I love our land guy

When our walk out to the barn looks like this

And this

And 4 - 6 inches of rain makes water bubble up from our stall mats 

This weather has been brutal.  So much of what we are working with right now is temporary. The barn, the sacrifice pen, the muck pile, the back entrance, the arena - all of these are not where or what they are going to be in 6 months.  The question is: how do we make them usable and safe without wasting money.  So far our little one acre turn out is handling about 4 - 6 hours of turn out - when dry and 3 - 4 hours when a little wet.  There are bad areas we will have to reseed, but the grass is looking ok and they are not turning it into a mud pit.  

The barn pen or sacrifice is a bit different.  Right now it is 1/2 its finished size and before Sunday it was just bare clay.  Ick.  We do not want to spend $$ on something that is just going to get scraped out later, so our land clearing guy (M.H.) suggested the mulch from the clearing.  It is mainly cedar and pine with a little oak thrown in.  It is free. And we have many tons of it.  We put down 8 -12" in a fan around the barn and it is working SO well, a bit hard to pick, and not very firm, BUT the horse have a dry outside patch to stand and walk around on. 

But the (temporary) mulch...

Gives the horses 6 - 12 hours... 

of daily 'outside' time.

For important things like staring at equipment and cows.

M. H.  is working on our property in sections - with the goal of finishing around mid Feb.  He has started in the back because we have an access road there where he can park his equipment.  Once he gets that finished and a rough grade put down we will finish the barn pen and another acre-ish turn out.  Until then we are in a holding pattern.

Dutch doesn't like that this means he has to share his hay bag.