How many horses and ponies per hectare (acre)?
Surrey County is divided into seven distinct landscape types, from the open, often treeless landscape of the Thames Floodplain to the rolling, enclosed and wooded landscape of the High Weald. Each area has different soil conditions, which dictates the number of horses and ponies that can be kept on a given area. The British Horse Society (BHS) recommends between 0.4 and 0.8ha (1-2 acres) of pasture for each horse during the summer. But of course horses and ponies are all different, and this may be far too much grazing for a Shetland pony! Different types of horses and ponies have different needs, and this must be taken into consideration. Overgrazed paddocks not only look awful, but are also bad for the horses and ponies in them, as the risk of harmful worms building up is far greater. Perhaps a good general aim on Surrey’s clay soils should be for 1.2 hectare (3 acres) per horse.
