This year has been filled with many changes due to COVID-19, from the way we socialize, to how businesses and schools operate, not to mention the effect the pandemic has had on sports and recreation. With indoor facilities including ice rinks closed, maybe 2020 is the year to consider creating your first backyard ice rink.
Crookston resident Mike Enright has built a backyard rink for his family each of the past five years and has used various materials to create the rink each year. “This is year five on that one,” said Enright. “We’ve used everything from railroad ties to some lumber. This year we’re using some leftover tile from a farmer’s field that blew out and got tangled up. So, I asked him if I could pick it up, and he wanted it out of there, so I picked it up and set up a rink. It’s going to work out pretty good this year. It’s 50×90 this year, which I think is the biggest I’ve done. It went down a lot easier than I thought. I did it all by myself in a morning.”
According to Enright, the weather has been a little warm for creating ice without a liner, but as the weather turns colder even rinks without liners should be able to start making ice by mid-December. “If I had a liner in this thing, I think I could probably start flooding it this week,” said Enright. “When the weather cools down with more days in the 30s to high 20s, and then the nights are in the teens. I know some guys who have already flooded their rinks in town, making ice. The pond behind our house is making ice right now, even with the heat going on. But without a liner, a guy has to wait for the ground to freeze, so it will be a little bit closer to mid-December until I can start sprinkling that one right now.”
Enright said outdoor rinks can be as simple or as creative as someone wants to make them, from flooding a depression to buying or building boards. “The easiest thing you can do is take the garden hose, hook it up to a sprinkler, and let it go once this weather changes,” said Enright. “Low depressions work great. Anywhere where water collects, it’s going to come out to be a great little pond to skate on. The easiest way to do it is to clear the snow off an area, get the ground to freeze solid, build up some snowbanks that are basically your boards, and hit it with water. The second way to go about it is to start picking up some hay, straw bales; I’ve used railroad ties. Anything simple like that can form a perimeter, and you can lay a tarp inside will work pretty good. Smaller ones will work better with that type of material.”
If you want a larger rink size, Enright suggests going with lumber, finding a way to level the ground, and considering a liner. “If you start going bigger, lumber works great,” said Enright. “You can get a lot of different stuff to work for you if you can rip some sheets of plywood that works amazing. All you have to do is make sure you’re backing it and putting in your supports every eight feet and another one in between those to hold it up. As far as liners, those are simple, just poly. The same stuff a guy poly’s the inside of his house with. The same stuff you can pick up at any lumber yard. In fact, a lot of these lumber yards are going to have a rink kit for you. If you wanted to talk to them about it, they’d be able to figure out exactly what you need. Some guys do use 2x4s, 2x6s, 2x10s, which works great as well. The biggest key, though, is to find a spot that isn’t too slanted. If you have a lot of slant in your yard, you’re going to want to fix that some way, shape, or form. Otherwise, it does end up being a lot more water than you think.”
Enright said he had 10-12 inches of slope that created challenges in previous years but redid his yard to level it off. Other solutions can be less costly to reduce slope. “I had one side of the rink that was almost 14 inches deep, and the other side was about two,” said Enright. “So, it was very thin. It would break out on the high side, and my low side took forever to thaw out. If you have a lot of slopes, you can deal with it. You can pack it down with different materials. You can try using snow in there and freezing that down, or try putting it under your tarp or liner. Some people use pallets and will build it up. I’ve seen people with 20 inches of slope in their yards, and they’ll use pallets to back that, straw bales. Or you can use dirt if you really want to get excited and get somebody to come in and level your yard for you, I guess. There are all kinds of things a person can do for that.”
Enright said several places will also cut liners for whatever size rink you make. “There is a lot of places you can visit,” said Enright. “There is a lot of great resources. There are ones that will custom cut a tarp for you. If you tell them how big your rink is, they’ll calculate how big of a tarp you need. They’ll cut it for you, and sell it to you. Otherwise, you could go to your farm dealerships and find someone that does silage tarps. Generally, they have a selection that would fit your rink. The key is to try to go about five feet longer and five feet wider than the rink you have. Just drape it over the top and clamp it. On Fitzgerald’s rink, you see that where they had clamps holding it together when they flooded it. Otherwise, pool noodles across the top, if you have sharp edges, work perfectly. There are all kinds of solutions. It’s really dealer’s choice on what you want to do, what you can afford and scrounge up.”
There are also kits people can get or can be created by a business, although Enright said there are plenty of other resources in the community if you want to build your rink yourself. “They sell kits that are actually plastic boards, stackable, with their own braces built for them and everything,” said Enright. “But to be honest, if you want to wing it and do it yourself, there is nothing wrong with that either. There are plenty of people in town who are a good resource to help you out and point you in the right direction. Tell you what has worked for them, what they’ve failed at, and what hasn’t worked. There is a lot of times a guy is going to screw something up, but it’s still way more fun than not doing it.”
Two such resources Enright suggested are on Facebook. One is the group Backyard Ice Rinks (here), with people from all of Minnesota and the country talking about their backyard rinks. The other is Crookston Neighborhood Rinks (here), with local resources to help you build your first rink. These resources can also help you connect with where you can purchase used boards.
Enright also suggested that lights be added to the rink if possible because of how short the days get during Crookston’s winters. “Lighting is great if you’ve got it,” said Enright. “It gives you a lot more timeframe, especially since you know how winter is around here. It’s going to get dark and dark quick and long. When it comes to maintenance, you’ve got to keep it clean. If you can keep it clean, it will stay good ice. If you get some heat and sunshine, it will resurface itself. It’s just if you let the snow sit on it; it turns into a bit of a problem. It will get that ice in rough shape, so if you can go out and shovel it, or you kids can go out and shovel it, it works perfect. It will stay nice for the year and will be a ton of fun all year long.”
Enright added that building a backyard rink takes advantage of Crookston’s biggest natural resource during the winter, cold weather, while also providing a great winter family activity. “This winter is going to be a tough one,” said Enright. “We have all the COVID restrictions. This is a great way to get out of the house, spend family time together, stay connected, active, and enjoy the area that we’ve got. We’ve got one great natural resource around here; it gets cold. We might as well take advantage of that and use it for some fun. I think this is a great way to do it.”
Aunt Polly’s Slough is a natural area with ice and has even featured youth hockey games in the past. The slough is also nearly ready for skating and nets.
