Brockholes helping with water quality

Practical ways to prevent water pollution from grazing livestock are being demonstrated to farmers at Grantshouse.
A solar panel and abstraction point at Brockholes Farm, Grantshouse.A solar panel and abstraction point at Brockholes Farm, Grantshouse.
A solar panel and abstraction point at Brockholes Farm, Grantshouse.

A free, on-farm meeting at Brockholes Farm near Grantshouse on Thursday, November 17, will give farmers in the catchment of the Lower Tweed an opportunity to see practical ways help improve water quality.

In 2016 the Lower Tweed was one of 42 river catchments across Scotland to become a “diffuse pollution priority catchment” with the purpose of improving the quality of Scotland’s burns, rivers and lochs.

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Through visits and on-farm meetings the Land Unit of the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) has been contacting 600 farmers around the Lower Tweed to discuss how farming activity, like ploughing or allowing livestock to drink from ditches and burns, can allow soil or other pollutants to leak into water courses.

The meeting at Brockholes is part of the Scottish Government’s new Farm Advisory Service (FAS) programme which is delivered by specialists from the local St Boswells office of SAC Consulting, part of Scotland’s Rural College.

Sue Arnott of SEPA’s Land Unit said: “We are seeing tangible improvements in water quality at Eyemouth Beach through changes farmers in the Eye Water and Pease Bay priority catchments have already made to the way they do things.

”We are confident that land managers in the Lower Tweed catchment will respond in the same positive manner. Just recently we spoke to a farmers meeting, organised under FAS, to raise awareness of the impacts that drainage run off from steadings, soil erosion and livestock management can have on water quality.”

The demonstration is from 10am to 3pm, contact 01835 823322 for more details.