Muck heaps now

R

Rollin

Well-Known Member
Joined
10 March 2008
Messages
4,782
Visit site
The Environment Agency in Yorkshire are now targetting muck heaps. It seems there is no end to the red-tape and 'tax' levied on today's horse riders.

My muck heap in France is taken by my local farmer every 4-6 weeks. He values horse manure for the contribution it makes to top soil. It is usually ploughed into his maize field.

Gardeners value the 'commodity' too. All our local garden centres and agricultural merchants sell horse manure compost at £5 a sack.
 
What are they saying?

I have people calling in to ask if they can have my muck, especially the 'neat' stuff from the small paddocks!

The rest, well, as long as it doesn't cause offence to my neighbours the County doesn't give a monkeys what I do with it.
 
Another regulation.......!!! Thankfully we're in West Yorkshire.
No doubt Mr dogooder is not bought up in the country......What does he think of farmers spreading their slurry???
Our local farmer rotates two trailers all year round, emtying them on his land when they're full. We let him make hay in our 5 acre field for part of the year - he keeps the lot to do what he wants (we feed our horses Fulmart Hayledge as we don't have the storage for bales of hay).
We think he may claim a subsidy on the field too - but we don't mind as it's a mutually beneficial agreement.
 
Think that new regulations came out a while ago, something along the lines that muck shouldnt be able to drain away and contminate the land/water courses. Muck heaps should be on "sealed" bases.....may well have got this completey wrong......
but if this is the case how can muck still be spread as fertilizer, this country has gone mad
 
It's no joke a farmer friend of mine in an environmentally sensitive area has to calculate how much muck his cows create in a year!! It is all coming our way along with the horse tax!
 
You are thinking along the right lines there....

Star's stable drains to a corner - and then no more....I have to put a shovel of shavings there to soak because the Farmer who is YO has to comply with regulations about 'Toxic waste'. Stable drainage is classed as Toxic Waste apparently!
 
You don't say what The Environment Agency are targeting about muck heaps. However muck and slurry have the potential to pollute water courses and groundwater. Groundwater once damaged by pollution may never recover and is an important resource that needs protecting. Water bills are increasing so that polluted water can be made fit for human consumption.

Farms in Nitrate Vulnerable Zones have to comply with certain rules. This is because farming is one of the biggest contributers to diffuse pollution and the increase of nitrates in water.

Manure and slurry should only be applied to land in certain conditions for example it should not be applied when it is flooded or frozen as it just runs straight off. Individually each muck heap might not cause a significant problem but many all leaching high nutrient liquids into water courses do have an overall impact and reduce water quality along with many other minor sources. Nutrients discharged to water cause bacteria and algae to grow - this in turn strips the oxygen from water - and this kills fauna such as fish and invertebrates because they cannot breathe. Also ammonia is a constituent of manure and slurry and that is also a damaging pollutant. Also incidentally hay washings are very high in nutrients and should never be disposed of where they can leak in to a water course.

It is perfectly OK to use horse manure as a fertiliser provided it doesn't cause pollution - does anyone think there is anything wrong with that? Also you should always use well rotted manure because the breakdown of carbon actually strips nitrogen from the soil although it is released back later.
 
I do understand about contaminating water courses.

When we built stables next to our house in Scotland SEPA insisted we put an interceptor and soak away to take water from the roof of three loose boxes.

When the burn across the road started to stink they immediatly focused on my stables - the source was actually a neighbour who admitted the overflow from his septic tank went directly into the road drain, 50 yards to the burn which ran into an SSSI. In spite of many complaints SEPA always insisted they could not investigate sewage contamination - just horses!!! It was someone else's job.

When a friend who was a Senior Officer in the EA built stables for her horses she registered as an agricultural holding (and put them in a barn) and was NEVER asked to put in special drainage.

I just don't like injustice and humbug.
 
I totally agree I also do not like injustice or humbug or one rule for one and one for another.

I don't understand about why you would need permission for roof drainage - that just clean rainwater and no permission is required to discharge clean rainwater but may be required to stop localised flooding.

Stabling horses in a barn - well generally there is no discharge as its contained within the building and soaked up by bedding so I do not see why she would need any permission for that?
confused.gif


Being an agricultural building is to do with planning status - and makes no difference to what you can discharge. Also it does depend where you are. If you are not near a water course and there is no vulnerable groundwater ie you are on a clay then there may be no need to do anything.

Don't understand why SEPA cannot investigate sewage contamination - the EA do.
 
Her barn was no different to my 3 loose boxes. Bedding absorbs poo and urine and has to be put onto a muck heap every day.

My drainage system cost £2k in 1997. No we didn't understand the reasoning either - but horse owners imo are easy targets.

If you own horses you must be wealthy so any amount of expensive planning restrictions can be added. If you are a farmer you must be poor!!!

In France I am a farmer and no differentiation is made.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top