Converting a horse arena back to ....

[ChanceTheRapids]

We keep seeing a lot of properties that have horse arenas, just big arenas full of sand.

We don't have horses and aren't really interested in getting them, so we're kind of confused on what we should/could do with this. It seems that it's a LOT of sand. Adding organic matter to turn it back into a good loam may take a considerable amount of time. Digging it out is one option, but I'm not really sure what we'd do with all that sand

Anyone else had this issue? What did you do?

Thanks

[RonM]

Disc it up several times , mix the sand in with the soil, plant turnips the first year then maybe roto till or moldboard plow it , should be good as new in a year or so.....

[ChanceTheRapids]

Thanks RonM!

[1sttimemom]

A lot of arenas are sprayed with foliage killer. Just FYI...

[BlueRose]

Advertise it on here or craiglist. Free Sand you load. Where I am at we are putting sand in the garden where the neighbor's horses spend the Winter 2 years ago and it is still packed down hard. I am using it here on my place to loosen the clay in the flower beds.

[Lyvia]

Hmm. Interesting question - we are on the other side of it: we have a sort of flat wooded area we hope to make into a riding arena. I wonder if there is anything we should do at this stage to preserve options for other uses later.

I did see a large roofed area for dog training once.

Beach parties?

[Rectifier]

If you plan on keeping any sort of livestock, keep the arena. If its anything like arenas around here it has a nice stockade fence around it? You can add a chute and some panels to divide it up, you can make a nice set of corrals. Or you can use it as a stock yard for feeding up lambs etc.

Otherwise I agree to disk it up and grow root crops that like deep sandy soil. Seems a waste of good fence though.