Blog: How the CFE can help you work with water

In his latest blog, he writes about his experience and why they’re running these events:

We all know that water is a vital consideration for a farm business. Whether it’s ensuring there’s enough to grow crops or grass, or making sure it doesn’t flood land or wash away soil in times of heavy rain.

To help equip farmers with the tools to improve the quality of water in the country’s rivers, the Campaign for the Farmed Environment partners were keen to run a series of events across the country this autumn focussing on ‘Water on your Farm’.

CFE knows that farmers take environmental concerns seriously and often a small change to the business can have a significant impact on the local environment. This is where CFE comes in to promote best practice management of soil, nutrients and pesticides, as well as looking at other practices such as cover crops. 

It works closely with the government’s Catchment Sensitive Farming programme and local water companies and this was the case for the CFE event I attended at Thames Water’s Farmoor Water Treatment Works near Oxford last week. Farmers who attended the event were given an introduction to CFE and CSF, followed by a tour of the works to look at how the water abstracted from the River Thames is monitored and treated.

Some of the issues dealt with by Thames Water at Farmoor can be attributed to farming upstream, including levels of metaldehyde (the chemical commonly used in slug pellets) and cryptosporidium (a parasite).

The company is working closely with farmers to look at solutions, including running pilot schemes encouraging farmers to substitute pellets containing metaldehyde with those containing ferric phosphate instead. This chemical still kills slugs but has a lesser environmental impact.

There are many simple CFE measures can also have a big impact on water quality on your farm, particularly buffer strips. You can find more guidance at www.cfeonline.org.uk