We are under contract for our new farm. It only has a house and a detached garage currently. No fencing or barn as of yet. The property is 5.8 acres and 280ft x 900ft rectangle. Did you hire someone to lay out your farm or what did you use to do it?
I crowd sourced and then did two temporary paddocks until I figured out the property.
Taken 3 years and I finally know what I want.
Are you planning on having an equestrian architect build the barn? If so, most of them offer site plan resources.
I only replaced my old barn with a new one in the same place, so didn’t do a lot of site planning. I’d recommend (if you have the time) spending at least one year (going through all seasons) before building anything permanent, unless you’re already very familiar with the property.
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I used a university-trained landscape designer who specializes in setting up horse properties. He came up with the plan, arranged for the work, and was worth every cent he made. He continues to advise on pasture management, coordinated the building of my dressage arena and irrigation, placement and installation of frostless hydrants. He even recommended and arranged installation of a backup generator, so in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene we had an operating well and water for the horses and hot showers for us for the seven days our power was down. With his contacts, he is able to get plumbers, electricians, painters, well services, tree services and such set up and done while I’d still be trying to get my phone calls answered. He was on vacation in Europe a while back when my well quit working. I texted and him the next morning he had the well guy at my farm at 8AM. And it was a Sunday morning.
Ask around and hopefully there are people like him in your area.
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Access for vehicles, both to get supplies such as hay in and evacuating horses out, waste disposal, water supply, drainage, wind protection, storage.
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Richard Klimish put out some good books, notably Horsekeeping On A Small Acreage, talking about design layouts for ease of use, step saving. I thought it was great for making you think how everything will work together, BEFORE jumping in to build and invest in the permanent features/structures. It is an older book, maybe you can find a used copy on Ebay or places like that.
One really good thing we did, was building an EXCELLENT driveway, straight back to the barn area, that could hold up to dump trucks and later FIRE TRUCKS. This drive will be heavily used for hauling in hay, base gravel for your barn, paddocks, etc. A clinic on Farm Safety spoke about practical driveways to be able to access the barns, storage buildings with fire equipment. Trucks can be HUGE, both wide, tall and long. Scenic wandering driveways seldom are suited to Fire Trucks that can’t make the curves. Fences along the driveway and gateways need to be wide too, not just 10ft apart. The Fireman (30yrs) speaker said the Truck will demolish narrow gateposts, fences, locked gates as they try to reach the fire. We learned a LOT at that clinic, not all related to farm access!!
Mr. Klimish also wrote a couple books on barns, layouts for how you will use the barn, store things in it, stall arrangement. From my experience I would never have a barn aisle less than 12ft wide. We store NOTHING along the aisle walls. This lets you drive thru, be able to pull Farrier, Vet trucks inside to work from, drive tractor and spreader thru for stall cleaning. We can also pull the hay wagons in to unload straght into storage areas. No carrying bales!! No stalls less than 12ft x 12ft. You can always put a little horse in a big stall, but a big horse (17h) in a little 10x10ft stall is hard on the horse. After 20years with little 14-15h Western horses, I never dreamed we would change to big Sporthorse types! Nothing under 15.2h and only one is that small. Most are 16.2 to 17h plus. Luckily we had built the big stalls when we built the barn! About the only regret is that the barn sidewalls are 12ft high. Wish we had gone 14ft high to allow more hay storage. But we NEVER expected to be keeping 8-9 horses either! 5 maybe… Ha ha
Just reading the Klimish books will give you ideas and viewpoints you never considered. Will be helpful as you finalize your plans. Living a year on the property will let you see what you will be dealing with in water runoff, wind direction, dirt, whether sandy, loam, clay types to make mud. You want big barn doors facing the prevailing wind for summer cooling inside. We had to change from N to S because our prevailing wind is W to E.
We also raised the barn base with fill dirt about 5ft. Bought a truckload everytime we had extra money. We let the dirt settle a year, then graded it to build on, with finished raised height about 4ft. This was recommended by BIL our barn builder. The extra height has prevented barn from ever flooding, all water flows away from it. Cement floors in barn have not cracked over the years either.
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I built my barn on an old foundation after having the original, collapsed barn, demolished. One extra I added was side doors so can pull (or back) up to them to unload hay or bedding. Very convenient to be able to unload without blocking the aisle.
This is definitely what I am looking for. I’ve searched our area and there are several ‘layman’ that advertise they do this by no licensed architects/designers. I wonder if some licensed companies can do ‘remote’ work
If you’ve got the money definitely hire it all out. My husband’s father is an architect and they grew up with horses too so had all that practical knowledge. We built 4 years ago and did spend a small fortune. What are your requirements for your horsekeeping? How many horses are you planning?
My requirements were horses out moving and not stalled, but the ability to be stalled. Having an indoor. Safe but cost effective fencing. Driveways everywhere. Big dry lot - 40x200. Composting manure. Access to everything with a tractor and front end loader. Auto waterers. I have pasture turnouts all around the barn and 14’ gates everywhere. Barn built up above the ground and same for dry lot. Dry lot surface at all gates. Ability to get a years worth of hay stored when cut. I did garage doors everywhere so no heaving in the winter. Love garage doors.
It all worked out very well but do have some regrets. Wish I’d had removable walls so my stalls (5) could be one huge area if that makes sense. Wish I’d put in a track system turnout in addition to my grass turnouts.
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really should not be a problem with today’s technology, I have used Google Drive By to configure bids without ever stepping foot on the actual site.
A satellite view with contour lines would be of use to determine rainwater flow patterns. Also the overhead view would expose adjoining or near to property characteristics
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If you are in or around Philadelphia I’ll give you a name.
If possible I would suggest you live there thru one wet/rain season to be sure how the property responds to a large rainfall.
Sure, we could have identified the swales that run thru our land on a survey, but it would not have given the drainage pattern of the adjoining property that at times makes us have what looks like a river running thru our land in two places.
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I second what @trubandloki said. Live there for a while and walk the property when you have weather, especially a heavy rain. I had one idea for our property but after a lot of rain completely moved where my arena was going to be. To most it seems like an odd place to put it, but it’s a mostly level area that drains really quick. I have so many people amazed at how fast my arena drains and how nice the footing is. And all because I chose a great spot for it after observing my property during a lot of rain. We are still slowly building ours (it’s been 9 years, 5 with horses at home!) and still making adjustments as we go to our original plans!
So be flexible and leave yourself room for flexibility. That has been a huge help for us!
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Some things I learned:
- Find out how water runs over the property. WHile I knew I had a slope< I did NOT know that all the water off my neighbor’s house would flow right between where I placed the barn and my house…
- Be sure you can get big trucks in to where your barn is.
2a: consider truck turning radius - Decide where you will put horse trailer.
- If you double fence your perimeter, be sure the corenrs are eased and possible for whatever mower you will use.
5, Place gates so that you can easily go from one field to another with your mower.
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Is your new farm under an HOA? This can potentially really wreak havoc with your plans.
And it’s time to start thinking about how you will be handling manure and soiled stall bedding. With 5 acres you don’t have a lot of land to spread manure over an unused pasture, and a composting pile or composting bins need to be carefully sited to please both you and your neighbors. If you plan having a service haul it off, how will you store it between pickups?
Another consideration is how you’ll get power and water to the new barn. Do you want hot water at the barn, needing 220V service. And heat and air conditioning for a tack room? And a toilet? That means a new septic tank and field for the barn, or connecting to a municipality sewer system. You don’t want driveways on top of the field.
If you’re interested in hiring out, I’m half way through a site plan/facility design with Quinis, and they are great.
