Minimum acreage for 2 15hh cobs

[thorneyislanddoris]

I've got 2 cobs and looking to buy some land. Could I manage on 3 acres if they have a stable each and hard standing?

Ground is fairly well drained.

You need minimum 1.5 acre for first horse + 1 acre for every other horse however these are minimum guides. But you also need to factor in ability to rotate grazing to prevent over grazing, poaching etc.
The only way you could manage this would be if you put a track system in place.
There will be people coming on to say yes you can manage but it isn't the optimum amount of turnout space required for 2 horses if you want good quality paddocks.

You would need to manage the area with electric fences to allow the grass to grow, so the actual land available would be less. You would also need extra feed/hay for the height of summer and the winter months. On the whole though, I think you could make it work.

I personally wouldn't

I usually see a rule of 2 acres for the first horse and one acre for each additional horse.

Were you planning on feeding hay anyway?

If you have a hard surface at the gate, and can keep the water trough away from both the gate and the feeding area, I would think it would be quite manageable, though to be fair mud isn’t as much of a problem here as in the UK.

Doable, just with very careful land management but I would want a bit more to allow for better rotation.

I have about 4 acres for 2 large horses and it's plenty. They are out all summer and in at night in the winter. We feed hay in our winter paddock and poo pick our summer grazing every day. We manage our grass with electric fencing. We do feed hard feed but it's mostly fibre and balancers.

It partly depends on drainage. My land has got worse and worse each year with climate change and the sheer amount of rain. A few miles down the road the paddocks are all sand and drain well so are holding up much better.
It is of course possible to manage, lots manage on less. What I would advise is budgeting to have some hard standing/track in the grazing so they can move between the stables, water and haylage in winter. That way they can have turnout all year round without trashing your grazing for the rest of the year.

Is it clay? Drainage is everything. Also remember you wouldn’t be able to graze the whole 2 acres. You’d need somewhere for the manure heap etc.

Yes you can if you do it carefully. 2 cobs I'd imagine are good doers so you could rest some over the summer while restricting their grazing with electric fencing, maybe even make a track around the field and leave the middle bit for winter.

Your hardstanding will be a lifesaver. If it isn't fenced I'd recommend doing that and using it during winter to keep them off the grass or during summer to limit their turnout with haynets if needed.

It would work with careful field management .

Thank you that's been really helpful.

Also are they being worked?

My friend had an issue which left a huge amount of her land unsafe for about 14 months. 3 ancient septic tanks were involved but they turned out to be only the tip of the iceberg. Long story.

This left her with at best 2 useable acres and 12 horses and ponies sharing them, several of whom didn't get along. It was hell.

But the majority of them were actually surprisingly fine as they were used to teach riding and driving lessons so were in and out much of the day, hacked out on their days off. The liveries who could move out temporarily did so leaving her with 7.

Some creative use of electric fencing, to separate the dickheads from the ones who wouldn't stick up for themselves and rotating the ones due to work soon into the 2 hard standing areas helped and the ones we trusted not to leave the property or create trouble were allowed to wander freely around the yard and graze on the unfenced patches of grass and cow parsley.

The ones who could not be trusted not to piss off up the drive and into the sunset, got taken out to hand graze between lessons and everyone stayed in at night.

It cost a fortune in hay and enrichment toys to keep them occupied and you couldn't miss a day's exercise or they'd be climbing the walls. But being in full work made all the difference. No one starved, no one fought, everyone was reasonably content except the humans.

So it was doable. Not an ideal situation, never fucking again by any means and certainly not permanent but I think 2 smallish horses who get along and are in full work, sharing 3 acres would be fine.