]

How much grass? Is it well rooted, or do you think they’ll be able to pull the plants out of the sand, roots and all?

 

[Flowerofthefen]

Could you pick the grass out before turning out?

 

[pistolpete]

Sand colic is very painful and particularly horrid. Avoid at all costs! Weed first or make sure there’s plenty of hay in nets on mats to avoid sand ingestion.

 

[Nicnac]

Rake grass up if not you'll just worry about it.

 

[exracehorse]

How much grass? Is it well rooted, or do you think they’ll be able to pull the plants out of the sand, roots and all?

They would pick and pull it up though the sand

 

[FieldOrnaments]

I would remove just because if there's an expensive way to self harm horses will make a beeline to it

 

[FieldOrnaments]

..... And this is supposed to be a fun and relaxing hobby so no need to add unnecessary things to stress about

 

[DabDab]

Not something I would risk with mine, no

 

[muddybay]

I'm currently turning my horse out onto a small pen on a surface (rehab), there's some grass which I was worried she would try to eat but I supplement with haylage which keeps her away from it

 

[nutjob]

I always pull up or dig out grass / plants with a small trowel. Mine go in the school a lot in winter, especially this year, and they go for anything green even though there's loads of hay.

 

[Midlifecrisis]

Tidy up the sand pit.

 

[AdorableAlice]

I wouldn't risk it because I think even with hay or haylage out with the horse, the lure of grass shoots at this time of year will overrule the hay in terms of interest. I've got flexiride and my horse found a bit of chickweed which pulled up with a lump of silca sand and fibre attached to it. It was about to go down the hatch rapidly had I not intervened.

You could plan forwards for using it next winter by giving it a good spray off and letting the grass/weeds die off for good.

 

[poiuytrewq]

So annoying. I’d be inclined to try spraying with something like vinegar, which I may be wrong but I think kills grass and would be harmless to horses.
Then just using it for a leg stretch while you’re there to supervise and see if they are eating it.

Friend put rubber mats with hay on in her sand school.

 

[BeDamned]

I keep horses on extremely sandy land - this summer was more sand than grass. I fed psyllium husk in their hard feed am &pm. Gave one table spoon on day 1, increased to 7 table spoons by day seven (say day 2 was 2 spoons etc). Then stopped after 7 days, did this every 6 weeks. No issues. I added plenty of water to the feed, its goes into a gel like consistency - helps remove sand from the colon.
I do this every dry year - in 15+ years Ive yet to have one go down with sand colic. May be worth a try?

 

[exracehorse]

Tidy up the sand pit.

It’s not a sand pit. It’s a full size sand schooling ring

 

[exracehorse]

I wouldn't risk it because I think even with hay or haylage out with the horse, the lure of grass shoots at this time of year will overrule the hay in terms of interest. I've got flexiride and my horse found a bit of chickweed which pulled up with a lump of silca sand and fibre attached to it. It was about to go down the hatch rapidly had I not intervened.

You could plan forwards for using it next winter by giving it a good spray off and letting the grass/weeds die off for good.

Yes,, I can’t do another wet winter like this. I’ll spray in advance. And be more prepared

 

[Midlifecrisis]

My apologies exracehorse for incorrectly labelling the sand based schooling ring which you have allowed to become seeded with growing grass. No it is not a good idea to turn horses onto such an area as sand ingestion would be very likely with very uncomfortable outcomes for the horses. If you see grass growing ..pull it out there and then..prevention is better than cure.