Horse farms can be found across the US and around the world. Used for breeding, training, and boarding horses, a horse ranch can take many forms but there are similarities among each farm.
Horse Barn and Stables
Horse farms generally maintain barns or stables for the horses and equipment. Some farms have indoor or outdoor arenas for working their horses.
Stables have stalls for the horses and turnout pastures. It is important to provide the horses with shelter from the weather. Horses are kept in stalls individually, so most farms have multiple stalls.
Maintaining your horse stalls
Stalls are equipped with mats and saw dust or straw for safe footing that is easy to clean. Water buckets and hay racks or hay bags are kept in the stall for the horses.
For horses to maintain proper health, stalls are mucked and kept clean using apple pickers and wheel barrels.
Some stables have standing stalls where the horse is cross tied and where they do not have free range of motion like in a box stall.
Box stalls are generally considered better for the horse due to their freedom of movement. Standing stalls are generally used for cleaning or staging before being moved to pasture or box stall.
What equine services are available?
Many large scale horse farms offer multiple equine services by co-opting with local vets, farriers, and other service providers.
Horse owners who board their horses with these large facilities are able to maintain their horses health and exercise needs without the cost of maintaining their own stables.
These facilities often offer training and breeding services.
The cost of boarding a horse varies widely depending on location and services offered. But most barns charge a monthly fee for boarding your horse.
Training is offered by experienced horseman to both the horses and riders. There are facilities that specialize in every discipline, including western riding, english riding, rodeo, jumping, and more.
Training facilities should have arenas and round pens. A very popular training technique is natural horsemanship.
Make sure there is great pasture land
Good horse farms also have plenty of pasture land available for all horses to be safely turned out to.
Good pasture additionally allows the horse time to socialize with other horses and to play naturally. It is important that the barn manager ensures horses that do not get along are not turned out together.
Horses turned out to pasture should also have access to forage for grazing. Horses evolved to spend up to 18 hours of every day foraging. And the closer you can get to that, the healthier your horse will be.
Every farm needs a horse trailer
Horse trailers come in many sizes with basic hauling styles all the way to luxurious multi horse trailers which come with fully equipped living quarters for comfortable living on long hauls and weekend shows.
There are many factors that you must consider when choosing your trailer, so having a good understanding of your current and future horse trailing needs is important.
Conclusion
Whether you are running your own horse farm or searching for a place to board your horse, there is much you must consider in order to provide your horse with all of there health and well being needs.
[catlist name=farm]