land going to waste

grazeaway

went for a drive yesterday, was going to go the match in limerick but decided we would go for a spin instead. Noticed there is a hell of a lot of land that is just gone to waste especially around towns and village. I suppose many of it was bought for development in the tiger days but has been left to go wild.

Came back into youghal from the Waterford side and was looking in at the area out side the town. This land was reclaimed from the bay generations ago and has the dykes and drains in place. good flat land, all laid out in fields but covered in scrub and weds now with a handful of horses in it. I was thinking of the lads that slaved to reclaim that place, no track machines or dump trailers and probably with local landlords hench men roaring at them. they probably thought they made land fit for generations but our lot have left it to waste.

with the shortage of fodder this year i was thinking would it not be worth someone's time to approach the owners (probably nama) and make an offer to rent the place. There must be hundreds of places like that around the country, and a lot of them just need clearing as there is not building material in them. All that seems to be happening to them no is they get full of burned out cars, rubbish, rubble and horses.

Dampintheattic

grazeaway wrote: »

went for a drive yesterday, was going to go the match in limerick but decided we would go for a spin instead. Noticed there is a hell of a lot of land that is just gone to waste especially around towns and village. I suppose many of it was bought for development in the tiger days but has been left to go wild.

Came back into youghal from the Waterford side and was looking in at the area out side the town. This land was reclaimed from the bay generations ago and has the dykes and drains in place. good flat land, all laid out in fields but covered in scrub and weds now with a handful of horses in it. I was thinking of the lads that slaved to reclaim that place, no track machines or dump trailers and probably with local landlords hench men roaring at them. they probably thought they made land fit for generations but our lot have left it to waste.

with the shortage of fodder this year i was thinking would it not be worth someone's time to approach the owners (probably nama) and make an offer to rent the place. There must be hundreds of places like that around the country, and a lot of them just need clearing as there is not building material in them. All that seems to be happening to them no is they get full of burned out cars, rubbish, rubble and horses.

Look inside our own farms first. You would be surprised, how much land can be eaten up, in awkward corners, and other places where it's not that easy travel with tractor. These places tend to get little attention, and over time bushes, scrub, docks, etc become dominant.
I have been guilty in any case, in this respect. Been making a good effort over the past three years, to getting these places cleaned up and back into mainstream grass production.

lakill Farm

agree with both posts so far.

when i moved here i got a flail in to every field and got 6-10ft back around each field as it had only been cut in silage and not grazed for previous few years. every little helps.

Took 2 hours x €40ph and got back at least that value for last 3 seasons.

There are so many wide ditches in this country, and the lads will tell you its shelter for animals. Its not shelter when its like that lads

grazeaway

i know we can all find a few bits around the home place, i'm more thinking of whole farms and fields that have been left idle.

i worked with a guy whose ajioning farm was just going idle. The old lad that owned it died and the will was being contested/fought over. After about 3 years he approached the solictor about the place and was told that it could'nt be sold so was just left. he approached the family and offered to rent it from them until it was sorted, they couldnt agree on teh how the rent should be split so took none. That was over 10 years ago and he is still famring the place. He has drawn the SPF on it but has put that money into a seprate account. He has told the solicator that when the farm is sold the money is to split what every way the sale of teh land goes.

bob charles

you wouldnt have to go within a mile of most places to find land in little or no use. I would think 60 - 70% of local land is producing little or nothing. Most of this land is claiming REPS and SFP so I suppose the required outcome of both these two schemes have being very successful

kevthegaff

i tried renting land that was idle off a family, nearly had it through till they all started fighting. left it too much hassle, and getting abuse on the phone never again. ya u should always maximise your own plot first

sheesh

it seems like a good idea.... hmmmm
apart from the horror stories

reilig

kevthegaff wrote: »

ya u should always maximise your own plot first

A neighbour died beside us earlier this year and he and his brother farmed together. They had a plot of 9 acres which is surrounded by my land and we share a right of way to it. The living brother went to a local auctioneer and it was advertised for rent for this year with no maps. Now the land is very poor quality. 4 acres of it have never been travelled upon with a tractor and the whole lot of it grows a sprat rush that has no feeding value. I was looking for a bit of extra land at the time, but I set a budget of €600 for it. When I rang the auctioneer, I was told that there was €800 on it. I weighed it up and decided to buy 2 extra ton of fertilizer so that my own land would benefit best from it.

Anyway, another neighbour came knocking last week. He had a cow in a drain and he had got stuck with his tractor trying to get to her. It was him who rented the land. €1700.

I nearly fell. It makes no sense. The same guy has 150 acres of land and spreads no fertilizer at all. Imagine what €1700 of fertilizer would do for him instead of paying for a wet 9 acres covered with sprat!

delaval

Around here when motor way was done the amount of land wasted was increadable. They bought and fenced extra so mchines could work comfortably and because it was the cheapest part of the project.
I suggested at the time that they take what they need and return what was surplus. Was told that without the fence some farmers would be watching them and waiting to claim for intrusion. I know this was a story they told but was true of some people, one guy went as far as getting himself and his family to lie on the road to stop trucks taking his road.

1chippy

There is always going to be waste. empty houses, empty factory units and even just people not mowing their lawns. some people may have just lost incentive or finances to sort it out and may be too proud. we can enquire about the likes of these but at the end of the day dont own them and dont really have the right to tell the op what they should or shouldnt do with their own property. its never just as simple as letting a farmer in for a short time, while say a developer waits to push on with a project. they may be looking at a site worth 2million for a couple of acres. 200 rent a year isnt going to exactly make or break them.
As for the land adjoining reiligs. i say fair to your man for getting 1700 for the ground. you cant really say its wasted ground, its just been taken by some ejit who cant use a calculator willing to throw away cash.

reilig

1chippy wrote: »

As for the land adjoining reiligs. i say fair to your man for getting 1700 for the ground. you cant really say its wasted ground, its just been taken by some ejit who cant use a calculator willing to throw away cash.

So do I. My point was that the guy who leased it spent a lot of money on it which would have given him a far greater return if he had spent the money on the land that he owns.