Poo picking

Diary

Posted: Saturday 3 September, 2005

by Rosemary at 8:08pm in Gardening 1 comment Comments closed

We got the first results of the poo picking home today. Those of you with horses will know what poo picking is. For the rest of you, poo picking is the manual (in gloves) removal of piles of poo from your horse's field. This strange equestrian pastime is done to keep the grazing clean and to prevent the spread of intestinal worms.

Smokey and his buddies, Willock, Barney and Wallace, occupy quite a small area of grass. This is because they are all native ponies and can live on fresh air. Too much grass and they get fat. Fast. Now each horse poos about 10 times a day. So the grazing gets dirty pretty quick. Horses avoid grazing areas where poo is lying, so the grass (and weeds) grows long there and gets overgrazed elsewhere. The field is then said to be "horse sick". It's bad management to let your field get like this.

So the owners of the four horses above poo pick. We left it quite late to start but we're doing well and the field looks pretty clean now. Dan and I have taken advantage of this by taking our wee trailer up to the field and leaving it there. As we poo pick into a portable box, we empty the box into the trailer. It saves us having to take a wheelbarrow back and forward to the yard and Dana nd I get the poo for the garden.

Dan's Dad brought the trailer home today and will take it back tomorrow. Dan put some of the poo on the raspberries and the rest in a pile to "mature". It has caused lots of interest for the hens and provided a plaything for Tess, who has been selecting choice balls of poo to throw around the garden. Hopefully, the raspberries will benefit too.