Dashboard
Video Library
Q&A
Forum
Instructors
Testimonials
Signup/Login

Forum

Monty Roberts Equus Online University
Horse Training Video Instruction Program

Learn all about Equus • Dually Halter • Shy Boy Mustang • Jumping Horses
• Story of a Horse Whisperer • Riding Horsemanship • Dressage Horses • Willing Partners
• Horse Training • Round Pen Lessons • Performance Horses • Join-Up

← back

Horse Care and Comfort

Grazing and exercise

By:
beryl
Date:
Hello! 100 lessons completed 150 lessons completed 200 lessons completed 250 lessons completed 300 lessons completed

Both of my mares are laminitics, but with careful management, they have now been laminitis free for almost 4 years; each summer i've been able to extend their daytime turnout from 35 minutes to so far this spring / summer they are out around
5 - 6 hours, so far so good.
I've done the grazing slightly different this year, they've got a strip down the side of the field & i've run electric fence along a strip under the woods that has loads of nettles etc which i don't generally use in the summer (the hay is growing in the middle bit.
By cutting the nettles, the sting goes out of them so they can eat them & they are very good antiinflamatories.
I keep a check on their weight using a tape measure & i was pleasantly surprised today when Ebony had lost 1 cm round her girth & so had Libby!!!!!
The extra exercise they are getting by trotting / cantering up & down the hill is obviously doing them a lot of good!
This track system of grazing is talked about a lot in the barefoot community, so i just wanted to pass my observations on in case it can help someone else.

vicci - UK (North Wales)
Hello! 100 lessons completed 150 lessons completed 200 lessons completed 250 lessons completed 300 lessons completed 350 lessons completed

This is really helpful Beryl, thank you. After many years of searching and not being able to afford to buy land I have finally acquired some land (5.5 acres) and stables to rent - its mine from 1st June; I can't tell you how pleased I am! Its good land, and there is a river at the bottom (2 ducks on their way too!) so me and my 3 boys (horses not kids lol) can be together in the same place at last. So your advice is very timely so any tips/hints on grazing and field management I shall welcome wholeheartedly, thanks all in anticipation!

Tiggy, Tears
Hello! 100 lessons completed 150 lessons completed 200 lessons completed 250 lessons completed 300 lessons completed 350 lessons completed 400 lessons completed

Vicci depends on how much advice you want on management? My dearly beloved is from a Dairy background so he's good at that! We rent about 4 1/4 acres with my 3 equines & 2 cows, we manage to cut about 2 acres of hay a year. Which doesn't give us enough hay but cuts down on the costs, and guarantees the quality!!

vicci - UK (North Wales)
Hello! 100 lessons completed 150 lessons completed 200 lessons completed 250 lessons completed 300 lessons completed 350 lessons completed

I'm open to all advice about field management Tiggy but I realise I need to be specific about what I've got and what I want to know! So as soon as I've 'moved' in I'll start a thread with specific questions. Many thanks.

Tiggy, Tears
Hello! 100 lessons completed 150 lessons completed 200 lessons completed 250 lessons completed 300 lessons completed 350 lessons completed 400 lessons completed

No worries Vicci.

beryl
Hello! 100 lessons completed 150 lessons completed 200 lessons completed 250 lessons completed 300 lessons completed

wow, lucky you vicci, I wish you luck with it.
I so wish my field was mine, as I'd be free to manage it as i want to! I rent mine too, approx 6 acres.
The track system re barefoot actually means you have different surfaces down in different areas so their feet get used to the different surfaces & they have to travel further to graze, go get water etc, but for my purpose, it's giving my girls extra room to move about & so exercise without being on too much grazing; under the woods is just wasted at the moment so i might as well make some use of it, they're loving it. I've spent 4 hours cutting back overhanging sycamore branches & cutting some more nettles etc - my back's going to complain a lot later!!!
At first they were down there with me, then went back up the top, then an hour or so later, I saw Libby galloping down the hill & whooshed up to see me, Ebby followed at a sedate walk!
I used to try to strip graze it but then they got laminitis so no good; the grazing is much better NOT being strip grazed as it opens it up to even more weeds, my advice to start with would be to either put them out for a set amount of time on the whole lot, or fence reasonable sized paddocks & rotate round them so some is always resting.
Also Electric fencing is brilliant.
My biggest problem is the whole field is now covered in yellow rattle & I'm not allowed to spray it, so last year, i only got 166 bales of hay off around 5 acres!!! That was down from the previous year, when it rained all summer & i got almost 400 bales!!!
If it had been dealt with when there were only one or two small patches, that would have been it, but making hay is the best way to spread it all over the place.

Tiggy, Tears
Hello! 100 lessons completed 150 lessons completed 200 lessons completed 250 lessons completed 300 lessons completed 350 lessons completed 400 lessons completed

Why aren't you allowed to spray?? Surely the owner doesn't want the field covered in weeds, unless it's Organic!!! Guess I'm lucky I rent from Tregothnan Estate so they're really good I basically treat the land as my own!

Tiggy, Tears
Hello! 100 lessons completed 150 lessons completed 200 lessons completed 250 lessons completed 300 lessons completed 350 lessons completed 400 lessons completed

Vicci, had a word with the dearly beloved, he recommends when you "move in " to get some soil samples done just to see if the land is deficient in anything. Local Agri merchant should be able to help with this.

vicci - UK (North Wales)
Hello! 100 lessons completed 150 lessons completed 200 lessons completed 250 lessons completed 300 lessons completed 350 lessons completed

Brilliant, please thank your beloved for me :-)

beryl
Hello! 100 lessons completed 150 lessons completed 200 lessons completed 250 lessons completed 300 lessons completed

Tiggy - Oh yes she doesssss - the more weeds the better under the guise of organic, meaning do nothing & gloat when i don't get enough hay!!
You've no idea!!!
no spray, no fertilize - however, with laminitics, you don't want a load of fertilizer anyway, but it is needed to put something back in, you can't keep taking out of the soil all the time, but it falls on deaf ears as "she MUST BE OBEYED!!!"

Tiggy, Tears
Hello! 100 lessons completed 150 lessons completed 200 lessons completed 250 lessons completed 300 lessons completed 350 lessons completed 400 lessons completed

Poor you! In 3 years ull have no grass left according to dearly beloved! Wait till she goes on holiday and spray it is his suggestion!!! Stupid cow!

MaggieF, Melbourne - Australia
Hello! 100 lessons completed 150 lessons completed 200 lessons completed 250 lessons completed

Vicci - that is so exciting for you! Hard work to look after but very rewarding and fantastic to be able to look out and see your horses. If you can it helps if you can divide it up. We have 5 acres here and over the years I have divided the largest paddock into 3. 2 smaller paddocks then one larger. I usually shut my horses up in one of the smaller paddocks at night where I have built shelter sheds for them. Watch those ducks - I had 2 beautiful ducks arrive on our dam 3 years ago. After checking all the neighbours and putting signs up with no response I started shutting them in at night so the foxes wouldn't get them. Next thing Mum duck sat on 15 eggs and out popped 15 ducklings. Lost 5 one night when they were very young but still have the remaining 10 and Mum and Dad. They are very friendly and great pets but annoying at times as they need to be shut up by sunset or they are too scared to come off the dam. Drove straight from my farmlet home to-day - 3.5 hours - just so I could get them to bed - just made it!

Mel - Ramsgate UK
Hello! 100 lessons completed 150 lessons completed 200 lessons completed 250 lessons completed 300 lessons completed 350 lessons completed 400 lessons completed

Hi guys
Vicci great with the land, I'll be glad when I can manage to do that also.
The 3 acres we rent in the middle of other horses is quite poor grazing, I've split the 3 acres onto 4 sections and rotate them at 3 week intervals so that each section should get a rest. To make them walk further the water is alway put at the far end away from the grazing. I also take them out to graze in the field near us for a change of scenery. Ragwort is a serious issue and we're not allowed to spray either, too many horses that could be affected, so I do about 2- 3 hours of ragwort digging a week. Last year I spent over 50 hours of ragwort digging and struggled to keep on top of it, so far this year it's not as bad so the digging it up is working.
Fertilising the land, not sure if you guys have tried this before, but if you compost the manure correctly it can be used back onto the land without increasing the worm load. The composter must be at least 1 metre high in order to generate enough heat to kill any eggs in the manure. We use 4 pallets to make a high enough composter and they are situated around the fields so the it makes poo picking much easier then after they've had several weeks heat they're ready to go back onto the land. We then take the top layer of compost and put it to the bottom of the next composter so that it can break down more with fresh manure going ontop. The cooked compost from the middle downwards goes back onto the field when that section has been shut up from the horses. Several benefits of this, no cost for manure being taken away, it reduces the flies as you are only using a small area and stacking the manure and fertilising the land. We also use the composters for wind breakers too.
Love the story of the ducks Maggie :-)

Tiggy, Tears
Hello! 100 lessons completed 150 lessons completed 200 lessons completed 250 lessons completed 300 lessons completed 350 lessons completed 400 lessons completed

Mel you can come nd sort my muck heap out, it's only 4' at its lowest point, covers an area 15' squareish!! When we clean out the cattle shed it goes on the side then gets spread over the winter weather permitting! Really could do with getting rid of most of it, take the top off its really good soil it's been there that long! The otherhalf takes 2/3 loader loads down to the garden every year but it hardly makes a dent! Need another 20acres!

Mel - Ramsgate UK
Hello! 100 lessons completed 150 lessons completed 200 lessons completed 250 lessons completed 300 lessons completed 350 lessons completed 400 lessons completed

Lol, that's a lot of 'compost' forgot where you live. I'm always full of ideas for creating ways of managing things, sure I could come up with something for you ;-) x

beryl
Hello! 100 lessons completed 150 lessons completed 200 lessons completed 250 lessons completed 300 lessons completed

Tiggy, your other half is dead right, got loads of yellow rattle, buttercups, red clovers going mad this year, common plantain, which is useful as it's antiinflamatory but grass growing?????
I wanted to spray on the quiet this year but literally no money, so I'll have to try really hard to get some together for next year.
She was "In control" of hay making the past couple of years & wouldn't get it cut till the last minute, 1st Sept & last year a couple of days earlier when i insisted she ask him to do it before it was all lost! Nothing more entertaining than praying Russian Roulette with other peoples lives!!
This year, i've asked someone else to do it, even if i get sod all, if it's cut earlier, the grass will have a chance to re grow before the winter & i can feed less hay then when they can eat a bit more of it.

Tiggy, Tears
Hello! 100 lessons completed 150 lessons completed 200 lessons completed 250 lessons completed 300 lessons completed 350 lessons completed 400 lessons completed

Ha, yeah he reckons about 80 tonnes piled up! He says he will spread it after we do the hay if there's a wet spell coming up! I was very nice to him last year and bought him an 8' spreader so he didn't have hand load the old land driven version that he acquired and restored!

beryl
Hello! 100 lessons completed 150 lessons completed 200 lessons completed 250 lessons completed 300 lessons completed

can he come & do mine??? HaHaHa

Tiggy, Tears
Hello! 100 lessons completed 150 lessons completed 200 lessons completed 250 lessons completed 300 lessons completed 350 lessons completed 400 lessons completed

If we were closer he probably would. Hes not pretty my dearly beloved but there's not much he can't do and we rarely have a cross word!

beryl
Hello! 100 lessons completed 150 lessons completed 200 lessons completed 250 lessons completed 300 lessons completed

You're very lucky to have found such a gem!

Tiggy, Tears
Hello! 100 lessons completed 150 lessons completed 200 lessons completed 250 lessons completed 300 lessons completed 350 lessons completed 400 lessons completed

I know, hes a decent cook too! Could do with cloning him for some friends!

beryl
Hello! 100 lessons completed 150 lessons completed 200 lessons completed 250 lessons completed 300 lessons completed

clone one for me??????

Tiggy, Tears
Hello! 100 lessons completed 150 lessons completed 200 lessons completed 250 lessons completed 300 lessons completed 350 lessons completed 400 lessons completed

Oh I could so make a fortune cloning him then, if only!!

Sign Up Now!

Monty and You...

Shop at Monty's Store

Monty Roberts Facebook

Pat Roberts Sculpture