Hows everyone’s field holding up

[racebuddy]

After such wet wheather and hardly any frost hows everyone’s field holding up , mines doing well bit of mud at the gate but other than that doing good but would like dry whetaher ???

 

[poiuytrewq]

Mine was kind of ok right up until recently. Then it seemed to go from ok to trashed within a day. I have a newish horse who has been pretty unsettled out there, he’s calming down but someone can sneeze a mile away and he does a quick few circuits so it’s pretty churned up

 

[Roasted Chestnuts]

Trashed but it’s a winter field with 10/11 horses in it daily and it gets rolled in spring and recovers every year.

 

[Melandmary]

My field is not too bad but there is a 100yd track to it which is a quagmire... As is the area in front of their shelter and gate. I am waiting somewhat impatiently for the quote for a 20x20 hardstanding and then I'm going to close the access to the field which has little grass anyway and give them the arena instead. It is forecast rain and more rain here. Roll on spring!!

 

[milliepops]

My field at the yard is pristine... got to be some upside to every sodding horse being on box rest

 

[meleeka]

Mine was lovely up until Christmas day, when it rained and didn’t stop. Its resembling a pond now . There’s no grass but there never is come winter abs mine have hay ad-lib.

 

[pistolpete]

Mine was kind of ok right up until recently. Then it seemed to go from ok to trashed within a day. I have a newish horse who has been pretty unsettled out there, he’s calming down but someone can sneeze a mile away and he does a quick few circuits so it’s pretty churned up

Same. Really good to trashed in a week!

 

[SEL]

They all had a mad gallop on Christmas - so trashed ?

 

[HashRouge]

Mine was doing great, but it's been chucking it down at home since Christmas day so I dare say it's trashed now. I'm away for a week, so I shall look forward to seeing the state it's in when it gets back! YO has very kindly brought mine in for a few nights, as my elderly mare does not do well with heavy rain.

 

[tiga71]

Ours is muddy for about 20 metres round the gate and the bottom of the field has a lovely lake feature, but there is 33 acres and most of it is fine. Plenty of high ground that they can use. There are only 12 horses so we are pretty lucky.

 

[Honey08]

Ours is fantastic. They’re usually on the all weather hard standing by the end of October, so it’s really unusual. Helped by having no liveries that hurtle around. My two are shoeless and laid back!

 

[laura_nash]

Pretty good. It's very muddy around the cows hay feeder but thats on stony ground so it can't really get any worse than it is now. Some gateways aren't great and in front of the ponies field shelter is trashed, but it's much better than the same time last year.

 

[Goldenstar]

Mine is just beginning to get awful it’s very very wet here now .
The horses will have to come in at night soon .

 

[Esmae]

Soggy to say the least. One field is trashed due to loony horse digging holes in it. Others holding up not too badly given the relentless rain.

 

[catembi]

Mine have been on the hardstanding only for several weeks now. We are on heavy clay & it gets trashed in literally minutes once it gets saturated. To be fair, on the run-up to my having to close the fields (when it's non swamp they are on the yard at night & let out in the morning for the day), they would go up the fields, mooch about, decide there wasn't much worth eating then come down & eat hay instead. They THINK that they want to go up the fields & spend a lot of time looking up there wistfully, but if I actually let them out, they would be back down very shortly. Roll on spring, when the fields go from swamp to concrete within the space of 2 weeks!

 

[saddlesore]

Really good still! Less rain than usual for the west coast of Scotland so far. Still enough to sustain horses living out without supplementary haylage.

 

[Coffeeandcakeandchocolate]

Bit muddy around the gate. Rest of the field is ok

 

[Peglo]

We had a colder week running up to Christmas so fields dried up quite a bit.

 

[Auslander]

Thought I'd share this, to make everyone else feel better! This is my muddiest field - thankfully there is hard standing under the mud, and they have the pen for dry land.
It wasn't too awful until these two hooligans decided to have a massive party!
On a happier note - doesn't my old crock look sound!

 

[scats]

My fields are fine. I block off the wettest bits and alternate between fields depending on the weather.

 

[CanteringCarrot]

Lol fields. What fields? All horses are tucked away in safely stables here 24/7 until at least May ? the fields simply cannot be tarnished!

Fortunately I am at a yard that has small winter paddocks and mine also has a tiny paddock off of his stable. Really the best you can get and still be able to ride/have access to a school.

Some are finally catching on and building winter paddocks, but still, they spend a vast majority of time in their stables.

There are some horses that live out on fields on the outskirts of my village, and their fields don't look so bad, and they always recover every year. Some people don't recoginise this as being possible though, so it's best not to let horses out at all, obviously ? the trade off is that these living out aren't ridden horses as there is no where to ride or school nearby.

 

[TheHairyOne]

Mine is still ok in walking boots, which means its a lot better than this time in previous years! Gates starting to go and the bits around the hay feeders and trough are not brilliant, but the rest is ok, even if there's not a lot of grass on it.

 

[Sossigpoker]

Mine have been on the hardstanding only for several weeks now. We are on heavy clay & it gets trashed in literally minutes once it gets saturated. To be fair, on the run-up to my having to close the fields (when it's non swamp they are on the yard at night & let out in the morning for the day), they would go up the fields, mooch about, decide there wasn't much worth eating then come down & eat hay instead. They THINK that they want to go up the fields & spend a lot of time looking up there wistfully, but if I actually let them out, they would be back down very shortly. Roll on spring, when the fields go from swamp to concrete within the space of 2 weeks!

Same here. I'm yet to find a horse who prefers to be out in mud with little grass over being in the dry with non-stop hay. The days when we have been able to turn out , mine has lasted an hour before the novelty has worn off.

 

[rabatsa]

Mine are sticking to the mud control slab area over getting dirty feet.

 

[Berpisc]

Not as wet as some years, we had a kind autumn but the last week or so of plenty of rain is starting to means tranding water in the furrows.. Mine are pretty settles as a group and live out so there isn't too much trashing going on.

 

[ImmyS]

This is our first winter on this land so its all a bit of a learning curve!

Got two out 24/7 on about two acres and so far holding up OK. Just one corner where they like to hang out is a bit trashed - despite having a dry area around the shelter! And also around the water is a little muddy but so far I’m pretty pleased.

Will definitely rest the winter paddock for longer next year however. It was only rested from September until December so would like to rest it from June/July this year to get more grass coverage ready for winter.

We’ve finally got a sunny and windy day so hoping it will dry out a bit!

 

[Goldenstar]

That’s looking great ImmyS .
Mine is wreaked this morning it’s rained very hard all night the field was wet it’s now underwater .
I will have to start stabling at night .

 

[southerncomfort]

Trashed but it’s a winter field with 10/11 horses in it daily and it gets rolled in spring and recovers every year.

Same.

Every year I look at it and think 'this will never recover' but every year it does as long as we roll and harrow.

 

[scruffyponies]

Now that the rain has started(we're on water-meadow), we don't bother with a brush, and just use a window squeegee.
:/

 

[HBB]

It went from lovely to completely trashed on Christmas eve, I've never seen my fields so bad they're saturated and standing water in places. More rain forecast and I am feeling very down, Spring feels a lifetime away