Wondering on some ways to keep your horses field looking great all year round? Spring is the perfect time to get started with improvements and here are some specific things you can do to create a healthier and more eye-pleasing pasture:
1.) Soil Testing and Fertilizer Application
If you’ve never had your soil tested to see what nutrients might be lacking, time to hop to it! Your local county extension office can help and your results will come back with a recommendation for fertilizer and lime application which can be applied yearly, though you will want to retest in three years to see if additional lime is needed. Spring is a great time to apply lime, but you may want to wait until the fall to apply your fertilizer.
2.) Give Your Pasture a Break
Allowing your pasture to rest is a vital part of keeping grass healthy. This can be achieved with rotational grazing or, for smaller acreages, using a sacrifice area. To learn more about creating a sacrifice area, see this post.
3.) Encourage Good Weeds
Not all weeds are bad. In fact, some have medicinal and nutritional value for horses and are technically considered “herbs”. These include dandelions, chickweed, mullein, broad leaf plantain, and cleavers. If you already have any of these plants in your pasture, leave them be, but if you don’t have them, consider planting a few!
4.) Over-seed Bare Spots
If you have a bare spot or two in your pasture, such as around high-traffic areas, you can over-seed the area to bring back grass. However, you’ll need to keep horses off of newly seeded areas for several months to allow the grass to get established.
Having a healthy pasture may take some work, but the rewards are worth it—especially for our horses.
This information is copied from yourhorsefarm.com