To just ask you all to either wear some proper wellies and walk on the footpath, or stick to the sodding pavements

[flamingflamingos]

This is my field. It's winter wheat - it's been ploughed and pressed and drilled and rolled and just as it's starting to grow into what will be harvested for flour to produce bread, the general public have trampled it into the ground.

I understand the need to get outside, absolutely I support this country's network of footpaths - we have 6km of footpaths on this farm which are maintained so that everyone can enjoy the countryside.

But this is taking the piss. If you don't want to walk in the mud, don't walk in the countryside in January. Please, stop this. We are all accountable for how we behave.

So the path is a bit wider? I don't really think this is a big deal.

@flamingflamingose supposed to leave an obvious path clear and not obstruct it if there is a public footpath. Most do around here*

How wide does an 'obvious path' have to be? Wide enough to walk along or drive a lorry along?

The clue is in the name. It is a footpath, not a lorry path.

I think that the issue that the OP is drawing attention to is that when it is wet paths get muddy and rather than use the path that the OP had carefully made at the edge of her crop, walkers have trodden all over her crop in order not to get their feet dirty - hence her suggestion that they invest in wellies or other suitable footwear.

I know. I was responding to (and quoted) the poster who was trying to say that it's fine for a landowner to plant over a footpath that runs across a field and obstruct it. It isn't.

It seems exceptionally bad this year, extra footfall and extra rainfall are a bad combination. Signage has no impact here, a turf field has had please keep off signs up all year, yet still has dog walkers, people playing football, people camping and having picnics; signs pulled out......
I live in a local beauty spot, that is on a well known footpath. The council did a survey too ask what they could do to improve the area. The replies including installing public toilets and a cafe, and tarmacing the path. People need to realise that the land is somebody's livelihood and our food supply.

So the path is a bit wider? I don't really think this is a big deal
Its trampling crops which is OPs income.

@Plussizejumpsuit

So the path is a bit wider? I don't really think this is a big deal.

Imagine a front garden. You plant it with lovely bedding plants. The pavement becomes unpleasant to walk on for some reason so pedestrians decide to walk across your garden instead, trampling your plants. Still don't see a problem...?

Yanbu!!
I had this conversation with DH because he had no idea why I was so mad at his suggestion we walk through the field instead of on the muddy path.

I think it is good lots more people are accessing the countryside but people do need to respect that it is someone's livelihood they are walking through!

I said this earlier. But worth repeating. Signs saying keep off or private are not much good. You need to say where the route goes, not where it doesn't

It comes across as helpful, not "get of my land" and it gives people an easy option ...and people do tend to do the easy option so they are more likely to follow the correct line than if they have to stop and think, when they may not bother to work out where the correct line must be

I can't believe the comments here about how are people supposed to know there is acrop. It's a field. All fields have crops. Even grass pasture is a crop, a crop to feed the animals in the field.

As a regular walker I have every sympathy for you OP. However, for every farmer who follows the rules (spraying the ROW within 2 weeks of planting) there are dozens of farmers who do not. They also put up electric fences with no insulation or clips and do not maintain stiles. Believe me, I've walked many miles of fields during lockdown and washed off A LOT of mud - so I'm not bothered about getting plastered in the stuff - including cow shit - but often farmers are victims of their own rule breaking. We have OS maps and GPS so know exactly where paths run (or don't in many cases).

@QualityRoads

I'm sorry this is happening to you, op, and feel your pain. Since last year's first lockdown, many people have taking to walking in the countryside for the first time and clearly haven't got a clue how to behave. We're in a sheep farming area and have had gates left open, sheep getting out, and dogs off leads. I'd look at fencing in the footpath round the edge of the field using electric fencing and putting up very clear signs. These people aren't thinking at all about how their "walks" are affecting farmers' livelihoods.

This is the issue. Before this latest 'proper' lockdown,the fields next to my house had the usual dogwalkers. One or two are thoughtless but not many. Now it's full of people. I've seen so many people who would clearly be getting their entertainment elsewhere if they could plodging straight through the middle of crop fields, dog off lead with no control.

I love dogs but don't love idiot owners.

@SoupDragon

sorry you do realise the farmer is more bothered about their income from the crop rather than ease of access for walkers? You don't have to walk there, they have to plant their crop!

I thought they were supposed to leave an obvious path clear and not obstruct it if there is a public footpath. Most do around here.

Yes, the OP has done, but it's muddy, so people are trampling all over his crops instead!

Farmers are required to maintain a 1m wide footpath if it goes through their crops, and they're not allowed to obscure it with crops. That poster shouldn't have to turn back from a public right of way.

Obstructing a public right of way is a criminal offence.

Thanks @FellowFlipFlop I didn't know the exact width of 1m which would be perfectly adequate, we walk single file in this scenario anyway. The field we encountered had no gap at all. A clearly sign posted path at either end of the field but then a seemingly solid mass of thight high potato plants.

My point really was that it is surely to the farmers benefit to ensure the path is not obscure because realistically they are more likely to get people straying and causing damage in that situation.

None of this, however, applies to the OP who clearly does maintain the paths on her land and there is no defence for what people have done to her field. That is shocking

I'm actually laughing at the pp's getting all protective over their special knowledge of the countryside. The countryside is shit you're welcome to it.

I am massively anti private land ownership. This isn't the same as thinking we shouldn't grow food. Most farmers despite what they claim are just rich land owners. So stop pretending its about food loss wjen it's clear from pp's about our countryside you just don't want peasants on your land. Ffs

And, if anyone cares, another common problem is wher tractors have made a clear line that is not the line of the path . The majority will follow the clear line and then end up off the path and needing to find themselves a way forward ( because people tend not to go back when they make a mistake )

Been walking years, seen it all unfortunately

@flamingflamingos What't that growing in the field to the right of the big patch of mud? It looks like a thin line of taller plants which people are taking to be the edge of the footpath.

These are probably the same arrogant, entitled, selfish morons who treat supermarket shopping as a family outing. I think all of us who live in rural areas are encountering large numbers of people haven't got the foggiest idea of how to behave. Let's hope it goes back to how it used to be, after this year, and theme parks and retail parks reopen.

That's what I also saw dotball, although they may be random weeds not hedging, hard to see from the photo, and many places have 6m wide set aside land at the edges of fields

@Christinaismyperson this land does 3.5tonnes per acre and all told I'll lose about an acre in this field from trespass. Winter wheat spot price is £200/tonne so that's £700 list on this field. Because people either don't want to get muddy feet or can't stick to the footpath.

Yes, the OP has done, but it's muddy, so people are trampling all over his crops instead!

I know! 🤦🏻‍♀️ I was responding to, and quoted, another poster!

It was a response to a different issue.

@MichelleScarn

Absolute arseholes OP. Am sorry to see your field. Everyone is walking through the fields where livestock is. People don't give a fuck. I was sadly highly amused by post I saw on social media where farmer said they'd had a complaint by walkers (who were going through the farmers land!) that the sheep dog wasn't on a leash and the walkers on the farmers land could legally tell the farmer to leash the dog...

And farmers can legally shoot walkers' dogs if they are worrying animals! The number of walkers out with dogs not under control...........

YANBU. People should either wear wellies and stick to the paths or, if they can't do that, stay out of the bloody countryside.

I am massively anti private land ownership

Yeah, so am I when that land concerned is built with shopping malls. Someone should bulldoze the fuckers and those who profit from them.

If it's a public right of way why isn't it fenced off from the crops?

You’ve never been walking have you?
The only time I have seen that happening is when the footpath is going close to a house/farm and people have been wondering in the garden leaving no privacy at all to the owners.

As for the poster who went about ‘maintaining the path’, as far as I am aware, owners have to keep the path accessible. So no overgrowth, a clear path if it’s in the middle of the field. No one has ever said it should paved or dry so people can walk easily in it. It’s a field. The countryside. Some areas are wet and muddy. That’s what happens in the winter fgs.

In Scotland farmers are expected to leave a reasonable gap at the side of the fields to enable access. Even where there isn’t a recognised footpath.

Problem solved.

Bloody farmers and “get off my land”