Clean Run - October 2012 - 52

Center’s surface to meet the requirements of a wide variety of different events including dog agility, horse shows, trade shows, and more, says, “River sand is a course sand that allows for fine-tuning.” Care must be taken when applying the sand to the surface. Make it too deep and it may be hard to run in. Wade has about 4" of sand in his facility. Elaine Coupé, whose agility ring is home to Memphisagility.com and used by 4 PAWS Agility Club, only has about 2" of sand, and it is mixed with her base clay soil at a rate of 30% sand to 70% soil. Eustis has a couple of inches of course sand topped with an inch of fine sand on her surface. Maintenance of a sand-based surface can be challenging until you know how to make your particular surface work for you. It also varies de-

pending on how you use your surface. A backyard ring that sees a handful of dogs every week differs greatly from an area that hosts multiple agility trials. And a ring that is used for horse shows and other events along with agility will have quite different needs. Most dirt/sand surfaces that are outdoors will require occasional weeding. Eustis says, “A couple of times in the summer I go around with Roundup to make sure that grasses/weeds don’t encroach.” She also tackles any leaves that blow onto the surface. “I use a battery-operated Ryobi leaf blower to blow leaves out around the edges,” she says. Rings that are under cover or don’t get much sun might have some problems with algae growth. Nield says, “Sometimes there is a green algae/moss growth that I have to spray with bleach to

kill it, and keep the dogs off it for about a week, until I can rake it under again.” Grading is a fact of life for most sand rings. Most of the time, dirt/sand/clay combination rings get hard over time as the sand gets packed down. Footing may also become uneven. Grading, raking, and otherwise breaking up hard sections and smoothing it all loosely down is necessary for a good surface. Coupé says about her sand ring, “I try to grade it once a month, but don’t always make it. I have a DR grader (www.drpower. com/) that is advertised for maintaining driveways. Basically it’s about a $1,200 grader/smoother that has teeth in front, so it digs [the sand] up then smooths it back down.” Wade has created a “prescription” for preparing the Tennessee Livestock Center’s surface for agility,

and it involves a week-long process of chisel plowing, gentle packing, work with landscape tractors using an attachment like the TR3 Rake from ABI Attachments (www.abiattachments.com/ products/tr3_rake.html), and watering with a garden hose. Watering is often a crucial part of maintaining sand arenas because it reduces dust and maintains the graded condition for a longer period of time. Deborah Davidson Harpur, who has sand over hard pack at her California home, says that watering also reduces the heat on the surface of sand in bright sunlight. “In the really hot summer sometimes I will go and water the sand down just so no feet get burned.” Watering can be a tedious process. Coupé says, “I don’t mind the grading, but I hate the watering after. If you don’t

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Clean Run | October 12

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Clean Run - October 2012

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Clean Run - October 2012