renovating sand arena

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dejavuagain

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I have approached my neighbour about using the sand arena on her property. She is in her 70s and the livery yard/arena have been vacant for over a year. Unfortunately, it is overrun with weeds and the membrane has come to the surface in a few spots due to mis-use by prior liveries. I have spent 2.5 hrs on my hands-knees weeding with a small hand rake only to clear about 30sm and start to get blisters! The arena is about 600sm!

I am considering round-up then in a couple of week harrowing. (however, I don't own a harrow, but willing to get a cheap one or open to ideas!)

Is there better way to accomplish this? I do not want to invest much money in her arena.
 
I feel your pain... We cleared the corners of our Arena, and it took days and days.
We now Round Up to prevent re-growth.
I'd be interested to see what responses you get, as we were advised that to use Round Up first makes it harder to then dig the roots out???
If the membrane is poking through you may need to dig it out, but it would be quite a big job, that could probably do with new surface... New rubber mixed with the existing surface would probabaly sort it.
Such a shane this facility has been left like this.
Our neighbours are made to help maintain our private arena. We rake the boards by hand then harrow using an aluminium gate and wooden pallet on top to weigh it down weekly to keep the surface from tracking.
We used to use a chain Harrow on the original (trackright - silica/coke mix) surface, but it's now silica and rubber so the gate is enough.
If you have to get a contractor in, I would highly recommend KLH Arenas
 
I don't know much about arena renovation, but you may be wasting your money on round-up at this time of year. The plant needs to be growing to translocate it and most weeds are in a dormant state at this time, so you would be better waiting until the spring.

If the membrane has come up then i think the gate levelling idea is better than harrows as you may catch & pull up more membrane especially if the surface is thin. I have used these gate type levellers in the past on sand & rubber mix surfaces with good results.
 
The membrane will definitely need reparing. The easiest way is to excavate around the affected area and patch it using a new section of membrane and strong cloth tape. (Depending how bad it is of course!)
 
Mainland said:
The membrane will definitely need reparing. The easiest way is to excavate around the affected area and patch it using a new section of membrane and strong cloth tape. (Depending how bad it is of course!)
Click to expand...
Agreed, forget the weeds at the moment, ask local farmer with a quad bike he will have various implements, to level for you, after you have repaired the patches, the most important thing is the base, if it has not been laid properly you are fighting the tide, but worthwhile, you need to pull all heaps of sand out of corners and it may need more surface, start saving!
 
If you wish to save some money simply invest in a metal 5 bar farm gate, remove the handle etc and turn it into a gate harrow it will level and is soft on the surface will not dig in and if you use it daily with the round up.you will get some good results
 
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