JennBags
New Member
- Location
- West Sussex
Hello all, I bought just under 5 acres of grazing land last year and moved my 2 horses onto it for the winter thinking everything would be easy and I'd have loads of grass. First time land owner and it's been an eye opener that's for sure! I need some advice on what I can do to improve my land and grazing please. Excuse the novel below but I'm trying to provide as much info as possible.
My land is wet, it's on a slope but has fields higher than it and all the rain slides down and ends up in my field, I wonder if this is partly due to soil compaction.
I had the horses on the whole field for the winter, and yes, they trashed the whole field. I had been hoping that the grass would recover quickly, I had the field harrowed, rolled and fertilized just before we were forecast some rain, but this never appeared. A couple of weeks later, we were promised some more rain, so I harrowed the field again and spread some seed. Again, the rain didn't appear.
I took the horses off it for a couple of weeks, and divided it into 3. One tiny paddock which I'll save for winter, just under 1/2 acre, another 1 acre strip, then a larger paddock of 2.25 acres. (I also have another 0.7acres which is made up of a pond, some trees and a little grazing which is where they went when the rest of the field was being looked after).
The horses went back onto the 1 acre strip and I also put out a couple of round hay bales for them, but within a month they had decimated it. I opened up the strip I was saving for winter as we've got a few months, but that wasn't even a week ago and that's now bare too.
The main field has some grass, but also has bare patches and the grass isn't thick except at the bottom where it was very wet. It has large patches of weeds (nettles mostly). I wanted this paddock to sustain the 2 horses being out 24 hrs over the summer but I am now thinking it's not going to be enough. My neighbours fields are wonderful, lovely green grass on a thick sward, and I'm feeling rather despondent as it's been my dream for years to have my own land that I can manage well and I seem to just be messing it up.
After reading posts on here, my next idea is to get someone with a sward lifter. Does this help, and how long would I need to have the horses off the land afterwards? Anyone know where I can find someone with this equipment here in Sussex?
Or does anyone have any other bright ideas (except get rid of the horses or get sheep!)?
Thanks for reading!
My land is wet, it's on a slope but has fields higher than it and all the rain slides down and ends up in my field, I wonder if this is partly due to soil compaction.
I had the horses on the whole field for the winter, and yes, they trashed the whole field. I had been hoping that the grass would recover quickly, I had the field harrowed, rolled and fertilized just before we were forecast some rain, but this never appeared. A couple of weeks later, we were promised some more rain, so I harrowed the field again and spread some seed. Again, the rain didn't appear.
I took the horses off it for a couple of weeks, and divided it into 3. One tiny paddock which I'll save for winter, just under 1/2 acre, another 1 acre strip, then a larger paddock of 2.25 acres. (I also have another 0.7acres which is made up of a pond, some trees and a little grazing which is where they went when the rest of the field was being looked after).
The horses went back onto the 1 acre strip and I also put out a couple of round hay bales for them, but within a month they had decimated it. I opened up the strip I was saving for winter as we've got a few months, but that wasn't even a week ago and that's now bare too.
The main field has some grass, but also has bare patches and the grass isn't thick except at the bottom where it was very wet. It has large patches of weeds (nettles mostly). I wanted this paddock to sustain the 2 horses being out 24 hrs over the summer but I am now thinking it's not going to be enough. My neighbours fields are wonderful, lovely green grass on a thick sward, and I'm feeling rather despondent as it's been my dream for years to have my own land that I can manage well and I seem to just be messing it up.
After reading posts on here, my next idea is to get someone with a sward lifter. Does this help, and how long would I need to have the horses off the land afterwards? Anyone know where I can find someone with this equipment here in Sussex?
Or does anyone have any other bright ideas (except get rid of the horses or get sheep!)?
Thanks for reading!
