Think Twice About Resowing
- Jenny Paterson
- 4 days ago
- 2 min read
Horse owners start thinking about renovating their horse paddocks in Spring & Autumn.
However, resowing is a lengthy and expensive process so you don’t want to be doing it unless absolutely necessary. It is not just a matter of sowing ‘horse-friendly’ grasses and letting horses graze it when it has reached 6”!
In fact that is a very unsafe thing to do as brand new grass is EXTREMELY potent in Potassium and Crude Protein/Nitrogen and can cause all sorts of issues including grass tetany.
New grass should be grazed by sheep or mowed when it is 6” high to boost root development, then left and harvested for hay, then allowed to mature again – then is safe to allow grazing access by horses.
A better strategy for most horse owners on small blocks is to improve the grass you have.
Do a soil test – the soil may be lacking in nutrients critical for grass growth
It is better not to just assume it needs lime. For example our recent soil test revealed a lack of Phosphorous so adding lime would have made matters worse.
When growing grass for horses, the goal is not to maximise yield as you would for fattening livestock. People with an agricultural background will automatically think this is what you want. Depending on where soil levels are to start with, adding too much nitrogen and potassium can render the grass/hay unsuitable for horses.
While there is merit in the idea of organically tending the soils and encouraging soil health, be aware that doing so will result in PROLIFIC growth. Good for growing hay but not so good for grazing the average riding horse. As horses do not self-regulate when it comes to the quantity of grass consumed, they will be getting far too much nutrition per mouthful and access to this pasture will need to be severely restricted. You will need a means of doing this such as a Dry Lot.
When it comes to species, we talk about ‘Horse-Friendly’ grass but what exactly is that?
It is grass that horses can consume every day, all year round, without developing any of the issues that horses grazing unsuitable grass inevitably do.
*See Health Check Link below.
Apart from Rye-grass, the vast majority of GRASSES ARE suitable for the vast majority of horses to graze so long as they are at a mature stage of growth – when there is more stem than leaf (indicating a high Dry Matter content) and yellowed off (nitrogen and potassium and sugar levels have dropped).
If your land is fertile or ex-dairy (ie has been fertilised) native/older grasses/brown-top/poa’s etc will not establish as they need the soil pH to be less than 6.
You will need to stick with the bromes, fescues, timothy & cocksfoot (don’t go overboard with cocksfoot if you use small-mesh hay-nets as it tends to make coarse hay)
What IS necessary is Pasture Management so that the horses aren’t grazing short, green, stressed grass all year round, because they are susceptible to the changes in such grass with the season and the weather.
*Health Check: https://www.calmhealthyhorses.com/health-check-list See the sort of land and grasses/shrubs wild horses thrive on....
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