How is everyone coping?

[AutumnDays]

Especially those of you who have nowhere to stable/hard stand your horses? My land doesn't seem to be getting any less wet, and the mud fever they got from livery due to their field being a bog in summer is still lingering. I've moved them into the best draining field, and they have tonnes of space, to minimise poaching, laid straw down in the gate way to try save it a bit, yet they still find wet and mud to stand in! It feels like it's been a long winter already due to the wet summer, and I'm feeling very down that the dream of having my own acreage is currently a messy slog (that's another rant in itself, trying to educate two machinery mad men in land management is not easy ).

Feel free to add your own rants and moans here, perhaps we can find solace in solidarity to take some of the edge off!

 

[maya2008]

Soooo wet, and now straight to frozen. I feel your pain!

 

[AutumnDays]

Soooo wet, and now straight to frozen. I feel your pain!

Ah no! We haven't frozen where I am, it's now just very cold wet rather than mild wet. I'm questioning my life choices a bit here!

 

[setterlover]

Feeling very depressed and feeling guilty as we have loads of land open pole barn access from fields and covered barn with stables but this year I have found it an horrendous slog sick of getting soaked battling against horizontal rain and wind and just not enjoying owning horses
We are both in our seventies and are now seriously discussing selling up and down sizing in the next couple of years.
We have already decided no more horses when the remaining 3 pass on.They are 24 ,22 and 17.
Definitely when down to one will move the remaining one to retirement livery.
For various personal reasons no longer riding.This horrible winter and barely no summer had just made us feel we have had enough.
Might feel better if we get a decent spring but we bothy think it's getting towards the time to downsize and walk away from horses.

 

[webble]

Ice is the problem now

 

[Ratface]

Fortunately, I have Old Horse at full livery is a 50 acre estate. The land is extremely well-maintained by its owner and there are winter paddocks and summer paddocks. The horses are out after their breakfasts (7am) and come in at dusk (currently about 16.30pm) Each horse has their own paddock but can see and touch its' neighbours over the electric fencing. There are small muddy areas at each paddock's entrance but that's all. The paddocks are poo-picked on a daily basis and rotated before they become over-grazed. The horses are weigh-taped regularly and visually checked for loss of top line, prominent hips and/or ribs on a weekly basis. They are provided with ad-lib hay and bedded on straw which is fully mucked-out each morning, left up to let wet patches dry and put down before the horses are brought in. If the weather is dreadful - persistent hail/rain/snow/ screaming wind they may stay in all day.

 

[ponynutz]

We have a sand paddock we use for turnout in Winter but it's waterlogged so they're in 24/7 atm

 

[Fransurrey]

As above, it's cold and wet, rather than icy, but to be honest I prefer ice. At least it's pretty. My older mare is really struggling. Waiting for vet to phone me back as she's uncomfortable on bute and I can't keep her on it long term (gut issues). I'm really stressed that I'll have to have her pts, which means a big lifestyle change for my other horse, as I don't want another and certainly don't want to share a field with them living out. Not sure I could cope with stabling and he needs to live out due to PSSM1 causing him to stiffen up. I'm done in and it's not even December.

 

[Widgeon]

We're doing okay really, the gateways are muddy but the rest of the field is fine (the foggage has protected the ground), and I still have a bit of long grass left in the centre of his track to strip graze - that should last another week or so. We're very lucky to have well drained fields and ours are all out 24/7, but even so, I'm barely riding - just finding the daylight hours to do the minimum necessary is a struggle alongside work. I hate winter! Although the current very cold, dry weather is *infinitely* better than the months of rain we've all had.

 

[Bellaboo18]

Its our first year with our own land and its a learning curve. I've completely miss managed it. We enjoyed summer far too much and haven't saved enough grass to protect the land and its just not stopped raining
It seemed to have dried out well at the weekend but then we've had a lot of rain since Sunday night. One step forward and all that!
I've got a plan for next year and now know the wettest bits of land etc. so that's keeping me going if spring could just come....

 

[AShetlandBitMeOnce]

I'm not too bad, sick of the wet and being ill with this flu that has lingered on for over 2 weeks now! Thankfully we don't have a huge amount of mud (and I am spoilt with 5 day part livery rather than DIY due to work - but still go down every day to late hay and do wraps etc).
The dark and wind though is destroying my mojo and Dex is definitely having more of an extended break than he usually would have - we do a little something about 3-4 times a week.

 

[marmalade76]

It's been worse here, we're not flooded.

 

[Gloi]

Our floods have frozen.

 

[PinkvSantaboots]

The ground is wet but it's mainly near the hard standing the rest is not that bad, it's meant to freeze now though then more rain after the weekend.

I try and keep mine out overnight as much as possible but they had a few nights in this week as it was so wet and horrible.

 

[poiuytrewq]

Not wishing to P everyone off (remember I cant even ride my horse properly so things are not all rosey!)
I'm having the easiest winter so far. Yes its by far been the wettest i can remember but I am at least a horse down, I managed to rest fields properly over summer having 3 fat ones left, two are ponies with no shoes meaning i have better ground cover and less to churn it up anyway.
The 3 are still on and doing fine with Summer routine. They all go out every night and come in for breakfast in the morning. They are always the far end of the field still asleep when i go to get them, never at the gate so i figure they are happy with this too!
My little yard got concreted properly this year so that's really heavenly! We have been incredibly lucky weather wise in that the worst days have so far been when I've been going off for a lesson in an indoor arena, otherwise, working mostly from home now I've been able to pick and choose times to ride and to an extent do stuff so I can often avoid rain.
I'm very much a winter person rather than summer though!

 

[poiuytrewq]

Its our first year with our own land and its a learning curve. I've completely miss managed it. We enjoyed summer far too much and haven't saved enough grass to protect the land and its just not stopped raining
It seemed to have dried out well at the weekend but then we've had a lot of rain since Sunday night. One step forward and all that!
I've got a plan for next year and now know the wettest bits of land etc. so that's keeping me going if spring could just come....

I did that at first, didn't really think to plan ahead but It does all come back good. However awful it gets too look just try not to get too hung up on it! Promise it comes back fine!
I, in fact never really mind because I have less grass that way come spring and don't have to worry about restricting it then.
I know someone who is very precious about fields in winter, then come spring/summer the horses have to stay in because there is too much grass!

 

[meleeka]

No ice here, it’s just a soggy, muddy mess. I was strip grazing, but that’s just meant the whole field they have is mud. I’m now waiting for the grass to lose some goodness so I can just let them have the dry bit.

 

[SEL]

I have 3 on 6.5 acres of grazing. Down 1 sadly but 3 is enough in this kind of winter. They're out 24:7 and will stay out unless their winter field disappears under water - it was about 10 days in overnight last winter & the mucking out killed me!

I got really good foggage in all my fields because they were on a track over summer. I was hoping to leave them on the top field longer but it's standing water and mud so they'll be in the winter field this weekend. Just trying to work out how to move two ponies and a fat PSSM mare onto 2.5 acres of long grass.

My gateways are horrendous and I feel the love for mud control mats!!

 

[Marigold4]

I have also had enough of this winter. Seems a lot of slog, mud and vet fees for not much enjoyment. My riding horse has had a virus and is still coughing now and then, so not riding. Ground so wet and slippery it doesn't seem a good idea anyway to start him right now since he is somewhat unpredictable. Dreading weaning my foal and so that's hanging over me. Foal is doing well away from mum for most of the day but soon my mare is going to a stud so that they are properly separated. Hoping neither injures themselves while settling away from each other. The foal I bought to keep mine company has been nothing but trouble: gave mine a virus, full of worms, very nervous and difficult to catch and now vet has decided she has a club foot and will need lots of extra attention to her feet - I had her vetted so quite furious that this was not spotted. Get a companion foal - it'll be fun, they said

 

[P.forpony]

I'm cold, the horse is cold. It has mud fever and has eaten all my money, oh and its always dark.


Is it April yet?

 

[Bellaboo18]

Have you moved to your own land recently OP?

 

[ponyparty]

Yep I'm feeling it too. I went DIY from 1st November for various reasons and am now mildly questioning my life choices I love it - but yes, the mud, the dark, the cold etc.

Horse got mud fever, but I seem to have got on top of it, for now. It was so mild I decided to get her clipped (just a low trace/Irish) - that's booked for next week, now I'm wondering if I ought to! There's no proper hard standing at my yard, so I've bought my own rubber grass mats to put down by the stable so at least there's a small area of decent surface to faff around with her on. The water pipes are above ground instead of dug down so they'll freeze in the cold snap, so I'll be lugging water up. Got about 4/5 weeks worth of grass left in current field, and there's another to move onto to last them into spring.

Horses are happy, they're out 24/7 with a fresh section of field to eat down each week, they have a field shelter which they do seem to use, they're warm enough. It's just me, the puny human, that's suffering roll on spring!

 

[HorseMaid]

We moved to our own land this year, first thing we did was build a hardstanding where horses have free access with a shelter where hay is fed - it's working well so far, the field is saturated though and I'm trying not to look at it!

 

[AutumnDays]

Have you moved to your own land recently OP?

Yes, we inherited a smallholding and the family business (blacksmiths, not the useful horsey kind either ) from my husband's side, moved in end of October. The land hadn't been touched for 15years, so had encroaching hedgerow to clear (and still do ) need new permanent fencing and drainage redoing. Husband and brother in law like playing with the boys toys like the digger etc, but don't actually use the fields, so they have created more work for me by digging trenches and driving tractors around it, and then leaving it because they have found something else to do. Unfortunately those are the fields I need to walk through to bring mine to the tiny bit of hard standing I cleared to do anything with mine. The big bit I cleared they filled with commissions and land rover defender carcasses for restoration (as for having shed space, forget it!). I feel very pushed out and not considered at all. I know I'm fortunate to be in this position, but it is a lot more of a slog than I was anticipating. Sorry for that whinge!

 

[Flowerofthefen]

Everywhere is just so wet. My boys go out for 6 hours a day. I'm trying to save what I have!! The best thing I did was invest in some mud control mats for my worst gateway. They have been brilliant!!

 

[Emilieu]

I am so grumpy.
First winter on full livery thanks to work and family commitments. In theory that should make it the easiest winter yet but if I can’t ride I just end up feeling useless, and between the dark and the ice I’m struggling to get any riding done last two rides have been bareback bumbles around the school, just to make sure her legs got a stretch. Her turn out days clash with my days off and I can’t make her miss turnout just to hack round the block with me. Gah. Hurry up spring!

 

[Palindrome]

I am planning to get gravel or rubble in the spring/summer as the mud control mats are not quite coping. Some of them have rubble/bricks underneath them and they work well but those that are directly onto the soil get a layer of mud on top of them.
I have totally closed the field as the horses were standing in puddles and one of them has now caught mudfever. They can only use the shelter, the track that leads to it and a small area by the gate.
I am seriously considering building some stables for next year.

 

[tda]

Not long til the shortest day ☺

 

[suestowford]

It is a slog but you do get used to it after a bit. I tend to abandon actually doing much with them in the darkest months, and just concentrate on what absolutely has to be done for their welfare.
I'm dealing with a lingering abscess which the vet said was almost certainly due to the continued wet weather. There's apparently been a lot of that about but he is on the mend now so feeling a little less fed up.

 

[Bellaboo18]

Yes, we inherited a smallholding and the family business (blacksmiths, not the useful horsey kind either ) from my husband's side, moved in end of October. The land hadn't been touched for 15years, so had encroaching hedgerow to clear (and still do ) need new permanent fencing and drainage redoing. Husband and brother in law like playing with the boys toys like the digger etc, but don't actually use the fields, so they have created more work for me by digging trenches and driving tractors around it, and then leaving it because they have found something else to do. Unfortunately those are the fields I need to walk through to bring mine to the tiny bit of hard standing I cleared to do anything with mine. The big bit I cleared they filled with commissions and land rover defender carcasses for restoration (as for having shed space, forget it!). I feel very pushed out and not considered at all. I know I'm fortunate to be in this position, but it is a lot more of a slog than I was anticipating. Sorry for that whinge!

Whinge away! Tbf I think you moved at a really hard time of year and it's hard doing it all on your own. I'm sure it'll be worth it in the long run but it's hard to imagine spring at the moment x