I’m on the hunt for a dusk-to-dawn solar light that ISN’T motion sensor. I have yet to find one, so for the time being I drive my car out to the barn for night check. Does my boyfriend think it’s silly? Sure. Do I care? No.
I used to really hate to go out to the barn after dark because my MIL’s cremated remains were archived out there (between the JD manuals and the grease guns I seem to recall.)
I couldn’t shake the sense that she was a little bit peeved about this. SO finally got around to properly laying her to rest, and it is so much easier to wander around out there without worrying about running into her, and her telling me she has a bone to pick with me…….
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I dont have horses at home but have to say that I’m so glad to see this thread! This is something that I’ve always wondered about as I’m pretty darn spooked in the dark. If my ponies at home dream ever comes true it sounds like some motion-sensor lights will be my first purchase.
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For years I resisted putting up lights between the house and the barn,because we didn’t want light pollution, and wanted to enjoy the dark and the night sky. But now we have the patio lights, 2 solar motion sensors and a dusk to dawn mounted on the barn. I still carrying the mag light but feel a lot more comfortable now.
I love to look out from the house and see that big floodlight lighting up the barn yard.
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If you don’t have WiFi that reaches to the barn, you can get a WiFi hotspot at some place like Best Buy and connect it to a Nest camera. That’s what I did when I had a sick horse I had to keep an eye on. Video feed eats a lot of data but you could just turn it on when you wanted to check on things and then turn it off right after. You can also decrease the quality of the image to take up less data. Even in “low” quality, you can see plenty- there’s night vision so it’s pretty good. It wouldn’t be an enormous monthly charge and might be helpful if the weather is terrible.
So tonight’s check was interesting…
Tonight was the first night of 24/7 turnout; which means I left his stall open to his paddock, and his paddock in turn open to his pasture. I went out around 9:30pm with my trusty headlamp and camping lantern to combat my fears (but the thought did cross my mind, “Now ‘they’ can see me all lit up, but I can’t see them!” Oh well.
I walked up and down the pasture fence calling for my guy. I put a handful of grain in a bucket and shook it. I cracked a carrot in half loudly! Nothing. I started to panick and visions of escaping or collicking horses filled my mind, while at the same time cursing him under
my breath because I HATE being outside in the eery night. I fumbled with the gate latch trying to find him, when I finally hear the slow hoof falls and crunching against pine cones. I have NO idea where he came from, but my only guess was he was asleep and I finally stirred him (he’s been dead asleep in his stall the last two evenings I checked on him).
So here is my new question, based on a previous poster - are night checks necessary for 24/7 turnout…??? I fed him grain around 6 pm and gave him MORE than enough hay to last a couple days (covered and netted), plus his 100 gallon water trough was cleaned earlier and filled.
For those of you who have horses in the pasture or free-roaming like my guy, do you perform night checks? If so, what do you do? Do you hunt them down in the dark like I did, just to ensure they’re alive/uninjured/eating/drinking/happy? I guess by asking this question I inherently feel like a “bad mommy” but I must admit - I have a pretty independent horse who could care less that I stopped by this evening.
I obsessively stare at my 2 horses many times (built farm 4.5 yrs ago), but no, I generally don’t check them again after evening feed/tuck in.
They have 100 gallon troughs, hay or grass, shelter, decent fence which is hot. No one is here while I’m at work (full time trainer lives next door if house is on fire, don’t have a barn, that’s one less worry), so it’s no different when I’m asleep.
Both horses are good drinkers, sensible (well, the 4 y.o. is mostly, lol), with stable bellies, so I don’t have any reason to worry more than, you know, the obvious baseline of owning giant suicidal pets (I have been known to believe said 4 y.o. who is not a graceful sleeper is having a fatal seizure when he’s dreaming, lol).
Exceptions when I make an extra late night walk (it’s only about 20-30 steps):
-major winter storms, rare in NC, but I’ll check blankets, adjust layers, more hay (but trough heaters have been one of my favourite things, inexpensive, but true luxury!)
-someone has bandaging to check
-I want to follow up on something, I.e someone looked a little dull or changed their routine
-air temps changed faster than expected, someone needs clothes or it was still too warm for clothes at dinner so I waited
I can see all pastures from house (when it’s not The Dark Times) & if something crazy was going on, I could hear it. I’m still occasionally paranoid, but I will also say that my horses have never been polite enough to injure themselves when I was looking & ready. While it’s never bad to check, I personally don’t think it’s necessary for mine at this point. Now I did more often the 1st 6 months or so, new fencing, new place, new routines.
TL;DR - Nah, you’re not a bad mommy, if horse is healthy, relaxed, & has forage/water/shelter & a buddy in safe fencing with the gate shut (I learned that helps, lol), he really doesn’t require hoof-holding to make it to morning.
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I carry a Stanley rechargeable spotlight when I go out at night but I never turn it on unless something really needs to be investigated. I feel much safer in the dark honestly. The only animal I’m seriously concerned about is the two legged kind and they won’t be able to see me coming any better than I can see them unless I light myself up. I think I would have pretty good advantage in the dark since I know where every rock, bump and stump is located. If you are really worried about coming across man or beast on nightchecks maybe taking a canister of bear spray would ease your mind. Be the predator. 
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Other than extra lighting at night, you might want to consider carrying a bottle of pepper spray with you (check local laws. Carrying pepper spray is not legal in all areas). You could also carry a keychain alarm. Maybe something like this: https://www.amazon.com/Personal-Emer…/dp/B076FVX6S1 Of course, that’s more effective if you have neighbors relatively nearby. But given it emits a 140db alarm, it’s easily heard by anyone reasonably close and is likely to scare off any human attackers.
You probably won’t ever have to use either one, but both are pretty cheap ways to buy some peace of mind if you don’t like to be out alone after dark.
Well, here, night checks are pretty much unavoidable in the winter because there’s snow on the ground and it’s dark by 5:00. I can’t free feed hay because my horses would weigh as much as elephants if I did, so I end up feeding them after dark in the evenings.
I always feed them in the corral, so 99% of the time they all come up there from wherever they happen to be because they know it’s food time. But it one of them doesn’t come, you can bet I walk the entire pasture with a flashlight until I find them.
So funny - the above would have me in tears yelling at spouse (whose idea it would have been) about why we can’t just enjoy nature. (Not criticizing anyone at all – just acknowledging how different folks can be!) But, the above sounds like a fair amount of work. There is a part of me that is saying, “Geez! Go get hypnotized by a qualified professional to be comfortable in the dark and be done with it!”
On the other hand, installing lots of lights probably means trips to Home Depot, and there are probably any other number of things needed/wanted from Home Depot, and I love going to Home Depot, so…
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I was getting alarmed and a little scared reading that! If you draw it out a little, it would make a good campfire story.
"…and eerily, the lights came on. Something was there, in the dark. I felt a tingle on the back of my neck and into my scalp as my hair stood up. I started to back away and SUDDENLY A MAN APPEARED! Or was it a man? His stride faltered in a zombie-like stumble. His face was hidden in shadow and as he advanced toward me, I froze in terror! And then … and then … and THEN … a deep rumble emanated from him… (pause), (said in a drawn out, quavery way) he spoke!
"‘What are we doing for dinner?’
“It was my husband.”
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Bwhahahahaha!
For my 24/7 guys I do night checks in the spring and fall when it’s dark. In the summer it’s light so I can see them, once the snow falls I can see them unless it’s a blizzard.
My checks usually don’t involve much other than, yep still alive, and yep there’s water and it isn’t frozen.
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Please don’t laugh at me, those of you who have the actual real task of building and paying for a barn, but here it is:
If I had my own barn, I would fill it with warm golden lights. I might include some strings of Tivoli lighting or warm-colored LED strands (set where rats and mice cannot reach them), and maybe have a lighted wreath which I could change with the season. From the outside, the barn would look as inviting as a Currier & Ives print, with several down-lights washing the sides of the barn and illuminating it in a pleasing way. On the inside, all of the lights would be very warm and welcoming like Christmas Eve when the tree is lighted and the house is quiet, but even better because there would be the sounds of horses munching their hay. What is it about that sound that we all love? Anyway, I would have a row of simple barn-style hanging lanterns and regularly-spaced wall washers on the columns down the aisle. In one grooming stall I would have very bright lighting on a separate switch spaced at different heights and angles for nighttime treatments and/or vet or farrier appointments which occur after sunset.
The interior lights would go on with a switch. The exterior lights would be set to stay on for only a few hours after sunset but could be switched on as well, with three-way switches so that one is in the house and the other is in the barn. I wouldn’t leave any lights on overnight because I don’t want to attract bugs and spiders, I worry about fire, and I like seeing the stars and moonlight. Landscape lighting would be designed into the system and would also stay on for only a couple of hours after dark. If appropriate, I would have landscape path lighting, especially after reading Bluey’s reasoning about snakes.
So back to the OP’s problem: I agree with others who have recommended LOTS of lighting, but with the added point of making it a warm and appealing golden colored lighting. If there is a specimen tree, a shed, or an artistic feature of some kind between the house and the barn (like a fountain, sculpture, interesting artifact like an old wagon or something), install an uplight to brighten the trip to the barn and make a pretty statement. Those low-voltage landscape lights are really inexpensive to run and easy to install.
…and just to add to the trauma - I suppose you have drapery that is closed very tightly at night…just in case the boogey man is peeping in???
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I do not do night checks after feeding dinner. My horses are out 24/7 and at the moment have limited access to pasture because it’s so wet, but it’s likely if I went down at 9pm the would be out in the 1.5-2 acre sacrifice pasture and wondering WTF I am doing down there. In the summer the big horses are on night turnout, and could be a couple of acres away from the barn. I might not find them by looking, and they may have no interest in coming back to the barn in case I wanted to stall them.
I used to check them more frequently until I nearly got trampled trying to bring them in out of the rain in the dark; I got flung into the mud but didn’t get hurt. Ex-DH was sleeping and it occurred to me that I would not have been found until the next day.
So, nope. I don’t do (late) night checks. If they were stalled I might…but I’d probably consider cameras.
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Regarding lights, you don’t have to light the place up like the Vegas Strip or Times Square, just enough to allow safe navigation and view the immediate area of the walkway and barn. Not everything that’s worth doing is worth over-doing!
G.
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