Spring preparations

I've been part of the #Horsebloggers Meet Up Facebook group for the longest time because I've found it to be a great community to be a part of, where it's possible to get help and support from fellow equestrian bloggers. This time the group inspired a blog post theme, which is spring preparations for the horses. I'm sure that I'm not the only who finds spring as a time for lots of preparation! This is further helped with the the clocks having moved forwards, which means it feels like we have SO many more hours of daylight and sunshine. You can smell spring in the air during the day, despite the fact that in the mornings we're having frost after a freezing night whilst the sun in the afternoons makes it feel the middle of summer... it seems like we are getting four seasons each day! 🌦

Spring for me signals the seemingly endless shedding of the horses’ winter coats, preparing for flies and other bugs and sorting out the paddocks. The horses are nearly there with their coat changes, which I'm very excited about as it means my clothes won't be covered in horse hair all the time! The horses have also had 'a spring sort out' - teeth, vaccinations and wormers are all done so in that respect we are nearly there and ready for spring and summer 🙌🏻

We've also had the first arrival of insects which are just starting to annoy the horses whilst they're turned out, but I've not started using fly rugs or hats just yet, especially now that the weather has cooled down again. Once the nights and days warm up I'm sure we'll end up having to use these on most days, so last week I washed all the fly hats and rugs that we stored away during winter. I also dug out the fly sprays and refilled all the bottles we have so that on the first properly warm week we are ready for all the flies. It doesn't help that our fields are next the fields which have cows, so the amount of flies during the summer is endless! 

For me spring time is the start of my yearly big clear and sort out - all the stuff that has been used over winter needs to be sorted out and organised ready for next winter! Winter coats and rugs have been going through the wash, although I do still need to send our heavyweight turnout rugs to be washed. Despite having moved last year, we own A LOT of rugs. They are all needed when you've got five horses to rug but you name it, and we more than likely have probably got it. Which means all of them have to be washed, mended (I have three stable rugs with big rips in them) and folded away neatly so that our storage room stays looking tidy!

Whilst our paddocks aren't too trashed after winter, the pathway to the paddocks as well as the gateways in each paddock are pretty gross! So last week everything was fertilised and rolled, and we have plans in place for the pathway and the gateways to have a layer of stone laid down and topped off with smaller stone/tarmac planings that will pack down and ensure that next winter won't be so terrible 🙏🏻

Riding whilst the paddocks were being fertilised and rolled - good boy Erik!