The Lincolnshire Bird Club

After our last Donna Nook visit, I e-mailed the Environment Agency to ask why it was now being farmed to the edge and why it was so regularly shot. The reply is below.


Karen

Thank you for your email about the management of our land at Donna Nook.

We were hoping to progress a habitat creation scheme on our land this year, establishing new areas of saltmarsh and mudflat. We need to undertake schemes such as this to compensate for the loss of internationally important inter tidal habitat in the Humber Estuary which is happening due to the effects of rising sea levels and the continued presence of flood defences we manage – a process we refer to as coastal squeeze. Our proposals are supported by Lincolnshire Wildlife Trust, Natural England and RSPB.

We had hoped to undertake the main construction works this summer, so we did not renew the short-term tenancy agreement which we had in place with a local farmer. Therefore, no crop was sown this spring and the site remained fallow, as you saw from your previous visit.

Planning permission is required before we can carry out the works, and our application was refused by East Lindsey District Council in June of this year. We are currently deciding whether to appeal this decision. If we do decide to appeal, and our appeal is successful, we would not be able to start work on the site until late summer 2011 at the earliest. Following local concerns about how the site would be managed in the meantime, we have taken the decision to re-let the land, on a short term basis, to allow the site to be cropped. The farmer has now ploughed the land and sowed a crop ready to be harvested next year.

When we acquired land we purchased both the shooting and farming rights. Our position on shooting is that it is still a legal sport and we treat each application on its merits. Shooting has taken place on this land for many years and continues to happen on neighbouring land and Natural England allow shooting on the outer marsh with set parameters.

If we are able to develop the site as compensatory habitat in the future, we will review our position on shooting rights at that time, but currently have no plans to prevent shooting on the land.

I understand that my Coastal Manager Mike Dugher has contacted you to discuss this matter. Should you wish to discuss this further with Mike, you can contact him on 01522 785849, or via email mike.dugher@environment-agency.gov.uk

Yours Sincerely


Andy Baxendale
Area Manager (Northern)

I understand the time limit for The Environment Agency to appeal is 6 months from the date of the planning refusal, i.e. late December so we should soon have more idea of how they intend to proceed.

You have to wonder how the public spending cuts just announced last week will impact on the scheme.

The Environment Agency have appealed against ELDCs refusal of their planning application so the story continues.........

Not sure yet when the appeal will be heard.