Are there requirements for horse paddocks?
Hello everyone,
My girlfriend currently keeps three horses in a paddock/meadow. Since it's very muddy at the moment due to all the rain, she's considering fencing in a second meadow. Then the horses can graze there and won't eat the other paddock bare. The problem isn't that there's not enough grass. It's more the mud that kills the grass. Grazing makes it even harder for it to regenerate. Another idea is to fence off the muddy part.
Now, various questions still arise regarding the requirements for a horse paddock. Opinions are somewhat divided here.
The main question is whether and for what purpose shelter is needed. Horses need to be protected from the blazing sun, of course. But does the same apply in the rain? I think wet horses are less of a problem than dehydrated ones. Especially with a suitable waterproof blanket, right? So a tree should be sufficient for this purpose, right?
Would the veterinary office get involved if there was almost no grass left in the meadow, but there was still enough hay, oats, etc. from feeding? That would be identical to keeping the animals in stables. Is muddy ground a point of criticism?
Perhaps someone here has some advice on what to specifically consider to avoid problems with the authorities. Simply fencing in a meadow and putting horses there is unlikely to be enough.
(2 votes)
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A shelter must not be accessible for cattle, for horses, except for limited pasture. If you put boxing horses out, they don’t have any. If the horses 24/7 are on the surface, there must be a shelter, whether they want to use it or not.
A blanket is always a problem for a horse. It has a great coat that actually protects well enough from any weather for the need of the horse. Only man cannot imagine that, worried blankets and makes his horse so difficult to live.
Whether grass is on a pasture, the Veterinary Office is interested in zero. Whether predators are available, yes. There are enough horses that are kept completely without pasture due to deer, only on exit surfaces.
If the area is distangled, this can really cause trouble with the environmental and water protection authorities. Simply put horses on too soft couplings has already cost so much horse keeping that they had to give up. Mostly it meets the small private, because learned farm or horse farmers know what to pay attention to. In Germany, however, the principle “ignorance does not protect against punishment”.
Therefore, there are horses where you can also attach a sufficient run-out area with paddoc craster, plaster or the like and leave the horses only on grass if it is dry enough that the grass scare holds.
The grazing area can be divided up in such a way that at least two surfaces can be alternately grazed, but there is still enough space to galop instead of a large pasture, it is especially important to be able to offer the horses even grass in a few years. If you only have one, you can never tow, possibly lime and let the surface rest. Have fun with Ampfer & Co., the lack of pasture management much easier to put away than grass.
So, I know that a subordinate is really a duty. On how many pages that must be closed, I don’t know, can be that 4 posts and one roof are enough.
I would cover horses only if they were old or sick, or not to train a winter fur as they are tournament horses. For all other horses (i.e. pure recreational horses, for example), a blanket is unnecessary because it brings the heat balance together. Apart from the fact that such a blanket does not stick like welded on the horse, it can slide, the animal can hover or tear the blanket and then also water comes under it…
How much grass is still on the meadow is insignificant, but it has to be available for predrying (heav and straw), as well as water. The Vet-Amt pays attention to this.
With too much mud, the Vet-Amt can sometimes complain, but much worse is the damage that arises on the ground. Sometimes the water management office also reports here, because the humidity levels cannot flow properly, but also comes up a bit on the position of the couplings.
In the long term, the mud is not exactly great for the horses, as moisture to the hooves can sometimes lead to diseases (not must!).
Therefore, it is appropriate to put paddock plates on the floor in extremely matted areas, or so rubber scrapers. The weight of the animals is better distributed, and they do not sink as badly (like snowshoes in winter in people).
Interchangeable couplings are, by the way, always advantageous, even with year-round coupling. Thus, a meadow can always recover and the grass grow for the hungry horse molluscs.
Why so cumbersome? Fasten the surface correctly, it no longer mates. You can’t use grass coupling as an all-weather outlet as soon as the soil is wet and the horses get there, the grass scare is relatively fast over. It also does not help to add further grass coupling. Expediently, there is a large attached and thus dry area on which the horses can always be, hay and weather protection, plus pasture with grass on which they come when the weather/ground conditions allow.
Personally, I always find it important that the horses have a shelter (there are so mobile pasture huts for which you don’t need a building permit) and that there is enough food (so also hay is fed) so that the horses don’t fight and grass around.
Weide huts are subject to approval depending on the design. Even the fence must be approved depending on the area and status of the user of the pasture.
You can find everything you need in the BMEL guidelines.
https://www.bmel.de/SharedDocs/Downloads/DE/_Tiere/Tierschutz/Gutachten-Guitlinie/HaltungPferde.pdf;jsessionid=FB743D5367C66136271DC98D8DAEB812.live852?__blob=publicationFile&v=3
In addition, construction regulations must also be complied with. Hangs at the shelter stop at the fence. If the pasture is located in the residential area, no horsekeeping is readily possible.