The fourth ‘Valuing Your Soils’ awareness raising workshop for farmers is taking place at Leitfie farms (near Blairgowrie) on 16th March. There will be machinery demos and open soil pits. For more details on the event please see the SRUC project page.
More information on this post is available from the University of Leeds website.
The third ‘Valuing Your Soils’ awareness raising workshop for farmers is taking place at West Mains of Kinblethmont (near Arbroath) on 23rd Feb. There will be a drone flight and other SoilEssentials Ltd technology demonstrations. For more details on the event please see the SRUC project page.
This report provides a broad assessment of the state of soil structure and drainage on commercial farms in four selected catchments during autumn/winter 2015/2016. We describe the policy implications of the findings. Similar UK studies are used to discuss our results. This project was commissioned by SEPA and addresses its Land Protection objective “make links between soil management and water protection measures to ensure maximum benefit for both soil/land and water quality” (SEPA, 2015).
SEPA are proposing to adopt monitoring to show effectiveness of rural diffuse pollution measures in reducing FIO from a livestock catchment. This will draw from the recommendations in the CREW report “Monitoring guidance to assess the effectiveness of the Rural Diffuse Pollution Plan”.
This workshop is supported by CREW at the request of SEPA. The programme includes talks from Neil MacLeod from Southesk Farms and experts from SRUC and SEPA on improving farm efficiency, the challenges associated with cultivating heavier ground and practical guidance, a farm tour with open soil pits and practical demonstrations of soil visual evaluation.
More information on this post is available here.
Soil cultivation, manure / fertiliser applications and chemical spraying can all contribute to diffuse pollution from agricultural land. Rainfall runoff from farm roads, tracks, yards and dusty roofs are also potential sources of diffuse pollution. Whilst many changes in farming practice have dealt with these sources of pollution there still remains instances where small amounts escape from a farmyard into a nearby ditch or where sediment laden overland field flows make their way into a ditch or burn, river or natural wetland and finally the sea.
This report provides a review and analysis of information on the passage by fish at wooden obstacles (woody placements), used for flood management, in Scotland.
The Scotland Rural Development Programme (SRDP) supports Scottish objectives that match the priorities of the European Union Rural Development Programme. A key requirement in the 2014 - 20 SRDP is to address the EU 2014-2020 Rural Development Programme priorities for (i) restoring and preserving biodiversity, (ii) improving water and soil management, and (iii) reducing green-house gas emissions, through agri-environment payments. In this context, CREW have been asked to develop recommendations for the spatial targeting of agri-environment options in the 2014-20 SRDP.