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Footing by the gate

I have some stone dust sacrifice areas and my older mare loves to pace to come in. She’s generally content out there but at lunch and dinner, the pacing starts. She is only in this paddock when the pastures are closed for winter.

The footing has crushed stone, a layer of meshy fabric, and then the stone dust footing on top. It does not get muddy at all BUT the pacing makes big divots where she turns. She’s now made a big hole at the ends of her pacing path and has gone through the stone dust, mesh, and is digging up the stones. I can refill daily but it doesn’t matter - since it’s disturbed, it digs up easily the next day.

I’m thinking of putting down some crushed stone to fill the holes and covering with a stall mat or other holey mat so the “pivot” ends aren’t on the footing. Has anyone tried this? Is there a good mat or cover for this? It would need to be quite solid, like a stall mat. Footing alone won’t be enough short of pouring concrete!

Thanks for ideas!

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I had the same issue and mats worked wonderfully.

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Since your mare is doing a hard pivot, the mats are probably going to shift around and require constant adjusting. Look into used conveyor belting-- Repurposed Materials always has some, with a few warehouses around the country so it’s not crazy expensive to have it shipped. One continuous mat won’t shift as easily, and you could cover a longer stretch of that fenceline for way less than stall mats.

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By meshy fabric, you mean a soft mesh?
I’d opt for the stiff grids that you fill with stone dust and compact. Then perhaps a conveyor belt on top.

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Have you purchased from them before? It looks like they have some things that would suit a project of mine. I don’t think I’ve heard of this company before.

It depends on what you want to spend. I think those stiff grids would be really good. Some heavy stall mats also would be good. I’m not convinced conveyor belting wouldn’t move just as much or more than a stall mat though, it’s much thinner and typically not as wide as a 4x8 stall mat. If you had a local quarry that would give you some it would sure be worth a shot, but not sure I’d travel far and spend much for some.

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This looks great but 60 minimum. I don’t think I’d need more than 4, tops. I will look around to see if something like this exists in small quantities!

I have a few of the Lighthoof panels (grids that you plunk down and fill with gravel or stonedust) that I don’t expect to use. I’m in eastern Massachusetts, but if anyone wants them, they’re yours for the cost of shipping. (They are heavy, though, so $$ to ship).

I got them thinking I wouldn’t need heavy equipment because you don’t need to excavate the mud-glop to use these, but, by the time I would have conscripted help with staking them out, and rented the equipment to spread the gravel and compact it, etc., it was just easier to hire someone to come in and excavate and then spread gravel and stonedust, without dealing with the grids. It took the professional guy about 4 hours to get the job done and done well, and would have taken me alot longer doing the grids DIY. But, maybe they’d be just the thing for someone else.

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I would recommend AGAINST using conveyor belting for this purpose. We used a lot of conveyor belting way back, before stall mats became widely available. The conveyor belting can be VERY slippery when wet. If mare is stopping hard, pivoting, the belting could cause her to slip, hyper-extend, doing that on wet or snowy days. Also the pivoting while mat is dry, could start the belting layers seperating. Then you have to cut the rubber flaps off to prevent tangling around her feet.

The belting was “better than nothing,” but has issues different than mats. I have stall mats under my main gates. They see lots of pivoting, excited horses on them when it is time to come in. A double row of mats helps a lot, giving more “face footage” on the dirt to prevent moving as easily. We have one complete row of mats under the hate. 2ft on either side of the 14ft gate, laid end to end. Then the second row inside the paddock alongside the first row. This gives you 6ft of mat for the horses to tromp on, spin around at each end. Probably will cover all your stone to keep it in place.

You can make the mats a longer row if needed.

We find a mat may be moved now and then, but not often. I use 2 pair of channelock adjustable pliers to move it back into place. If you have tractor forks, they are a big help moving mats too.

My main issue is young horses galloping in, then doing sliding stops on the mats!! My mats in front of the fencing are out there 4 deep, but horse stopping hard on mat SOMETIMES makes mats “surfboarf” up onto mats behind!! We have clay dirt and when saturated wet, it can be slippery when they stop hard on the mats. So I then need to pull or lift mats back into their correct location.

I need to video this and make the big bucks from Funniest Home Videos!! Imagine, horses that make money! Ha ha

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I’m actually in western MA! Are the Lighthoof panels a solid material? I may be able to pick up depending on size and if our truck will start and if I can pull it off with the newborn human. I’ll PM you :slight_smile:

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