- Location
- Carmarthenshire, West Wales
A track "open" to the fields is great too when slurry/muck spreading as you can drive onto the field at a different point each time so stopping getting ruts in a gateway (and silaging if the ground is a little wet too), so a fence would be a big disadvantage to the farmer, not even thinking about the hassle of getting a field number for a new parcel and having to change IACS maps when doing single farm payment.One side is already fenced, so by fencing both sides you'd create a long thin fenced area that was difficult to drive up and down with wide farm equipment, plus getting into the track from the fields either side with tractors and trailers would be equally difficult. If you made the fenced area wide enough to allow easy machinery access you then lose more grazing area and create a job for yourself to maintain the areas that used to be grazed but would now just grow tall grass and weeds. I can totally see why the farmer doesn't want a completely fenced off track, it would be nothing but extra hassle for him and his workers/contractors and he gains nothing from it. So why would he agree to it?
When you want to do a deal both sides have to gain something they want. The OP gains from a fence, what does the farmer gain?
I think the first port of call would be, look at the deeds and your correspondence with your solicitor regarding the matter when you bought the house. Rights of access is a legal minefield. Is your access for social, domestic and pleasure? How wide is your right for? Do you have just access or are you allowed to maintain the road?
If someone had access through my field and decided to place 100 tons of planings on it unilaterally I would be tamping, big time!
I have also read on here not to use planings for cow tracks, as the stones in the planings cause lameness in the cattle.