Last year, the horses were put in the hay field near the start of the rain season. On clay soil, a horse will damage the ground beyond repair in a matter of days. They sink down deep and push the grass sward with them. The ground becomes rutted and when it dries it is almost impossible to walk on. It is also dangerous for horses as they can get injured on really uneven ground.
So what do you do? Well, there is only one way to fix it and that is reseed. This means you have to plough, harrow, seed and roll in either September or spring. We lost 6 acres of hayfield because of this. It will take 3 years for the sward to become strong. It may take longer for us as we are an organic livery yard and we don't use fertilizers or sprays. In addition, organic grass seeds are 8 times more expensive that regular seed. As a guide, in cost terms including the overseeding it will be around £1,500 in seed and labour. The field yielded about 400 bales (A non-organic field could treble this amount with the addition of fertilizer.) so we will be 1,600 bales down over the next 4 years before the field is back to full production. (If it wasn't organic this process would take half the time as you could use artificial inputs to aid and stimulate the growth - the cost is about the same as what you don't spend on seed you spend on Nitrogen).
The pictures here show the field just after the reseed process had taken place in April. We'll take a few pictures in September to show you how it is coming on. We plan to overseed in November. There are places where the seed has not taken so we will have to attend to those areas in isolation. We may also have to scarify the ground to raise a light seed bed and apply more seed to strengthen the coverage. It is all a bit of an experiment that needs constant monitoring. The biggest issue is losing the hay. Fortunately we have another 20 acres to hay at present that is natural pasture/meadow so none of the horses will miss out.If you want to know more about planting pasture there are a couple of links below. Most of the reference out there is from North America. Talk to a seed specialist before planting as different grasses do different jobs and take better in different areas.
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