if the ditch is up top the field its fine to put the spoil on the side of the ditch, if its down bottom then it can be a bit silly depending on the lie of the land, then it wants carting away to fill up odd hollows or bits that don't have much topsoil, this is the obvious thing to do
River Lugg, Herefordshire
- Thread starter hootbe
- Start date
- Status
Exfarmer
Member
- Location
- Bury St Edmunds
Come on Henarar, this is common sense, so obviously will never get into the rules
I was told at a Seminar run by the EA a few years back, that we are required to put spoil on top of the ditch bank.... Hence my earlier comment. Last place I want it, building up the bank higher and higher, and if the spoil is wet, finding its way back in...
Suffice to say, traditionally if I'm working on arable land, the spoil was always placed on a stubble or next to a growing crop, as far away as possible from the ditch, and then incorporated. Obviously, with 6m buffers, that is a stretch with a small digger, so I worked at and angle with the digger, so I can track each bucket full onto the stubble with each move. Moving to a 3t machine resolved that issue
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Steevo
Member
- Location
- Gloucestershire
Good point that. It would also contain reduced levels of pollutants when done more often.
Many pollutants come from motorway runoff draining into ditches. I bet that water contains plenty of oil and tyre rubber at times.....but once diluted by ditches it rarely shows up at sampling points. Do motorway drains have oil traps fitted?
- Location
- Essex
You have a point but are you suggesting the farmer is happy to lose so much topsoil so quickly? It#'s the most valuable thing on the farm surely?
- Location
- Glen Clova, Angus, DD8 4RD
When the EU waste directive came in the UK interpretation was that river silt became waste once the bucket had deposited it. It also has to be chemically analysed before work starts and if any contaminants exceed levels set in law it becomes hazardous waste.
Overnight this raised the cost of desilting projects around 5 fold in most places. Around here we stopped all rural desilting immediately and even clearing the critical channels in London became too expensive in many cases (all classified as hazardous thus having to be carted 70 miles to a licensed tip at Peterborough so only 1 load per lorry per day)
1 step forward, 3 steps back.
- Location
- Glen Clova, Angus, DD8 4RD
It appears they are as they keep letting it happen!
- Location
- Glen Clova, Angus, DD8 4RD
Most do but they seldom get maintained these days in my past experience and so overflow.
There used to be an oil boom on the river Lee at Luton Hoo, Just outside the town. Contractors used to pump a tanker of waste oil a week out of the site to prevent it contaminating the rest of the river.
Steevo
Member
- Location
- Gloucestershire
Not at all. I’m sure the farmer/landowner didn’t want that to happen for one second and is more upset than anyone else that he has lost his valuable topsoil.
The EA almost suggest from their tweet that he is complicit or cutting corners. Should those who have had their houses flooded, kitchens damaged and sofas ruined also receive a visit from the EA. Would they be happy to have lost their valuable assets too?
It’s easy shutting the door after the horse has bolted. Hindsight is 20/20 and all that.
Farmers cannot always do the ideal outcome for whatever the future holds. When dealing with nature we cannot see the future or determine every factor. For example this year many winter wheat crops had delayed planting due to the high % of spring crops planted last year, which would have resulted in a later harvest and pushed everything back, meaning crops are less developed than they might ideally be for this time of year.
I have fields on my farm planted in Sept, Oct and Nov. Not out of choice, but because of late harvest, trying to fit in ditching in between, difficult drilling conditions and a large proportion of the farm going into winter wheat as the crop most likely to turn a profit.
The October planted wheat the contractors ploughed and power harrowed in looks a picture because it has established well and so may hold the soil well even on sloping ground. Sept wheat that I DD’d in looks worse in many places so less roots to hold the soil but perhaps the reduced soil movement when planting makes it safer even despite the lack of soil cover or poorer rooting. There is no one right answer.
If someone can tell me exactly how the season will go, I will happily make all the right decisions at the right times. Until then, I shall just keep trying me best to do what is right on the day.
Exfarmer
Member
- Location
- Bury St Edmunds
We were approached by a waste company, to build a lagoon to take water from an airfield about 15 miles away at their expense. They had been offered the contract to take away water off the runway which was no longer going to be allowed into the river due to the use of Urea de icer.
we declined and later met up with the manager of the company who told me that they had persaueded another farmer to go for it . He said after the first load was emptied in the new lagoon the farmer refused to allow any more due to the thick layer of kerosene on the top.
- Location
- Essex
I agree with all that and we are in a similar position to you. Looks like a bit of a risk cultivating on a slope like that at any time of year especially with the extreme weather we now get. Loose soil is loosely held though isn't it?
Steevo
Member
- Location
- Gloucestershire
Better a good crop on loose soil or a poor/no crop on less disturbed soil?
I bet the EA would want their cake and eat it!
- Location
- Essex
True but once the top soil has gone it's no crop
Steevo
Member
- Location
- Gloucestershire
....and yet the EA encourage slowing up rivers and flooding of farmland.
- Location
- Essex
Yes because slow water drops soil as sediment; fast water takes it away....and yet the EA encourage slowing up rivers and flooding of farmland.
Steevo
Member
- Location
- Gloucestershire
....and when rivers overflow onto farmland and wash the topsoil away with them?
Need these guys in charge of the whole country
MAINTENANCE DREDGING &BANK RAISING.
Maintenance dredging forms an important part of the Commissioners’ channel maintenance works. It is critical to the efficient operation of the Commissioners’ artificially pumped and gravity systems to dredge silt deposits from channel beds as, over time, watercourses’ and drainage channels’ silt deposits naturally build up as they are carried into them by water flows.
The gradual build-up of silt and decaying plant material along the channel bed prevents efficient water conveyancing during heavy rainfall and pumping events, and can also make statutory navigation of the Commissioners’ system difficult.
The Commissioners periodically undertake channel bed surveys of their watercourses. The survey information is plotted and used to help prioritise and programme where future maintenance dredging works are required.
Most maintenance dredging work is pre-planned to be undertaken during the colder winter months. This helps to reduce the impact on local wildlife habitat, ecology and navigation traffic.
Contractors are used to undertake maintenance dredging works, using Long Reach Excavators. They are able to reach out into the water channels and efficiently remove silt to a uniformed pre-determined bed level.
The silt dredgings at this point have a high-water content, and are placed along the back of the grass embankments to dry out sufficiently until they can be re-handled later in the summer months.
Silt drying can take a few months, and sometimes requires a digger to return to site to ‘open up’ the silt, inverting the wet material at the bottom of the piles, to allows the entire depth of material to be dried out uniformly.
Once the silt material has dried out, it is either levelled on adjacent arable fields and returned back into the cropping rotation in the autumn months, or if the bank crest height adjacent to the dredging site is deemed to be low, and the dredged material is of the correct quality, it is placed onto the bank top and levelled out to raise the bank height to meet the Commissioners’ bank level requirements. This provides a great saving to the Commissioners’ expenditure and prevents the need of importing bank raising materials from elsewhere to complete the task.
When the silt is levelled out onto the newly raised bank crest, it is sown with a hard-wearing grass seed mixture and left for a few months to establish.
From silt survey to grass seed establishment, the Maintenance Dredging and Bank Raising process takes approximately a year to complete.
MAINTENANCE DREDGING &BANK RAISING.
Maintenance dredging forms an important part of the Commissioners’ channel maintenance works. It is critical to the efficient operation of the Commissioners’ artificially pumped and gravity systems to dredge silt deposits from channel beds as, over time, watercourses’ and drainage channels’ silt deposits naturally build up as they are carried into them by water flows.
The gradual build-up of silt and decaying plant material along the channel bed prevents efficient water conveyancing during heavy rainfall and pumping events, and can also make statutory navigation of the Commissioners’ system difficult.
The Commissioners periodically undertake channel bed surveys of their watercourses. The survey information is plotted and used to help prioritise and programme where future maintenance dredging works are required.
Most maintenance dredging work is pre-planned to be undertaken during the colder winter months. This helps to reduce the impact on local wildlife habitat, ecology and navigation traffic.
Contractors are used to undertake maintenance dredging works, using Long Reach Excavators. They are able to reach out into the water channels and efficiently remove silt to a uniformed pre-determined bed level.
Silt drying can take a few months, and sometimes requires a digger to return to site to ‘open up’ the silt, inverting the wet material at the bottom of the piles, to allows the entire depth of material to be dried out uniformly.
Once the silt material has dried out, it is either levelled on adjacent arable fields and returned back into the cropping rotation in the autumn months, or if the bank crest height adjacent to the dredging site is deemed to be low, and the dredged material is of the correct quality, it is placed onto the bank top and levelled out to raise the bank height to meet the Commissioners’ bank level requirements. This provides a great saving to the Commissioners’ expenditure and prevents the need of importing bank raising materials from elsewhere to complete the task.
When the silt is levelled out onto the newly raised bank crest, it is sown with a hard-wearing grass seed mixture and left for a few months to establish.
From silt survey to grass seed establishment, the Maintenance Dredging and Bank Raising process takes approximately a year to complete.
The 2 metre rule is just an arbitrary rule linked to the English Basic Payment Scheme and has no consideration of such ecological thoughts! It just shows what a minefield of regulation there is that is contradictory at times.
Campbell
Member
- Location
- Herefordshire
1 hr agoBulldozing of Lugg riverbank 'may have stopped flooding'
By Carmelo GarciaLocal Democracy Reporter
The River Lugg in Kingsland pictured this week by Martin Williams
From Hereford Times on line.........
By Carmelo GarciaLocal Democracy Reporter
The River Lugg in Kingsland pictured this week by Martin Williams
From Hereford Times on line.........
Nearly
Member
- Location
- North of York
Dredging and reconstruction of river bank probably stopped flooding.
- Status