Hi there…new to this platform and need help or ideas. I have a mare and pony on 1acre. I know that’s not enough land but it’s what I have. Since it’s only an acre and the way it’s laid out, I don’t have the option of sectioning off any of it to manage it properly. It’s become a weed field and I have no idea how to fix it because I’ve read I need to keep them off of it for a few weeks if I apply anything. That just won’t work unless I confine them to a very small paddock with no grass next to the run in. On one hand it will help control their weight but I know the mare will flip out. They are both turned out 24/7 and keep it grazed down and I supplement with hay. Pony is in a muzzle in the spring/summer. I know they’ll eat weeds but it doesn’t seem like that should be their main source of forage. Any help would be appreciated. Thank you.
I would put them in the small paddock with hay most of the time and give them a few hours in the big pasture for play time.
You need to do a soil sample which is free or maybe low cost at your local ag office. They can advise on how to grow grass again.
For the weeds, mow them short and don’t let them get tall enough to seed.
Then do whatever your local ag office tells you.
You really need to use the dry lot and preserve the big pasture.
I agree with everything @luvmyhackney said. If you want to grow grass you’re going to have to find a way to keep your horses off the pasture for a while. I have two horses that are confined to a 1 1/2 acre field for about 2 months in the spring (May-June). They are stalled at night and spend about 4 hours in a dry corral during the day, so they only get about 9-10 hours grazing with muzzles. Even with all this restriction the small field is pretty well eaten down after two months, and I have to keep them off it for several weeks to allow it to recover.
Could you partition your field with portable electric tape? The horses could graze a small section for a few days, and that would allow the other portion of the field to rest. Then you could move the tape to partition off another section to graze and let the first section rest. With just one horse and one pony you should be able to subdivide an acre into 3-4 sections and rotate through.
In general, I don’t like to use chemicals on fields, but I think sometimes it’s necessary to get the weeds under control. It’s not true that you always have to keep animals off for several weeks after applying chemicals. Grazon, for example, is supposed to be safe for grazing after application.You’re right that weeds shouldn’t be the main forage. In fact, some weeds are very high in non-structural carbohydrates and could trigger a laminitis attack.
Well, I agree that you’re unlikely to be able to keep grass on one acre with two horses (unless you live somewhere with just the right soil, rain, and sun), so, I would just mow the weeds every few weeks and continue to supplement with hay. If you want to try to maintain one small grass strip, you could try fencing off a narrow strip, restoring it to grass, and then eventually let the horses onto it for an hour a day or whatever it could tolerate. I guess you could then slowly expand the grass area strip by strip, one horizontal, then one vertical across your paddock. Your mare would probably not notice being kept off a small strip. Maybe eventually you could get to half grass, half dirt lot and maybe that would be okay with her.
Pasture Pro can be sprayed and animals can graze almost immediately - I believe the wait time is something around 30 minutes. I would also mow to control the weeds coming to seed and spreading.
I would use the smaller section as a sacrifice pasture - put the horses here when the weather is bad or you need to mow/spray weeds in the larger pasture, etc.
If possible you could run a section of fence to split the larger pasture and rotate the horses to different sides, that may also help.
We are on small acreage, to control overgrazing we have four interconnected paddocks and a separate 20 meter round pen that all can used to contain the beasts to limit their access trying to eat every blade of grass to the ground.
I do not use any chemicals on the pastures, just cutting or pulling the weeds that show up.
We got a LOT of trashy weeds introduced from feeding round bales during a draught about ten years ago that took many years to eliminate
I second Pasture pro and then drag and mow drag and mow. You should be dragging it at least once a week to keep things spread out if you aren’t cleaning up all the manure.
To rehab the field, I would divide it in half with temporary fencing. Treat and seed one side at a time. But after that, I would open up the whole pasture and never divide it for rotation. It’s important for the horses to have room to roam and get up a run if they want to. As others have suggested, I would mow it regularly to keep the weeds down and either pick or harrow the manure a couple times per week. Supplement with hay, and you will have two happy horses with a bit of grass and room to roam.
I find many people are obsessed with having picture perfect pastures, but it often comes at the expense of quality of life for the horses if they are confined to small dry lots for days at a time. Horses were born to roam. My pasture gets destroyed every spring because I let the horses roam even when it’s muddy. Once things start to dry up, I harrow it several times to work out the dips and bumps. By mid-June you can’t tell it was chewed up. Been doing this for 10 years and the pasture is perfectly healthy.
Yeah, with only one acre you can’t have it all unfortunately. Either your horses get room to roam, or you put in a lot of effort to develop a pretty paddock with good grass, and then only give them limited access. Some horses don’t seem to mind the confinement of a dry lot, or it’s just what they’re used to, but personally I would rather let them move around even if it means the grass isn’t great.
really can not Roam much if any on an acre as that is an area in square feet of less than 200 feet by 220 feet
This.
I don’t think it’s reasonable or possible to keep the grass growing in a way that actually provides forage. I would personally just keep it mowed short and feed hay. They will find things to nibble but the grass is really never going to grow if they have access to it. And, I also agree that turnout in an acre is better than having very limited turnout but some (limited) grass.
But when all you have is an acre, there is no real benefit to confining them to an even smaller space unless you’re riding daily or nearly daily.
With having one in a grazing muzzle and only an acre; Id set it up as a true dry lot as much as you can and just source hay as the main forage source year round. I took.a course through UMN earlier this year and was shocked at how high the NSC can be with pretty common and abundant weeds. If they aren’t getting much grass, I would consider supplementing Vitamin E as well.
No way would I want to rotate on just an acre–but that is just me…
I had 3 on probably 2 acres max and then up to 5 on maybe 3 acres and I just let it be what it was and fed hay 2x daily. It was easier to manage weight that way.
They were happy looking for stuff to nibble on, I was happy not having to lock anyone up and they got the nutrition they needed from hay and unlimited turnout.
