# designing from scratch



## Avna (Jul 11, 2015)

My husband and I are going to be moving across the country, to New England, from California. 

We are shopping for a place with at least 10 acres of cleared pasture with a flattish sunny building site (we intend to put up a modular home) and may have found something like that, but have yet to get out there and see it with our own eyes. Being 3000 miles away and all. 

Nevertheless, I am already fantasy-designing not just a stable but a whole two or three horse farm layout in my mind (we only have the one horse now but she'll need a companion or two) The stable itself, I am thinking three 14 x 14 stalls since in winter the horses may be inside much more than they are here. A 12' aisle with drive doors at both ends. Insulated metal roof (noise, climate control), open rafters with no loft (I want to separate the main hay storage from the horses, for fire safety), well-thought-out ventilation system, natural light, a rodent-proof, heatable, insulated tack room with a big sink . . . I am planning on a whole-barn concrete slab with interior drainage (maybe gutters with gratings?), with matting in the stalls and grooming area. Multiple water taps and GFI outlets and excellent lighting. It's possible I might want a wash stall. Dunno. This already sounds like it's going to cost as much as a house!

The stable will have lean-to sheltering porch (I know there is a better term for it but it isn't coming to me) on the paddock side, both to protect the stall doors and provide the horses with an outside place to lounge in the paddock under shelter. The paddock may have sand or something else in it to prevent mud. I hate mud! Not just because it is ucky but because to me as a land steward it means I have failed in my design. Mud means you have destroyed the soil structure and have created erosion (even mud on flat land will wash in a rainy climate). Paddock gives on to a rotational pasture system.

I'd like to be able to walk under cover from my house to the stable. Most likely this will be through the garage and/or my husband's adjacent machine and carpentry shop. At least that is the idea in my mind right now. Working from the traditonal northern New England farm plan of "big house, little house, back house, barn" which is a series of multi-purpose linked buildings. 

I'd also like to have some kind of an arena too, and a way to keep my trailer under cover. I like learning what I call baby dressage but as a foundational skill than as any kind of goal. Mainly I'm a trail rider and horse camper.

I'm not getting any younger, so ideas which contribute more ease, efficiency, and comfort are all very welcome!

Looking for critiques . . .


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## Hubble (Nov 8, 2016)

Im not verry good with these kinds of things, but a thought I had from today that might be of help, if you are going to keep youre hores stalled at all, do get them windows! I was in the stable for a few hours waiting today, and Ohh how much the horses used and appreciaed them <3


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## Avna (Jul 11, 2015)

Hubble said:


> Im not verry good with these kinds of things, but a thought I had from today that might be of help, if you are going to keep youre hores stalled at all, do get them windows! I was in the stable for a few hours waiting today, and Ohh how much the horses used and appreciaed them <3


Glass windows?


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## tim62988 (Aug 30, 2012)

what part of the northeast are you moving to?

unless you plan on riding straight through the winter so not wanting your horse to grow a thick coat I woudln't be quite as concerned about climate control.

you don't want a breeze in the barn but don't need insulation to prevent that. our barn does have an unused loft so it's not as noisy as a straight metal roof but I would be more concerned about the noise than the climate factor.

you may also find your horses spend more time outside than you will think, here in upstate NY my wife & I blanket the horses when it's below 10, even though my horse I will often wait until 0 then bring them in at night and with the exception of a few snowstorms they were content outside even on our below 0 days.

but anyway sounds like your best bet is something in the 40-44' long (keep it cheaper on a 4 or 8' length) so maybe 2 14' stalls and a 12' stall then I would do something like 38' wide to give you the 14' depth for stall 12' isle then 12' x10' tack room 12x10' wash bay and then extra space either leading to the house/shop or hay storage for the week/month (if you put no outlets & no electric in that corner of the barn it would virtually eliminate the fire risk once the hay has sat in your larger hay storage after being baled)


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## Hubble (Nov 8, 2016)

Glass migh be a bad idee if there arnt bars inbetween the glass and the horse (Thats what we got) but there is stronger kinds of glass, pr plastic glass, that might work wonders!


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## tim62988 (Aug 30, 2012)

some ace hardware stores can do plexiglass, maybe do a layer of plexi then a spacer then another layer of plexi just like the old windows used to be


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## Avna (Jul 11, 2015)

tim62988 said:


> what part of the northeast are you moving to?
> 
> unless you plan on riding straight through the winter so not wanting your horse to grow a thick coat I woudln't be quite as concerned about climate control.
> 
> ...


Yes, the noise factor of a metal roof is significant -- we have one right now so I'm aware! The only room I am interested in insulating is the tack room. 

We are looking in Western Massachusetts, east of the Berkshires. Winters are probably a little warmer and brighter than yours but a similar climate. Your measurement ideas are very useful.


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## Joel Reiter (Feb 9, 2015)

What a lovely vision you have for your new home! You have already put a lot of thought into what you want. If you and your husband can agree on the plan, you're on your way.

I keep my horses outside 365 days a year in Minnesota. They have an open shelter but only use it to get out of a fierce north wind or a freezing rain. So I can't comment on your plan for stalls.

As you design your pasture, it is very important to have a sacrifice area for those transition weeks in spring when the snow is gone but the grass hasn't thoroughly established itself. If you don't want mud you can use gravel or asphalt or sand, or one of the grids like Lighthoof (https://www.lighthoof.com/) or hoofgrid (HoofGrid® Mud-Free Paddocks in Monroe, Washington).

Whatever you use, it will work best if the sacrifice area is on the south side of your shelter or stable, and has enough slope to encourage drainage. And just to make your puzzle a little more difficult to solve, you'll want to be able to conveniently feed and water your horses in the sacrifice area, and have access to all the subdivisions of your grass directly off the sacrifice area.

One of your challenges in the New England climate will be keeping water available to your horses in the winter. I think you will find that your buckets will freeze in the stalls. The most convenient solution would be with some kind of watering device like a Ritchie or Nelson, either heated or superinsulated. That will take some planning with water lines and electrical service. If you do it the old fashioned way, like I do, with a 100 gallon trough, you'll need an outlet to feed the 1500 watt heater and enough income to pay the resulting electrical bill. It would be nice to have a frost free hydrant located at the trough, but if you have that, the extra $500 for an automated watering device will pay for itself in a very few winters.

You'll also want to decide how you plan to keep your pasture mowed to control weeds, and some way to drag to break up and spread the manure, and a way to clean the sacrifice area when the horses are confined to it.

Please keep us up to date as you progress. I think often of how I would do things if I was starting over and had any money to spend.


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## Avna (Jul 11, 2015)

Hubble said:


> Glass migh be a bad idee if there arnt bars inbetween the glass and the horse (Thats what we got) but there is stronger kinds of glass, pr plastic glass, that might work wonders!


I'd like to have ventilation in the summer and a wind screen in the winter . . . maybe a fixed grill in the window with a plexi shutter of some kind on the outside. Even safety glass could possibly work -- it doesn't dull and scratch like plexi. It's expensive new though. I don't like sliders, they always warp or rust or fill with crud. Something with hinges.


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## Joel Reiter (Feb 9, 2015)

Is your husband's concern erosion, or the welfare of the horses? If it's erosion, I'd wait and see what path the horses choose and then reinforce as necessary. If he's worried about the horses, do a search on Tevis Cougar Rock and let him watch some video.

I personally think the steeper and more challenging the obstacles in the pasture, the better your horse will perform on the trail.


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## Avna (Jul 11, 2015)

Joel Reiter said:


> What a lovely vision you have for your new home! You have already put a lot of thought into what you want. If you and your husband can agree on the plan, you're on your way.
> 
> *ho ho on that last sentence . . . *
> 
> ...


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## Acadianartist (Apr 21, 2015)

I live in eastern Canada, 1.5 hours from the Maine border. So it depends on where you are moving to in New England, but you'll probably have a similar climate to mine. 

I have a steel barn with a steel roof. The noise doesn't bother me or the horses one bit. I did not insulate my barn. No one here does, because we don't heat or ventilate our barns. Our summers don't get so hot that you need ventilation (as long as you have high ceilings and good natural ventilation with lots of windows), and heating a barn in the winter in this part of the world is prohibitive for most. Maybe not where you're going though, but literally no one heats their barn here. Tack room, maybe. I don't know anyone who has a wash stall for that reason. We don't wash our horses in the winter, because they would freeze to death. We do ride all winter. So what if they have a thick winter coat? We don't ride them that hard so they don't get sweaty. We don't clip, but I do blanket Harley because he coughs when it gets cold. Kodak rarely gets blanketed (like twice last winter in freezing rain). She just grows a coat like a grizzly and the cold doesn't bother her one bit. 

My barn is 48 x 32 and 20 feet high. There is an open sort of loft space in the middle, spanning the 12 foot aisle, but it does not extend over the stalls. So there are beams at the tops of the stalls, but then it's open all the way to the top of the roof. Both my vet and my trimmer have commented on how well ventilated and airy my barn feels. It helps that I have dutch doors leading into the paddock. The tops of those stay open except in the worst of storms, so lots of air flow and they can stick their heads out. In the summer, the bottoms stay open too so the horses can choose whether they come in or out. Sometimes when it's very hot and the flies are bad, they will come into the barn, which is always much cooler and where there are fewer flies.

I have heated water buckets and would not want to live without them. Get a frost-free hydrant for water and dig way, way down. Ours is below frost line, but where the water comes out of the ground, into the tack room, sometimes it can freeze. I have heard bad things about automatic waterers overflowing and flooding stalls, then freezing so I opted not to go that route. 

I did put windows in my stalls (that's in addition to the tops of the dutch doors). But they were placed so high that the horses can't reach them. They can't look out them either, but the windows can be opened so they provide air flow and light. Since the horses can see out the tops of the dutch doors, I don't care that they can't see out their stall windows. Also, I had my contractor build a 10 foot long overhang that spans both stalls in the paddock. So 10 feet by 24 feet (my stalls are 10 x 12 - I have two small horses). I LOVE it and so do the horses! It provides shelter from snow, wind, rain, and sun. They like to hang out under there, and it has kept most of the snow from blowing into their stalls and blocking their stall doors. 

Your plan of being able to walk from the house to the barn seems idyllic, but I know that here, it would be a problem with the insurance company. If a fire were to start in any one of those buildings, it would quickly spread to all of them. So maybe look into that before you build. You might be able to build a type of carport/breezeway so that you would at least have a roof. But honestly, unless you are planning on heating your barn (see paragraph above on that), you are going to have to dress for the cold anyway. I figure my horses have to go outside, so I do too. Mine are out every day unless there is a major blizzard. And even then, I try to let them out a few hours. I don't keep my horses in for cold weather, although when it got to -39 Celcius, I considered it. I just give them extra hay and they can come into their stalls at any time if the wind is too much. 

Hubby plows the path from the house to the barn for me with the snowblower that is kept in the equipment bay part of our barn. Symbiotic relationship  Buy long wool underwear (top and bottom - merino wool doesn't itch like regular wool) and a long down-filled coat that overlaps with your warm winter barn boots (I like arctic Muck boots) and has a warm hood. It's harsh some mornings, but it gets your blood flowing and sure wakes you up! You'll have to go outside to dump your manure anyway. That's fun, after getting a couple of feet of fresh snow. If possible, locate your manure pile downhill from the barn. A muck bucket on one of those round saucer sleds slides right down to the manure pile for you. Forget trying to use a wheelbarrow in snow.


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## Avna (Jul 11, 2015)

Joel Reiter said:


> Is your husband's concern erosion, or the welfare of the horses? If it's erosion, I'd wait and see what path the horses choose and then reinforce as necessary. If he's worried about the horses, do a search on Tevis Cougar Rock and let him watch some video.
> 
> I personally think the steeper and more challenging the obstacles in the pasture, the better your horse will perform on the trail.


We are both concerned with erosion. It is a constant struggle where we live in steep mountains with heavy rainfall in the winter. Since it never rains in summer, there is no grass renewal once the spring rains are over, and pastures are almost invariably overgrazed by july, a cycle of perpetual soil degradation. One thing I am looking forward to is a different set of problems!

I agree with you about challenging pastures. My horse grew up in a big steep mountain pasture. I think she is very much the better for it. She watches her feet on the trail, and is competent no matter what the terrain.


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## horselovinguy (Oct 1, 2013)

Good comments from so many already...
I would add...
Winters in the northeast are unpredictable at best....
Where you describe can have mild to sub-zero temperatures, rain to blizzard conditions and snow accumulations.

I would consider a loft so you can have a ceiling height to contain body heat in winter and funnel breezes in warm & humid summers.
Instead of a metal roof consider a real roof of plywood and shingles as you have snow load to handle and not sure metal is strong enough to hold not only snow but icing conditions.
Windows that have shutters to open and close instead of glass or you need high windows where you get light, you get ventilation but you don't get any curious noses from either inside or out touching.
Unless you are going to have behemoth sized horses you don't truly need 14'x14' stalls.
12'x12' stalls are more than adequate for up to 17 hand horses...you don't need them to do endurance laps inside. Huge stalls are more work to clean, more materials of bedding needed and can make a huge difference in cost when building.
A 36' wide barn would be a minimum width giving you multiples of 12' for stalls and aisles.
A overhang minimum of 8' wide but preferably 12'++ would give you the added protection from weather and enough width for a horse to "hide" from the days weather.
You mentioned a wash stall....incorporate that idea with a area for the vet and farrier to work inside, with superb lighting and electrical powered outlets to run emergency equipment for "just in case" situations.
I would add enough room under the roof for storage of wheelbarrow, manure forks, extra shavings, a few bales of hay, feed....to list a few. When wind-driven rains or snow drifts arrive it is not pleasant to be dragging "necessities" through inclement, horrible weather.
Don't forget you need a frost-free water hydrant or better system for watering the animals in frozen winter.
Proper positioning of your barn will give you cooling winds in summer and warmth of sun in winter...
A tractor with 4WD is a must for grooming of pasture and plowing of snow....make sure it is large enough in size to do all your tasks needing done.

Planning is such fun....
I hope you fulfill your biggest and brightest dreams.... 
:runninghorse2:....


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## tim62988 (Aug 30, 2012)

for water if you are going with a new line put in a frost free hydrant, if that isn't an option throw some heat tape around the hydrant and wrap it in insulation then wrap the insulation in duct tape to keep the water off.

since you are building I would just run an electric conduit down the outside of the stalls overhead the door and put in 2 outlets and use heated water buckets: https://www.tractorsupply.com/tsc/product/allied-precision-heated-flatback-bucket-5-gal?cm_vc=-10005

you can get away with 2 outlets if instead of having 3 stalls where door is on the left bucket on the right you switch one stall to a door on the right bucket on the left so the water bucket for the 2 stalls is only divided by a stall partition. in the barn we haven't had the water freeze in the heated buckets even when it was -30 outside.

for the outside we just have a muck bucket with a submersible water heater and it works pretty well TSC also has a larger version (if you have any friends in the area you are moving to have them check out tractor supply right now, I just bought a spare 20qt bucket for $25 or 30 vs the usual $40)


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## Acadianartist (Apr 21, 2015)

horselovinguy said:


> Instead of a metal roof consider a real roof of plywood and shingles as you have snow load to handle and not sure metal is strong enough to hold not only snow but icing conditions.


The metal roof is not a problem. We have a rather large snow load in my area, and I can assure you, my metal roof is more than capable of handling it. It's easy to find out snow load for any area. The metal is just the covering, what really matters are the trusses. They have to be build to hold up everything. I watched them put them on and it was quite an impressive sight! We didn't skimp on the roof for obvious reasons, and I feel quite confident that this barn will be there as long as our house. It was also built on a full concrete foundation with a 4 foot frost wall so it will never move.

Now, building a wooden barn and covering it with metal is different from buying those metal buildings they try so hard to sell you. I don't have a lot of confidence in those.


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## Acadianartist (Apr 21, 2015)

tim62988 said:


> for water if you are going with a new line put in a frost free hydrant, if that isn't an option throw some heat tape around the hydrant and wrap it in insulation then wrap the insulation in duct tape to keep the water off.


Again, I have to comment on this from personal experience. Get the frost-free hydrant. I did everything to keep my water from freezing, but it still froze. The problem is that it freezes where it comes out of the ground and reaches the frost line, which happens well before it actually gets above your floor level. So the part where the water freezes is not accessible to put heat tape on since it is somewhere underground.


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## tim62988 (Aug 30, 2012)

Acadianartist said:


> Again, I have to comment on this from personal experience. Get the frost-free hydrant. I did everything to keep my water from freezing, but it still froze. The problem is that it freezes where it comes out of the ground and reaches the frost line, which happens well before it actually gets above your floor level. So the part where the water freezes is not accessible to put heat tape on since it is somewhere underground.


good point, ours is actually filled with sand so our heat tape goes down into the ground a bit.


I would also ask some locals about their barns and what they wish they had done differently. i get lake effect snow so it's light and blows around quite a bit, you will get snow off the ocean which will be heavy & wet but not as much snow. so metal roof with a steeper pitch may help snow slide off, or a roof built with shingles at a more moderate slope so you can shovel it off it needed 

if you do sliding doors on the end ask the locals as sometimes a door that slides on the inside of the wall vs the traditional outside is a bit nicer, you can keep the track clear inside easier than snow/ice building up against the wall on the outside


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## Avna (Jul 11, 2015)

Acadianartist said:


> I live in eastern Canada, 1.5 hours from the Maine border. So it depends on where you are moving to in New England, but you'll probably have a similar climate to mine.
> 
> I have a steel barn with a steel roof. The noise doesn't bother me or the horses one bit. I did not insulate my barn. No one here does, because we don't heat or ventilate our barns. Our summers don't get so hot that you need ventilation (as long as you have high ceilings and good natural ventilation with lots of windows), and heating a barn in the winter in this part of the world is prohibitive for most. Maybe not where you're going though, but literally no one heats their barn here. Tack room, maybe. I don't know anyone who has a wash stall for that reason. We don't wash our horses in the winter, because they would freeze to death. We do ride all winter. So what if they have a thick winter coat? We don't ride them that hard so they don't get sweaty. We don't clip, but I do blanket Harley because he coughs when it gets cold. Kodak rarely gets blanketed (like twice last winter in freezing rain). She just grows a coat like a grizzly and the cold doesn't bother her one bit.
> 
> ...


I like your barn! I have borrowed some ideas from it already, by the way . . . and will save the ones here as well.

I also like the connected farm buildings motif. They are still very common in the part of New England I'd be in. I would build a firewall between the machine shop/garage and the house though. A roofed connector like a breezeway is, to be honest, almost as much a fire hazard as a connecting building. Those open rafters are a fire conduit. The climate of most of California is termed a fire ecology. Wildfires are part of everyday rural thinking. For example, there is a local volunteer wildfire horse rescue network, that gets called up most years in fire season. It would be interesting to see what the building codes are out there. From what I have read, most barn fires are caused by faulty or rat-eaten wiring, damp hay, plus an accumulation of dusty cobwebs, which are like tinder. Plus poor judgement like improperly situated and protected heat lamps, or letting horses have seances with candles. 

I don't mind dressing for cold (I already have my merino undies thanks!), but I am sixty years old, and have a hope this will be my last house, and have a desire to not break something falling on the ice when I'm ninety-two, doddering out the winter stable to feed my old horses. The insulation will be for the tack room only. Not insulating a whole barn, good heavens.


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## horselovinguy (Oct 1, 2013)

Avna said:


> I also like the connected farm buildings motif. They are still very common in the part of New England I'd be in.* I would build a firewall between the machine shop/garage and the house though.* A roofed connector like a breezeway is, to be honest, almost as much a fire hazard as a connecting building. Those open rafters are a fire conduit.


You need to build more than just a firewall between machine shop/garage and the barn too....
Noises & smells that mean nothing to you, to your horse, it _*will*_ freak them out.
Scatter and run in fright in their stalls if you use certain types of machinery or certain activities done.
Horses are way more sensitive to smell, sound, and especially electrical current running...
You know that "fight or flight" thing they still have....
I get wanting to be "connected" but I have also seen how "freaked" a horse was from running certain tools in our friends garage with the horses having a adjoining stable wall!
Just beware and build accordingly...
:runninghorse2:...


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## Acadianartist (Apr 21, 2015)

I think that if you can achieve a connected pathway to the barn, you will have achieved what all of us living in this cold climate dream of. One of my friends just finished the top of his barn and moved into the loft. It is actually quite a nice space! Problem solved, LOL 

But if you can do it and remain within building codes for insurance purposes and fire-safety, you'll love it. Except the part where you still have to haul their manure outside... maybe design a chute system??? 

We do have an equipment bay in the barn where my husband keeps a tractor, two 4 wheelers and various other things. Now, there is no welding done in there and the scariest tool is the cordless drill. The horses don't care. Of course the equipment bay is fully shut off from the barn side - floor to roof, but with double wide doors for machinery to get through easily. The noise don't bother the horses a bit. They're more likely to spook at a cyclist than a tractor. Go figure. I wouldn't put in a real workshop with welding equipment, but for things like tractors, snowblowers, etc., it's fine. In fact, it's very useful to me because the tractor can move the manure and the snowblower clears a path.


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## carshon (Apr 7, 2015)

Our horses have a lean too off our 45X64 shed. We do everything in that shed (weld, hammer, start motors, grind) and the horses do not bolt out of the shed or seem phased in the least. 

Our shed is about 25 yards from our house. As other said we could not build it closer due to the hay stored in it and the potential for a fire hazard. Our shed also has the main fuse box for the house in it. One thing I would say about having horses that close to the house is- be prepared for noise and some additional flies.

I am not saying this is bad - I am just saying that with our windows open in the summer we can hear EVERYTHING that goes on in the shedrow of stalls and their runs. I can remember watching TV in bed one night and hearing a loud gaseous explosion from one of the horses and laughing until I had tears running down my face. there is still some smell and flies even when stalls are cleaned daily. 

My horses spend the day in a sacrifice lot with minimal pasture turnout (just an hour or so daily) and about 8-10 hours in the stall with a run.

So excited for you and your horse. No more boarding issues!


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## Chasin Ponies (Dec 25, 2013)

From the stables I have boarded, there seem to be a couple of things they all lack or were mistakes in the original building.

One is making sure that the area in the stall where the horse eats is completely separate from their water source. Seems like a no brainer but they all have had water bucket or auto waterer, hay rack and grain pan in the same corner of the stall. Bad idea. The water bucket gets hay/grain in it every day and has to be dumped and cleaned continually. 

The other one that has been a problem is adequate lighting and electrical plugs. Don't scrimp on those or underestimate how dark the inside of a stable can get, especially while grooming or treating an injury. You can provide a lot of natural light and save energy on the electric bill by installing some translucent roof panels. Some people will claim that they leak, but the farmers around here who have them say they never leak if installed property.

Another thing I've run across is concrete walkways that are finished too smooth and slippery. I suspect they had the contractor come in and didn't remember to tell them that horses need a rougher surface finish for traction. I've watched a lot of horses fall in the aisle because the concrete was finished for humans, not horses!

And, something I see a lot that really surprises me is outside concrete surfaces angled flat or sloping into the barn!!! Constant flooding straight into the barn and stalls. I guess you'd have to really have to monitor and communicate with your concrete contractor.

Yeah, these do sound like obvious things to remember but it's surprising to see how many barns have these issues. The owners always shake their heads in regret but it's too late to fix it!


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## Avna (Jul 11, 2015)

Chasin Ponies said:


> From the stables I have boarded, there seem to be a couple of things they all lack or were mistakes in the original building.
> 
> One is making sure that the area in the stall where the horse eats is completely separate from their water source. Seems like a no brainer but they all have had water bucket or auto waterer, hay rack and grain pan in the same corner of the stall. Bad idea. The water bucket gets hay/grain in it every day and has to be dumped and cleaned continually.
> 
> ...


These are all great ideas to think about. I am familiar with badly draining concrete myself. My goat barn used to flood ... last night I was thinking of concrete in the stalls (mats and bedding over this) with a very slight slope toward the aisle. Aisle is slightly crowned, and there are grate-covered gutters along both side of the aisle. Heavily brushed concrete aisle but I would mat the grooming area. And the idea about a wash stall which was super-lit for vet and farrier work is being added to my list. 

I wonder what the best design for natural light would be?


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## waresbear (Jun 18, 2011)

If you put in an true hydrant, it won't freeze unless it's not deep enough, has to be below the frost line, 6' I believe. Because the water drains back when you shut it off, it doesn't freeze. We get -40 and colder, never had the hydrant freeze.


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## Acadianartist (Apr 21, 2015)

waresbear said:


> If you put in an true hydrant, it won't freeze unless it's not deep enough, has to be below the frost line, 6' I believe. Because the water drains back when you shut it off, it doesn't freeze. We get -40 and colder, never had the hydrant freeze.


THIS! The only thing I would change in my barn. Do it!


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## Avna (Jul 11, 2015)

Hydrant is on the list now.


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## jaydee (May 10, 2012)

Mass. has much the same climate as CT
Winters are mostly cold (as in below freezing) from the end of December through to March. It warms up fast once you get into May and then it stays that way. 
We don't get much mud here at all because the grounds either frozen or it drains away and dries up really fast
I personally wouldn't have a metal roof unless it was insulated - too cold in the winter and too hot in the summer
We have fans in our barn that are used a lot from July through to October
I second (or third) the hydrant. Something we regret not doing when we built the addition to our barn so we have to store water in tubs in there. OK in summer as we leave the hosepipe from the garage lying across the drive all the time but not so great in winter
In the winter you might need to look at some way to keep water from freezing in the buckets.
Our barn has a door at each end and each stable has either 1 or 2 windows. Some of the windows are still the original small paned safety glass that we remove altogether in the warm/hot weather but some have been replaced with sash type windows that we bought from Home Depot that slide open and have an insect screen built into them
We do have a hay loft above the stables but I'm not sure I would have built it that way, its handy for storing stuff but to easily get hay up there you need an elevator and you still have to manually lug bales down the stairs when you need to use them. DH is working on a trap door idea so we can just drop them through.
Not sure if you've looked at any companies that sell barns and parts for DIY builders but we've used these guys and they're really helpful and sell a good range of stuff. They have some floorplans that might help you with ideas too
https://www.barndepot.com/shop
http://circleb.com/


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