We study the dynamics of the geodesic and horocycle flows of the unit tangent bundle $(hat M, T^1mathcal{F})$ of a compact minimal lamination $(M,mathcal F)$ by negatively curved surfaces. We give conditions under which the action of the affine group
generated by the joint action of these flows is minimal, and examples where this action is not minimal. In the first case, we prove that if $mathcal F$ has a leaf which is not simply connected, the horocyle flow is topologically transitive.
A classic result due to Furstenberg is the strict ergodicity of the horocycle flow for a compact hyperbolic surface. Strict ergodicity is unique ergodicity with respect to a measure of full support, and therefore implies minimality. The horocycle flo
w has been previously studied on minimal foliations by hyperbolic surfaces on closed manifolds, where it is known not to be minimal in general. In this paper, we prove that for the special case of Riemannian foliations, strict ergodicity of the horocycle flow still holds. This in particular proves that this flow is minimal, which establishes a conjecture proposed by Matsumoto. The main tool is a theorem due to Coud`ene, which he presented as an alternative proof for the surface case. It applies to two continuous flows defining a measure-preserving action of the affine group of the line on a compact metric space, precisely matching the foliated setting. In addition, we briefly discuss the application of Coud`enes theorem to other kinds of foliations.
We show that the equidistribution theorem of C. Bonatti and X. Gomez-Mont for a special kind of foliations by hyperbolic surfaces does not hold in general, and seek for a weaker form valid for general foliations by hyperbolic surfaces.
We describe several methods to construct minimal foliations by hyperbolic surfaces on closed 3-manifolds, and discuss the properties of the examples thus obtained.