What if it never stops raining and doesn't dry up a bit?!

Kallibear

Kallibear

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How will you cope?

Like many people, I suspect, Im only just managing with my field nd just about hanging on 'until it dries up a bit'

But what if it doesn't?

I have 5 acres for 2 horses. They live out 24/7 as I've no stables. Over half of it currently squelches as I walk across it and parts are big puddles of water. Only round the feeder is proper mud but much of its so soft and poached. I keep looking at it and thinking: 'it'll recover in the spring when it dries out'. But what if it doesn't dry out and we get another summer like the last? Im not sure how I'll cope.

Just a general whinge about the weather but feel free to add your own wet weather woes.
 
We should be 3 feet under snow and -234785623487562786 right now.
Yestersay it was plus 14 and raining

Copper and the colts took up water skiing...the mares and babies were windsurfing and the rest of the wusses started building an ark for "just in case"
 
It has been this wet before and recovered:D picture in my sig was taken in 2007 IIRC. That lake is on a well-draining Fenland field:eek:
 
It's just miserable isn't it.

But I am genuinely concerned about this year. My field HAS to dry up otherwise it's just not going to survive :(. Fine if I had stable and didn't mind having them in 18hrs a day but I don't.

Anyone know if there's a general forecast for this spring? Are we due for a repeat of last year?
 
Think positive - I know it's hard when you are dripping wet & getting blown around - I keep telling myself it will be summer soon :)
 
Dee O'Dorant said:
It has been this wet before and recovered:D picture in my sig was taken in 2007 IIRC. That lake is on a well-draining Fenland field:eek:
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Has it really? I don't remember such a prolonged year od wet wet wet. Sure, plenty of periods of flooding but never for month after month after month. My field has looked like your sig all summer and worse than that now.:(
 
It will dry up - in 4 months we'll all be moaning that the ground is too hard to canter on, or they'll be another hay 'shortage' because of the drought !!

If our weather is really changing we'll just adapt, there will be a lot more big open barns built so we can keep our horses in the free herds they are used to but under cover (like cows) and we'll buy in hay from abroad/ or just feed straw and supps like the do in lots of countries too hot to grow decent grass.
 
I'd imagine we would all start building indoor schools, stables, sand turnout pens and hydroponic grass trays. It WILL stop raining; we WILL soon have more grass than we know what to do with (there's another whinge waiting to happen), and I WILL be able to ride across my fields again. I think.
 
I'm on heavy clay and have to sacrifice winter paddocks, they're just mud at the moment but I have invested on turn out areas in each paddock, which is drainage topped by a membrane and woodchip.

It will get better! Over the past few years summer has tended to be in April, so your land will have an opportunity to recover.

Fence off half of your field and it will recover for the summer.
 
We need a drought now......!

I am very lucky to have a well draining hill field for winter use, so am saving the flatter grazing for spring. Therefore my fields still look green and only really muddy in the gateways.

However if this wet is going to be a regular feature in the future, maybe we will have to learn to manage our horses differently, with areas of hard standing to replace grazing in the very wet mnths.

Not only is it frustrating to manage horses in this wet weather, it is also playing havoc with competitions, so imagine jumping/dressage on surfaces may be the way forward. I hunt weekly but even this activity has been affected as no farmer would welcome us on their land atm, and don't blame them!

This winter has been very testing on both human and horse, and just hope spring is kinder to us all, and gives those that need it a chance to recover grazing.
 
I'm studying weather patterns (and flooding as a result... yay engineering) atm, and it will stop and turn around pretty soon. This isn't a big event and it just hasn't had the chance to move on yet.

Apparently. According to my lecture today, that is :D
 
Kallibear said:
Has it really? I don't remember such a prolonged year od wet wet wet. Sure, plenty of periods of flooding but never for month after month after month. My field has looked like your sig all summer and worse than that now.:(
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Our main route out of here is now open having been flooded for three months. On Google Maps it actually shows as flooded, it's an A road. I think we're finding it especially hard (all of us) in comparison to last year when here the main route didn't flood once!
 
Cortez said:
I'd imagine we would all start building indoor schools, stables, sand turnout pens and hydroponic grass trays. It WILL stop raining; we WILL soon have more grass than we know what to do with (there's another whinge waiting to happen), and I WILL be able to ride across my fields again. I think.
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That's true! There were some hydroponic grass trays on the market some years ago weren't there, that had to be withdrawn because they poisoned horses?
 
Our paddocks definitely look worse than any other year. I am also wondering if our first BE at beginning of March will actually be able to run - It's only 5 weeks or so away and I can't see the ground improving in time :(
 
Kallibear - no idea whether practical for you but could you consider a mobile field shelter that acts as stables? When we first moved we had nothing here and I kept them happily in one all winter. 12 buy 24 foot split into two with gates on the front - no need for planning and it was only £3,500 (top spec there are plenty cheaper I'm sure).
We put ours on straw and it worked fine (but took a lot of years to rot down after!), a friend has similar (she's on her second winter) but she has rubber mats inside and out and they seem to stop the mud comming up really well.

Alternatively if you're really desporate is there anywhere sensible you could put them on livery for a month in early spring so the whole place gets a good rest?
 
Kallibear said:
Has it really? I don't remember such a prolonged year od wet wet wet. Sure, plenty of periods of flooding but never for month after month after month. My field has looked like your sig all summer and worse than that now.:(
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I agree it has been wet before,and certainly in winter,but the combination of a very wet and quite cold summer and prolonged spells of rain in winter (with relatively little cold weather even to harden up the ground) is to my knowledge quite unusual and not been seen for quite some time??

I have never known it before anyway,not for such a long period as this,and I have been keeping horses on and off since childhood (and yes that was longer ago than I would like to think:o).

As for original question,I am greatly concerned about it,especially as on a weather programme I saw they said we might be in for a 'series' of wet summers due to the rise in atlantic temps or something or other.

My land is already flood plain,and will literally not survive another wet summer with my two on it.
I am seriously having to consider the prospect of getting rid of my bigger horse,and replacing him with a small companion to try and reduce the stress on the land:(

If we have a hot dry summer,or at least dry then maybe it will recover enough to support them both as they are,but too much wet and it will just remain a muddy bog as it is now.

Is becoming a real worry TBH.
 
Polos Mum said:
Kallibear - no idea whether practical for you but could you consider a mobile field shelter that acts as stables? When we first moved we had nothing here and I kept them happily in one all winter. 12 buy 24 foot split into two with gates on the front - no need for planning and it was only £3,500 (top spec there are plenty cheaper I'm sure).
We put ours on straw and it worked fine (but took a lot of years to rot down after!), a friend has similar (she's on her second winter) but she has rubber mats inside and out and they seem to stop the mud comming up really well.

Alternatively if you're really desporate is there anywhere sensible you could put them on livery for a month in early spring so the whole place gets a good rest?
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Plan is for mobile field shelter eventually but need to save pennies. It's also far too wet to get one in right now and has been all summer :( A tractor or lorry would destroy the ground even more. Can't really afford livery AND field rent (and having for shelter) but am considering it. I've got loads of bales haylege left so once (if!?) it dries up a bit they'll be shut in a small area with a bale whilst the rest recovers.

I had a horse in 2001 as teenager but he was on livery so don't remember it being so wet!
 
This time last year there was a drought - can we remember this? The reservoirs were empty and vegetable farmers didn't plant as they couldn't irrigate their crops. A man from the Environment Agency was on the radio say that to re-fill the reservoirs there would have to be x times the normal rainfall. Well, I don't know what raindance he did, but it worked! It has been raining more or less non stop since May. There was hardly enough grass for first cut silage, then it started to rain and didn't stop until the Olympics, which was just enough to make hay. Apart from an odd dry day, or maybe 2 or 3 in a row, it has virtually rained since. The fields were still too wet in the frost, an established orchard of fruit trees is suffering from rotting roots.

Will it go on? Who knows. If the Atlantic Ocean has warmed up even by 1 degree, that will mean more rain, but all we can do is wait and see.
 
Kallibear said:
A tractor or lorry would destroy the ground even more. !
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I do feel for you, the guy who we bought ours from built it on site, he came with a landrover and trailer so might not be as bad as you think.

I saw someone else post recently about the last 10 months being the most difficult to keep horses healthy in her 40 years of horse ownership - so you're certainly not alone by any means.

I keep 2 on 12 acres and keep then in during the worst of the wet, not sure the land would cope with more this year - we've usually had 5 on here no problem!!
 
Have had our place for six years and this is definitely the worst it's been . There is very little of our fields which isn't under water. Just looks like lakes and swamps rather than nice green fields. I really hope we get a dry spring. Last year march was very good but who knows. Our fields are so wet the ground moves under your feet. Trying to stay positive.
 
I couldn't ride much last year as my fields were so wet. We are having an arena put in but they started this week and have had to stop twice already because the dumper truck was slipping in the wet. I hope we get a dry enough period so they can finish it and then I promise I won't be moaning about the rain, other than when I try and push the wheelbarrow through the mud.
 
Orangehorse said:
This time last year there was a drought - can we remember this? The reservoirs were empty and vegetable farmers didn't plant as they couldn't irrigate their crops.
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not up here there wasn't and for those of you that have had the chance to complain about hard ground? not happened up here for years (2006 was the first year I had my horse-last prolonged spell of hot dry weather we've had, he threw a splint). We didn't get a summer last year apart from that week in march-it scarcely got above 15 degrees and we've had 3 crap harvests in a row.
 
Orangehorse said:
This time last year there was a drought - can we remember this?

Will it go on? Who knows. If the Atlantic Ocean has warmed up even by 1 degree, that will mean more rain, but all we can do is wait and see.
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I *think* it was only certain parts of the UK that were suffering the drought conditions.I know here in Devon there were no hose pipe bans and we actually had quite a lot of rain over winter,although it did dry up for some of feb and march and they were making noises then about potential droughts (few weeks without rain and they panic it seems:rolleyes:).

The wet weather actually started here in april (very bad flooding end april/ beg may that's how i know it started before may),and hasn't stopped since,and if you disregard feb and march it has actually been raining here since october 2011 pretty much:eek:

The rising temp in the atlantic is a worry as that will lead to many more wet summers apparently.
It happened back in the 50's and they had around 10 years of wet summers so it said on the programme i watched,still none of them were as wet as we have had it this year mind.
Doesn't bear thinking about really:(
 
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