Mooring at end of farmers field

[MrCJ]

OK been having this debate about mooring on a BW canal at the end of a farmers field.

 

1. If a farmer says its ok for you to moor at the end of his field for free is this ok.

 

2. Do you just have to pay your BW licence or do you have to pay a fee to BW to the right to moor at that spot?

 

3. Am I right in saying just cos you got a canal at the bottom of your garden or field it does not give you the right to moor a boat there?

[ymu]

1. No. He has to get agreement from BW, and (AFAIK) he has to pay them half of the mooring fee, set at an appropriate market rate for the area and facilities.

 

2. Unless you are in a private basin, you will need a licence to keep a boat on the canals.

 

3. Yes, you do not own the canal, just the edge of it.

[kienik]

I moor at the end of a farmers field (along with just short of 200 other boats), we all have to pay the farmer for the use oh his track and toilet disposal,water,rubbish disposal etc etc, we also then have to pay BW an end of garden fee (which for me is around £400 for 23ft NB). in addition to that we have to pay the usual cruising licence fee to BW (again this is around £400 ish), so i reckon i pay around £1000 per annum to have the boat fully licensed and mooring fees.

 

To me that is a great del as if i went into a marina id probably be looking at £1000 for the marina owner then another £600 ish to BW, then when im in the marina i cant paint my boat (on my landing stage) nor can i do any form of major work on the boat, as for inviting boat engineers into the marina to carry out engine repairs then thats out of the question (as far as im aware please correct me if im wrong). whereas at the farm we can do basically anything we want to our boats (as long as we give the farmer the nod first).

 

In short, would i go into a marina....................................not on your bloody nelly

 

 

Nik

[casper ghost]

The odd thing is that if mooring against a farmer's field BW will want you to pay them to 'reserve' the water space below your boat, but, if you push your boat across the canal and moor on the towpath, on BW owned land you then don't have to py BW and you can probably get away with leaving it there for ages or just chug up and down a little..

Casp'

[Speedwheel]

3. Yes, you do not own the canal, just the edge of it.

 

And sometimes not even the edge either.

[ymu]

The odd thing is that if mooring against a farmer's field BW will want you to pay them to 'reserve' the water space below your boat, but, if you push your boat across the canal and moor on the towpath, on BW owned land you then don't have to py BW and you can probably get away with leaving it there for ages or just chug up and down a little..

Casp'

Well, no. If you moor on the towpath, you either get 2 weeks max or you pay BW full mooring fees to stay put. If someone owning land adjacent to the canal wants to rent out the land for mooring, then BW also need to agree to rent out the water.

[MrCJ]

so how do BW police this would they remove a boat that is moored at the end of a field if they not given permission

Edited August 17, 2010 by MrCJ

[ymu]

so how do BW police this would they remove a boat that is moored at the end of a field if they not given permission

They give them notice to move on. There were some moorings we came across on the private side which were being used for residential purposes and some local nimby's insisted that the boats be moved on. Three really nice mooring spots with parking space and a fuel pile but the liveaboard boats were being moved on. There were some new boats moored there last time we looked - presumably being parked up rather than used. Such a waste.