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| It's hard to beat your own slice of heaven, even when the weather is hell. |
Olivia over at https://diyhorseownership.com/ posted about having horses in her state. And it sparked my interest. See I grew up outside of Chicago and moved down here in high school. To my family back home it seems like NC would be a much better state to have a small farm. They are only mostly wrong.
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| This is a fall hunt with our local Hunt Club. |
NC is large for an East Coast state and surprisingly horsey. We live only 60 minutes from the Tryon International Equestrian Center, 60 minutes from Camden, SC, and 90 minutes from Aiken, SC. these 3 places are horse show heaven. There is pretty much a rated show every weekend in my preferred disciplines. In addition we have a thriving GMO that has every weekend covered with multiple shows to pick from, unrated and rated. This pulls quality trainers of various disciplines, quality vets, and quality farriers. Heaven!!
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| We have some seriously nice places to show. |
Now for the not-so-heavenly. The climate. NC is wetter than the Pacific Northwest and hotter than most places in the desert Southwest. No joke, went hiking in Arizona and called a man a lie-er when he said it was 100 degrees, it was so different without humility.
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| This is everyday from July to September. |
We average 50 inches of precipitation per year, compared to Portland's (picked for being know as a rainy place) Gets a measly 44 inches, which is a LOT of rain. Especially since the soil here is clay based and does not drain. Mud is a huge problem for most horse barns.
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| It is wet here, y'all. |
Most people think that this rain would mean great grass and hay, but sadly what the summer heat doesn't kill and the winter and spring rains don't drown is scrubby nutrient-less grass. Most larger boarding barns get their hay from Pennsylvania or New York 2 or 3 times a year. You have to baby any pasture you want to keep grassy. If you drive by a boarding barn here and the grass is lush, they probably offer very limited turn out. At our place this means regular mud management. We top off stone dust every few month and rotate our round bale feeder every 2 weeks to try and control the mud.
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| There was a reason our barn year looked like this when we bought it. |
The husband and I regularly dream of winning the lottery and moving to Northern Virginia or Kentucky. If we ever make that move, it will be great for grass pastures and hay costs, but we will loose out on a lot of the top horseman and show venues that are literally a block a way, even in crappy weather.
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| This super nice barn has 2 arenas, top quality trainers - and is not even a 1/4 mile down the road. |
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| Also NC is seriously pretty. |
* Some pictures stolen from google image search.
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