The rain started far earlier than we had hoped. Our great plan of cleaning up the horse paddock and stalls didn’t quite make it so we rushed to get it done between raindrops.

Horses are heavy, walk, poop, and pee quite a bit. Add a ton of rainwater and bad drainage and winter equals a mire of mud and water. It’s uncomfortable for them and probably not very healthy.

While the stall enclosures are important to keep the stalls dry – we needed better drainage and footing in the paddock. We rented a trencher and a dump trailer from Veneta Equipment Rentals and got three truckloads of crush rock from Conser Quarry. We started with the trencher – cutting in a French drain in the paddock and out through the arena to a ditch along the property line. We hope this will help direct some water away, but we were working in muck already so hopefully it won’t harden and defeat the purpose.

Then Bridge spent the better part of a day moving gravel. In total about 30 yards of gravel to build up and slope the grade from the stalls to the back of the paddock. Then we added some walk-on bark for added measure and absorption.  We hope this plus some gutter repair will help keep them dryer and healthier this winter.

Additional projects include a new fence around the main pasture along with hot tape to keep them from bending the fence and cribbing on the posts!