Jessica Jahiel's HORSE-SENSE Newsletter Archives

Outdoor arena dust

From: Lori

Dear Jessica, you won't remember me, but I was an auditor at one of your dressage clinics many years ago and you were kind enough to include all of us, not just the riders, in your discussion period. You gave me some advice about building an outdoor arena at home. I had it done just as you suggested, with road base over compacted earth with two inches of sand on top for footing. The way our land is, we had to cut a level place for the arena into the side of a hill which is why I only have a small arena.

So anyway I built my outdoor arena almost exactly ten years ago and it has been really great for most of that time, like the first eight years. It's still flat, it drains great, and I love it. But the last two years I have been noticing more and more dust, which would make sense if we were in a drought but we aren't. The dust keeps getting worse and riding is a lot less fun. Even though we aren't in a drought, our air is dry and we can't really afford to water the arena every night which is basically what I would have to do to keep the dust down. We tried doing that for a week and it was much better but we can't afford to use that much water all the time, we need it for our cattle.

Can you suggest anything that would let us cut down on the dust without having to use so much water? I see ads for all these products and I know people who use them in their indoor arenas, but we have all the sun and wind outdoors, so I don't know if those would work for us. My husband has a friend who worked at the race track until just a couple of years back, and Dale said that the track used sand that was coated with polymer and there was never any dust at all no matter how dry the weather was. That sounds perfect but it probably costs a lot. Do you know about this stuff? Also the footing in my arena is getting thin and I know we need to add more, but I didn't know if adding more sand would be a good idea or if there was something you could suggest that wouldn't get so dusty, also I would really like to know where all the dust is coming from, because it wasn't like this before. If it keeps getting worse with the dust getting higher and higher, I don't know if I can go on riding in there.

Thank you, Lori

Hi Lori! I'm glad the advice worked out for you. Without seeing your arena, it's hard to be entirely sure but I suspect that there's a connection between your thinner footing and the dust. I think that the dust you're seeing IS your footing - the sand, over the last ten years, has been breaking down into smaller and smaller particles, so now you have less cushion for your horse's feet, and more dust in the air.

This isn't good - you don't want to be breathing all that dust, and you don't want your horse breathing it either - but it IS normal. Footing - even sand - deteriorates over time. You've had the same footing for ten years, and it sounds as though it's time for you to have what's left of your sand removed and replaced with new (coarse, angular, quartz) sand. If you've been using your arena for ten years and the footing is only now becoming too dusty to live with, I'd say you've done very well and you shouldn't feel bad about having what's left of that footing removed, and new sand added.

The sort of products that your instructor is using in her indoor arena can help retain moisture, but I wouldn't advise you to invest in any such products at this point. As you point out, there's a big difference between an indoor and an outdoor arena. But more to the point, the various products that can keep arena footing reasonably moist will simply not work if the footing is mostly dust. Once you've had the dust/powder/sand removed and replaced, it might be worth your time to look into some of the available products. Don't buy anything based on an ad, though. Call and talk directly with the manufacturer's representatives, and be sure that they understand exactly where you live and what your climate is like, and are giving advice accordingly.

Talk to as many manufacturers and supplier as you can, make notes, and keep track of the numbers involved. Of course it would be lovely to be able to put polymer-coated sand - the racetrack footing that your husband's friend recommended - into your arena, but most people simply cannot afford the prices associated with that sort of footing. You may find that it's easier, infinitely less expensive, and much more sensible to budget for some sand removal and replacement every nine years or so.

Jessica

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