Countryside Stewardship Strips - Being phased out?

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canteron

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Are they are being phased out by 2014? If so, then its back to road hacking for all of us!!

Any farmers on here who know what is happening? And what has it been replaced by?

Thanks
 
The countryside stewardship scheme was actually finished in 2012 and has been replaced by HLS. Can I just add though that none of these strips should be ridden on, the farmers can risk losing their payments.
 
toffeeyummy said:
The countryside stewardship scheme was actually finished in 2012 and has been replaced by HLS. Can I just add though that none of these strips should be ridden on, the farmers can risk losing their payments.
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Is the HLS scheme in essence the same, will they still fund the strips, or are they looking for a different type of conservation?

I have just found the DEFRA site that lists the strips that you can walk/ride on. I think that it depends on the type of scheme you have whether the public have permissive access or not!

http://cwr.defra.gov.uk/
 
It is a higher level scheme. You cannot have access to any of the strips unless it is a bridlepath or footpath. It is purely put there for conservation purposes so must be left alone. We cannot even trim the strips until after July 1. My farmer husband is always getting on at me if I sneak on to one hoping my hoof prints don't show up.....!
 
Under the Higher Level Environmental Stewardship scheme there were some Permisive Bridleways established for 10 years. Sadly this option is no longer available to farmers. They were quite well paid and a real boon to local riders - I use one which has made a real improvement to my hacking.

I suppose that when the 10 years are up it will be closed.
 
If you would like some more permanent local off road riding then I suggest that you support the BHS by joining them as a member which will help to resource more off road bridleways.
The advantage of bridleways is that they are permanent public rights of way.
 
You will find that a lot of farmers will be glad to get out of the stewardship as many of the public have taken advantage of it and gone where they are not permitted and the councils have backed them up, so perhaps it will bring many walkers and riders back down to earth a little as if you don't respect the farmers property don't be surprised when the no entry/no right of way starts going up.
 
I agree. I think a lot of people see those inviting strips of grass around a crop and think it won't harm to have a quick canter down it. This is private land, the same as walking through someone's garden or fenced field.
 
I think there is a bit of confusion. I suspect the OP was talking about the scheme that gave rise to some temporary permissive bridleways, not to sneaky rides along field margin strips. One of the farms near my village has quite an extensive set of these permissive paths & very useful they are too. You can find maps of them listed on the DEFRA website.
 
A farm near here has about 4 miles of off road riding which was originally under the scheme. He has now taken on the funding of it himself, local riders pay a set fee a year to be allowed to use it, and he keeps the tracks maintained. Seems to work very well, not sure how much it costs for riders as I only use it as a walker and it is free for me.:D
 
Echo Bravo said:
You will find that a lot of farmers will be glad to get out of the stewardship as many of the public have taken advantage of it and gone where they are not permitted and the councils have backed them up, so perhaps it will bring many walkers and riders back down to earth a little as if you don't respect the farmers property don't be surprised when the no entry/no right of way starts going up.
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completely agree- were in ELS and it is an invitation.for anyone to trap where they please, walking their dogs through disused railway we shoot, because it looked nice.

A lot of councils are trying to reintroduce permissive paths, I spend a lot of my time fighting them.
 
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