Willow Flats
Well-Known Member
Hi Everyone! Just trying to keep my chin up here. Still covered in ash and bad air quality. I was making such good progress with my ponies that it's hard not to be driving, but I know it's what is best for them. I am looking at re-positioning my pasture area and somewhat enclosing my training area.
The pasture area I have now has two wooden gates side by side with a divider down the center and I have been using step in posts with electric rope; switching grazing from side to side. I am going to reconfigure it making one pasture and try strip grazing. I have solid posts on all the corners which I'll be moving, but I don't like the plastic step in posts I have been using. They get so brittle and break so easy you can't really move them around much. Since I don't know for sure if I will like my new set up until I use it I don't want to do anything too permanent. I read somewhere and now I am not even sure I read it on this site but someone said they made their own movable posts using wood and attaching some insulators. I think she cut the wood into 2X2's Basically making stakes by cutting a point on the ends. Wondering if anyone has ever tried that or heard of it? I don't want to do t-posts until I am sure its the way I want it. My ponies have never tried to get out of the step in post set up. Too busy eating. I know wood rots but it would last longer than the plastic in our hot sun. You have to pick up the whole post with the rope on it otherwise the clips just break right off after one season in the sun.
So for the training area it will just be a visual barrier, where I currently set up cones. I would like to be able to practice dressage there too, so it would be something to hang the letters on. A trainer I met when I was volunteering at a CDE said just drive in pieces of rebar, slide on PVC with T's on the top and string a rope through the T's for a visual barrier for the horse. Has anyone done this? I think I have read that the VSE dressage courts are 30 x 60 meters. So should I just make it 100 x 200 feet?
The pasture area I have now has two wooden gates side by side with a divider down the center and I have been using step in posts with electric rope; switching grazing from side to side. I am going to reconfigure it making one pasture and try strip grazing. I have solid posts on all the corners which I'll be moving, but I don't like the plastic step in posts I have been using. They get so brittle and break so easy you can't really move them around much. Since I don't know for sure if I will like my new set up until I use it I don't want to do anything too permanent. I read somewhere and now I am not even sure I read it on this site but someone said they made their own movable posts using wood and attaching some insulators. I think she cut the wood into 2X2's Basically making stakes by cutting a point on the ends. Wondering if anyone has ever tried that or heard of it? I don't want to do t-posts until I am sure its the way I want it. My ponies have never tried to get out of the step in post set up. Too busy eating. I know wood rots but it would last longer than the plastic in our hot sun. You have to pick up the whole post with the rope on it otherwise the clips just break right off after one season in the sun.
So for the training area it will just be a visual barrier, where I currently set up cones. I would like to be able to practice dressage there too, so it would be something to hang the letters on. A trainer I met when I was volunteering at a CDE said just drive in pieces of rebar, slide on PVC with T's on the top and string a rope through the T's for a visual barrier for the horse. Has anyone done this? I think I have read that the VSE dressage courts are 30 x 60 meters. So should I just make it 100 x 200 feet?
