Horsey horsey...
Discussion
CantDecide - That looks fantastic.
Can I ask a few questions:
- Does your manege have a watering system? If so, what is the set up please?
- Do you have hot water on site at all? (I'm thinking of shower facilities) and wondered if solar heated this?
- What base did you put under the manege? Our previous owners basically put a layer of sharp sand and then 6 inches of surface and no membrane so wondered what yours was
- What machinery are you using? Front loader tractor with PTO? ATV or UTV? and what attachments do you have? (We have a topper, bail spike and various other things like a ftowed flail and a sprayer)
Looks great!!
Can I ask a few questions:
- Does your manege have a watering system? If so, what is the set up please?
- Do you have hot water on site at all? (I'm thinking of shower facilities) and wondered if solar heated this?
- What base did you put under the manege? Our previous owners basically put a layer of sharp sand and then 6 inches of surface and no membrane so wondered what yours was
- What machinery are you using? Front loader tractor with PTO? ATV or UTV? and what attachments do you have? (We have a topper, bail spike and various other things like a ftowed flail and a sprayer)
Looks great!!
The jiffle king said:
CantDecide - That looks fantastic.
Can I ask a few questions:
- Does your manege have a watering system? If so, what is the set up please?
- Do you have hot water on site at all? (I'm thinking of shower facilities) and wondered if solar heated this?
- What base did you put under the manege? Our previous owners basically put a layer of sharp sand and then 6 inches of surface and no membrane so wondered what yours was
- What machinery are you using? Front loader tractor with PTO? ATV or UTV? and what attachments do you have? (We have a topper, bail spike and various other things like a ftowed flail and a sprayer)
Looks great!!
Eeek! As you're asking the question, you probably know that that's maybe not ideal.Can I ask a few questions:
- Does your manege have a watering system? If so, what is the set up please?
- Do you have hot water on site at all? (I'm thinking of shower facilities) and wondered if solar heated this?
- What base did you put under the manege? Our previous owners basically put a layer of sharp sand and then 6 inches of surface and no membrane so wondered what yours was
- What machinery are you using? Front loader tractor with PTO? ATV or UTV? and what attachments do you have? (We have a topper, bail spike and various other things like a ftowed flail and a sprayer)
Looks great!!
In basic terms, a typical one these days will normally be:
Surface
Non-woven membrane
Aggregate
Woven membrane
Drainage
Sometimes people will put the lower membrane under the drainage with the pipes inside the membrane but that brings challenges when it comes to laying the membrane.
There's a good guide https://www.mainlandaggregates.co.uk/riding-arena-... . They suggest quite a pragmatic approach (have some but not too deep) to drainage but sacrifice performance a bit by not specifying much fall on the drains and they also specify a lighter (but much cheaper) non-woven than everyone else I spoke to recommended.
Built a full size Olympic (60x20) as a summer project, so if you've got any questions about any construction specifics then happy to help.
ETA: I think CantDecide went for soaker hose irrigation, ours is getting sprinklers very soon. Was discussed a couple of pages earlier in the thread.
Will confess to being a bit envious of him having freedom to start from scratch instead of working around existing buildings!
Edited by LooneyTunes on Wednesday 9th November 17:05
Thanks! Will try to answer your questions.
- we have a leaky pipe water system (I’ll attach a photo. Haven’t used it yet if course since it wasn’t complete until after all the lovely weather. It does mean the sand gets watered deep and capillary action is supposed to ensure the moisture spreads, it’s supposed to avoid the high evaporation when you water from the top but time will tell.
- we don’t have hot water, solar charges the batteries with inverter giving us mains to power lighting, sockets (kettle/microwave etc). We might get a hippo shower for the horses…
- we have drainage installed which feeds into the pond, on top of the drainage and base is a heat sealed membrane, then leaky pipe system and finally the surface (high quality silicon sand/fibre mix), we used combi ride.
- so far we only have an ATV and Equestrian Surfaces arena grader. Goodness knows what else we will need next year once the grass starts taking off (sprayer, topper, roller…).
Drainage going in
Leaky pipe
Horses moving in today!
- we have a leaky pipe water system (I’ll attach a photo. Haven’t used it yet if course since it wasn’t complete until after all the lovely weather. It does mean the sand gets watered deep and capillary action is supposed to ensure the moisture spreads, it’s supposed to avoid the high evaporation when you water from the top but time will tell.
- we don’t have hot water, solar charges the batteries with inverter giving us mains to power lighting, sockets (kettle/microwave etc). We might get a hippo shower for the horses…
- we have drainage installed which feeds into the pond, on top of the drainage and base is a heat sealed membrane, then leaky pipe system and finally the surface (high quality silicon sand/fibre mix), we used combi ride.
- so far we only have an ATV and Equestrian Surfaces arena grader. Goodness knows what else we will need next year once the grass starts taking off (sprayer, topper, roller…).
Drainage going in
Leaky pipe
Horses moving in today!
The jiffle king said:
CantDecide - That looks fantastic.
Can I ask a few questions:
- Does your manege have a watering system? If so, what is the set up please?
- Do you have hot water on site at all? (I'm thinking of shower facilities) and wondered if solar heated this?
- What base did you put under the manege? Our previous owners basically put a layer of sharp sand and then 6 inches of surface and no membrane so wondered what yours was
- What machinery are you using? Front loader tractor with PTO? ATV or UTV? and what attachments do you have? (We have a topper, bail spike and various other things like a ftowed flail and a sprayer)
Looks great!!
Can I ask a few questions:
- Does your manege have a watering system? If so, what is the set up please?
- Do you have hot water on site at all? (I'm thinking of shower facilities) and wondered if solar heated this?
- What base did you put under the manege? Our previous owners basically put a layer of sharp sand and then 6 inches of surface and no membrane so wondered what yours was
- What machinery are you using? Front loader tractor with PTO? ATV or UTV? and what attachments do you have? (We have a topper, bail spike and various other things like a ftowed flail and a sprayer)
Looks great!!
Edited by CantDecide on Thursday 10th November 06:32
CantDecide said:
Equestrian Surfaces arena grader.
We have one of those for the sand surface. MrsLT ordered it and I winced a bit at the price, but it’s a nicely made bit of kit, and works well. Chain harrow used on the old rubber surface.
CantDecide said:
Horses moving in today!
Congratulations! Be ready for a trip to buy new 
ETA: in terms of other kit, I’d suggest finding a good contractor to do most of it. We have a 50hp tractor at home, which is the right size for small yard work, along with flail to keep grass under control under smaller areas. For large areas/more grass work you may need to go larger or take all day doing it and we found that the cost of bigger machines just didn’t stack up vs getting someone in to do it. If you don’t need to do any grass work, or can keep it to stuff you can tow behind the ATV, a small telehandler with bale spike, forks, and large bucket can be more useful than the tractor everyone assumes is going to the the right choice.
Edited by LooneyTunes on Thursday 10th November 07:35
The jiffle king said:
Its colder and the water in the fields is freezing. We've tried to put plastic balls in the water to stop it from freezing but no joy
Anyone got any ideas for preventing freezing (We do break the ice and remove every day
Water even froze in the stables last night as we were -9C
Assuming they’re the usual metal field troughs then I don’t think you have much of a chance at the moment - think you’d have to lag the entire setup. Cardboard sheets on the top (not in the water as one lady thought lol) weighed down with a stone seemed to stop them freezing longer than the ball trick, but it’s now been too cold for too long and everything is rock hard. Ours are stuck inside for the rest of this week though luckily none seem to care Anyone got any ideas for preventing freezing (We do break the ice and remove every day
Water even froze in the stables last night as we were -9C
Same here a good 2in solid ice in metal drinking troughs, frozen taps (even with good insulation) and frozen drinkers in the stables. Thankfully most days we have had one tap in the kitchen that still functioned so we could fill buckets. Thankfully looks like this cold spell is coming to an end over the weekend, so back to the much :-(
We’ve yet to find any solution to troughs/drinkers freezing when there’s a prolonged cold spell, burying pipework deep helps with that freezing but there’s not much you can do with the bit above ground.
What we are doing though is making sure that we have at least a couple of taps that we can be confident won’t freeze so that we can get a hosepipe to most parts of the yard. Fortunate that at home we have a heated tack room, so there’s a tap there we can use. We have some that live elsewhere and what we’re about to do there is set it up using large diameter pipe work (32mm), lagging, and adding trace heating (basically a heater wire that you run along the pipe to keep the chill off). The trace heating will only kick in when very cold but serves to keep the pipe a little warmer than it would normally be. Runs at about 10-30 watts/metre so going to be keeping it as short as possible but the running costs shouldn’t be too bad compared to the hassle of having no water there.
Probably teaching people to sick eggs, but one thing to watch is that some fittings can be pushed apart by ice, ballcocks can be held down by ice in troughs, and bursts don’t always become apparent until pipes thaw. We’re forecast to thaw overnight Saturday, so all the stoptaps are tuned off so that we can check all is well/things can be de-iced and avoid any nasty surprises.
What we are doing though is making sure that we have at least a couple of taps that we can be confident won’t freeze so that we can get a hosepipe to most parts of the yard. Fortunate that at home we have a heated tack room, so there’s a tap there we can use. We have some that live elsewhere and what we’re about to do there is set it up using large diameter pipe work (32mm), lagging, and adding trace heating (basically a heater wire that you run along the pipe to keep the chill off). The trace heating will only kick in when very cold but serves to keep the pipe a little warmer than it would normally be. Runs at about 10-30 watts/metre so going to be keeping it as short as possible but the running costs shouldn’t be too bad compared to the hassle of having no water there.
Probably teaching people to sick eggs, but one thing to watch is that some fittings can be pushed apart by ice, ballcocks can be held down by ice in troughs, and bursts don’t always become apparent until pipes thaw. We’re forecast to thaw overnight Saturday, so all the stoptaps are tuned off so that we can check all is well/things can be de-iced and avoid any nasty surprises.
A belated happy New Year to all you horsey people. How’s everyone doing with all the recent wet weather?
Our dessert pond is now at/over max capacity such that the car park hasn’t got anywhere to drain to. Might need to rethink that one slightly ;-)
From this:
To this:
Thankfully our hard standing winter turnouts have been working well and man we can avoid the poor things standing knee need in mud and water.
Not looking forward to the mini freeze coming next week. Hope you are all fairing well.
Our dessert pond is now at/over max capacity such that the car park hasn’t got anywhere to drain to. Might need to rethink that one slightly ;-)
From this:
To this:
Thankfully our hard standing winter turnouts have been working well and man we can avoid the poor things standing knee need in mud and water.
Not looking forward to the mini freeze coming next week. Hope you are all fairing well.
The cold, wet, weather isn’t the most fun but did usefully prove that the drains under the arena we built actually work. Likewise some newly added drains on the yard are keeping that much dryer.
We did however end up seing some damage to pipe work due to the low temperatures, so am taking a few steps to try to reduce the impact in the future.
The pump room for our irrigation/water supply system is insulated with 75mm PIR on five sides but the temps were so low for so long that a filter bowl froze and exploded. In an effort to avoid that happening again it’s is getting a small (120W) thermostatically controlled tube heater to try to keep that above freezing. Not a lot of heat output but hopefully enough in a small, sealed, insulated room to make a difference (will put a greenhouse thermometer in to see).
If it seems to work, will be doing similar in the feed room to try to stave of freezing there too, and a small length of trace heating to make sure that we have at least one convenient tap kept flowing.
We did however end up seing some damage to pipe work due to the low temperatures, so am taking a few steps to try to reduce the impact in the future.
The pump room for our irrigation/water supply system is insulated with 75mm PIR on five sides but the temps were so low for so long that a filter bowl froze and exploded. In an effort to avoid that happening again it’s is getting a small (120W) thermostatically controlled tube heater to try to keep that above freezing. Not a lot of heat output but hopefully enough in a small, sealed, insulated room to make a difference (will put a greenhouse thermometer in to see).
If it seems to work, will be doing similar in the feed room to try to stave of freezing there too, and a small length of trace heating to make sure that we have at least one convenient tap kept flowing.
Horsey Horsey, eats grassy grassy....
is there a thread on PH about paddock car and brains to pick on the nuances of small paddock care ?
We have a south facing, reasonably drained 0.9Ac paddock we put 'him' in from about mid April until October at home.
So no field rotation - just off season.
No 'plant' as such, but a drop spreader, and a local chap with a little MF with a harrow or roller.
Not badly poached. Noticed some moss in it recently.
Would like to erase the moss, place some more seed in, and suregro for a long term release.
Comments on what / when and how to ensure this strategy works ?
is there a thread on PH about paddock car and brains to pick on the nuances of small paddock care ?
We have a south facing, reasonably drained 0.9Ac paddock we put 'him' in from about mid April until October at home.
So no field rotation - just off season.
No 'plant' as such, but a drop spreader, and a local chap with a little MF with a harrow or roller.
Not badly poached. Noticed some moss in it recently.
Would like to erase the moss, place some more seed in, and suregro for a long term release.
Comments on what / when and how to ensure this strategy works ?
We have moved the nags AGAIN to another yard. this has to be their last.
They have settled in well and the dotta is happy so there's that. i am absolutely skint now though lol.
Next thing on the list is to either buy a 7.5t box or invest in a trailer (but also need a car to tow it). Competition season is approaching fast.
They have settled in well and the dotta is happy so there's that. i am absolutely skint now though lol.
Next thing on the list is to either buy a 7.5t box or invest in a trailer (but also need a car to tow it). Competition season is approaching fast.
PushedDover said:
Horsey Horsey, eats grassy grassy....
is there a thread on PH about paddock car and brains to pick on the nuances of small paddock care ?
We have a south facing, reasonably drained 0.9Ac paddock we put 'him' in from about mid April until October at home.
So no field rotation - just off season.
No 'plant' as such, but a drop spreader, and a local chap with a little MF with a harrow or roller.
Not badly poached. Noticed some moss in it recently.
Would like to erase the moss, place some more seed in, and suregro for a long term release.
Comments on what / when and how to ensure this strategy works ?
I'm not expert on this but a local farmer or agri contractor could help. There are multiple options but without seeing the land and knowing the area, it's difficult to give a definitive answeris there a thread on PH about paddock car and brains to pick on the nuances of small paddock care ?
We have a south facing, reasonably drained 0.9Ac paddock we put 'him' in from about mid April until October at home.
So no field rotation - just off season.
No 'plant' as such, but a drop spreader, and a local chap with a little MF with a harrow or roller.
Not badly poached. Noticed some moss in it recently.
Would like to erase the moss, place some more seed in, and suregro for a long term release.
Comments on what / when and how to ensure this strategy works ?
Options include:
- Kill the lot and re-seed it end of October/early november. Its not a big space but we did similar a couple of years ago. I killed the field off and then it was about 2k in total (Including VAT) to sort it out including levelling, reseeding etc
- put a moss killer on and grab a few mates to remove the debris and re-seed
- Over-seed it and hope (But if the moss is thick then no chance
- Kill the areas and re-seed manually
Tricky to know what to re-seed with. I think this is the bit I would phone a seed supplier on. Rye grass grows quickly but has high sugar content and can cause Laminitus in some horses. A meadow grass is a good option but roots are shallower and slower growing. You know your horse and spring grass can be very rich.
I'm far from an expert but have just seeded a 5 acre field (which was a different project and also did our 1 acre field as described above
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